How to Be Happy - LessWrong

And thus, the Harvard Study of Adult Development was born. The original cohort of 268 men included people from many walks of life, including some who went on to become well-known, such as John F. Kennedy and Washington Post editor Ben Bradlee. Still, over the decades it was deemed too demographically insular—all Harvard men!—to give generalizable r

We use our understanding of cause and effect to try to improve our lives. We do certain things (causes) in order to feel a certain way (desired effects). Instead, however, perhaps we might be better served if we decided to feel the way we hoped to feel, and then did what we really wanted to do. For example, instead of needing money or a relationshi

What you must do instead is realize that what you have been doing is not the problem, it’s the why. You thought that doing important or impressive work will make you happy. This was precisely wrong. It’s that being happy will help us do important and impressive work, quite possibly better and more pure work.