To celebrate the 12 Days of Christmas from now through Epiphany and to advocate for the idea of reading books to support New Year projects, resolutions, and goals, I’m writing a series of posts with themed book lists for various popular resolutions. So far…

Day 1: Be More Fit

For Day 2, let’s look at books on happiness. Recently, psychologists, who used to study only the afflicted, have turned attention to studying healthy and well-adjusted people to see what we can learn to improve all of our lives. This field is often called Positive Psychology. That work has been translated for the general public by a variety of authors so we now have books with evidence-based advice on how to be happier.

I read a few books on this topic a few years ago, before I started my blog, so I don’t have reviews. I found these helpful:

• What Happy People Know: How the New Science of Happiness Can Change Your Life for the Better by Dan Baker and Cameron Stauth
• What Happy Women Know: How New Findings in Positive Psychology Can Change Women’s Lives for the Better by Dan Baker and Ina Yalof
• Stumbling on Happiness by Daniel Gilbert
• A Short Guide to a Happy Life by Anna Quindlen

Some other possibilities I’m considering are these:

• Authentic Happiness: Using the New Positive Psychology to Realize Your Potential for Lasting Fulfillment by Martin E.P. Seligman
• The Art of Happiness by Dalai Lama XIV
• The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom by Jonathan Haidt

Have you read any of these books? Which did you like? Do you have other books on the topic to recommend?

The Read Along book for the New Year’s Resolution Reading Challenge fits this topic. Join us to read The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin with questions, discussions, and ideas for enriching our lives from this book. If you register for the Read Along, you’ll also be entered in a drawing to win another book that can have a profound effect on happiness: The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg.

If you’re reading books about happiness for the new year (or for other goals, projects, and resolutions), join us at The New Year’s Resolution Reading Challenge!