Product Description

What would it take to make you happy? A fulfilling career, a big bank account, or the perfect mate? What if it didn't take anything to make you happy? What if you could experience happiness from the inside out -- no matter what's going on in your life?

In Happy for No Reason: 7 Steps to Being Happy from the Inside Out, transformational expert Marci Shimoff offers a breakthrough approach to being happy, one that doesn't depend on achievements, goals, money, relationships, or anything else "out there." Most books on happiness tell you to find the things that make you happy and do more of them. Although there's nothing wrong with that, it won't bring you the kind of deep and lasting happiness most people long for -- the kind you'll never lose, no matter what happens in your life. Based on cutting-edge research and knowledge from the world's leading experts in the fields of positive psychology and neurophysiology, plus interviews with 100 truly happy people, this life-changing book provides a powerful, proven 7-step program that will enable you to be happier right now -- no matter where you start.

Studies show that each of us has a "happiness setpoint" -- a fixed range of happiness we tend to return to throughout our life -- that's approximately 50 percent genetic and 50 percent learned. In the same way you'd crank up the thermostat to get comfortable on a chilly day, you can actually raise your happiness set-point! The holistic 7-step program at the heart of Happy for No Reason encompasses Happiness Habits for all areas of life: personal power, mind, heart, body, soul, purpose, and relationships.

In these pages you'll discover moving and remarkable first-person stories of people who have applied these steps to their own lives and have become Happy for No Reason. You'll read phenomenal tales from a former drug dealer turned minister, a hit filmmaker, and a famous actress who escaped a "family curse," as well as stories from doctors, mothers, teachers, and business executives. You'll learn practical strategies that will help you experience happiness from the inside out.

You don't have to have happy genes, win the lottery, or lose twenty pounds. By the time you finish this book, you will know how to experience sustained happiness for the rest of your life.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #17223 in Books
• Published on: 2008-01-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 336 pages

From Publishers Weekly
According to the World Health Organization, the year 2020 will see depression become second only to heart disease in terms of the global burden of illness, a sad state of affairs that motivational speaker Shimoff (co-author, Chicken Soup for the Woman’s Soul) believes can be changed by learning to cultivate "a happiness that’s beyond reasons and that’s here to stay." Inner happiness, she says, is within reach for anyone who can turn down the volume on their hectic lives and learn the 21 Happiness Habits that Shimoff has cultivated from 100 interviews with "deeply happy" people (including actress Goldie Hawn and author Elizabeth Gilbert). Emphasizing a holistic approach, Shimoff takes into account mind, heart, body and soul in seven chapters that cover three Happiness Habits each, as well as corresponding anecdotes that "define what it means to be Happy for No Reason." The personal stories of happy interviewees prove enlightening, and the princples they support are sound and commonsensical ("Focus on the solution," "Make peace with yourself," "Question your thoughts," "Practice forgiveness"), if not exactly groundbreaking. Exercises and quizzes give readers practical steps toward their goal, such as breathing exercises (Spring Forest Qigong) and writing assignments ("Write a letter to your Higher Power").
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Review
"With Happy for No Reason, Marci Shimoff has hit a home run. This book presents a definitive, broad-based approach to becoming truly happy that combines great spiritual depth, top-notch research, and psychological practicality. I'm certain that if you follow the practices in her dazzling new book, you too will manifest a lifetime of happiness." -- from the Foreword by Jack Canfield, author of The Success Principles and cocreator of the bestselling Chicken Soup for the Soul series

"You can't depend on external circumstances for lasting happiness. It has to come from inside you. Based on scientific research and the experiences of truly happy people, Happy for No Reason shows you step-by-step how to raise your happiness set-point." -- Mehmet C. Oz, MD, coauthor of You: On a Diet and You: Staying Young

"Marci Shimoff is one of the most compelling people I've ever known. I'm happy she's shared her wisdom with all of us in Happy for No Reason." -- Marianne Williamson, #1 New York Times bestselling author of A Return to Love

"Happy for No Reason offers seven clear, powerful, and effective steps you can practice to be happier right now!" -- John Gray, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus

"This book is a wonderful collection of techniques and examples, shared by people who have had one of the most important realizations I think we can have -- that we already have within us the ability to live in a state of Happy for No Reason." -- Lindsay Wagner, Emmy Award-winning actress, The Bionic Woman

About the Author
Marci Shimoff is a celebrated transformational leader and a #1 New York Times bestselling author. The woman's face of the biggest self-help book phenomenon in history, she is the coauthor of six of the top-selling titles in the Chicken Soup for the Soul series. She is also a featured teacher in the international movie and book sensation The Secret. President and cofounder of The Esteem Group, Marci delivers keynote addresses and seminars to corporations, women's associations, universities, and professional and nonprofit organizations. Over the past 25 years, Marci has inspired millions of people around the world, sharing her breakthrough methods for personal fulfillment and professional success.

Carol Kline is a #1 New York Times bestselling author and the coauthor of five books in the Chicken Soup for the Soul series.

Customer Reviews

Happy for No Reason
Written by the author of the best-selling "Chicken Soup for the Woman's Soul", this is one of the most popular happiness books around. While the author isn't a bona fide positive psychology researcher, that's not necessarily a bad thing when it comes to happiness books. Some people think that the best happiness books are written by the positive psychology researchers themselves- because they know the info the best. On the other hand though, there are excellent happiness books around written by non-happiness researchers, such as "Finding Happiness in a Frustrating World" -penned by a physical therapist who began studying happiness after wondering how some of his patients in the hospital could be so happy- despite being so sick or faced with a grave prognosis. I guess its nice sometimes to get a non-happiness researcher's point of view to avoid the inherent biases they have when they discuss and write about their own research. Anyway, you be the judge- on to the book.

The idea presented is to get the reader to become "Happy for No Reason"- which the book defines as true happiness that isn't dependent on external circumstances. You can then take a questionnaire to see how close you are to being "Happy for No Reason."

So if you're not quite there yet, how does the book intend to get you there? By several ways:

-you'll learn three guiding principles that will help you get past the common blocks to happiness

-you'll learn how to apply the "Law of Attraction" to being happier (the author was featured in the mega-bestseller "The Secret" which focuses on this law)

-you'll learn about a seven-step program to become "Happy for No Reason". Each step has three "Happiness Habits" with corresponding exercises.

-the author interviewed 100 happy people and shares 21 of their stories that define what it means to be "Happy for No Reason"- stories reminiscent of the "Chicken Soup" series.

In conclusion, there's plenty of value in this book. Happiness books written for the popular read seem to fall into one of two general categories. They're either mainly based on scientific evidence and give you research-tested techniques OR they primarily give you advice and things to think about to help you "reframe" your thinking. "Happy for No Reason" seems to fit in the latter category- and for that I have no trouble recommending it.

Many reasons to read this book
When I first saw the title, "Happy for No Reason," I'll have to admit that my initial reaction was that this would be just one more new age, touch-feely, full-of-fluff feel-good book. So I was very pleasantly surprised to see how thoroughly-researched, well-written, and down-to-earth practical this book is. "Happy for No Reason" is a groundbreaking philosophy that belongs in the same category as the work of David Burns (cognitive mood therapy), Martin Seligman (learned optimism), Daniel Goleman (emotional intelligence) and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (flow). It is a brilliant blend of scientific research summarized in language that anyone can understand plus stories from people Marci calls the Happy 100, people who are role models of happiness for the sake of happiness, not because of love or money or other exogenous factors.

I was so impressed with this book that I gave copies to each of my children as Christmas gifts this year. I'm hoping they will read it with a pen or highlighter in hand, which is what I found myself doing - and would recommend to you as well. It's easy to be unhappy, which might be why so many people are. Watch TV for an hour and you'll have a hundred reasons to not be happy; it's nice to know that you can choose to be happy for no reason at all.

I was surprised by the book...
I thought it would be namby-pamby or filled with fluff until I read this paragraph in the introduction:

"My first major discovery was that scientists have found that we each have a `happiness set-point,' the genetic and learned tendency to remain at a certain level of happiness, similar to a thermostat setting on a furnace. Fortunately for those of us not born on the sunny side of the street, it's been shown that we can change our happiness set-points. I'll discuss this more in the next chapter and offer you specific exercises throughout the book to raise your happiness set-point."

As I read the book I was surprised at most every turn. I was delighted that she included Mark McKergow's Solution Focus Technique--a longtime favorite of mine that keeps you focused on what's working in your life instead of on what's not working.

...And that she actually tells how to do one of Chunyi Lin's Spring Forest Qigong techniques that energizes the body and literally brings you feelings of happiness and joy.

Part of her process in studying happiness was to interview 100 truly happy people. Another surprise was finding a link where I could actually listen to highlights of the interviews online.

So...I'd get the book.