If you can't take the time for a vacation right now, or even a night out with friends, put something on the calendar - even if it's a month or a year down the road. Then whenever you need a boost of happiness, remind yourself about it.

One study found that people who just thought about watching their favorite movie actually raised their endorphin levels by 27 percent.

Our comforting conviction that the world makes sense rests on a secure foundation: our almost unlimited ability to ignore our ignorance.

After a crisis we tell ourselves we understand why it happened and maintain the illusion that the world is understandable. In fact, we should accept the world is incomprehensible much of the time.

I have always emphasized the willingness to discard.

One emphasis of my research has been on the question of how people spend their time. Time is the ultimate finite resource, or course, so the question of how people spend it would seem to be important.

Although professionals are able to extract a considerable amount of wealth from amateurs, few stock pickers, if any, have the skill needed to beat the market consistently, year after year.