Volunteering to help others is the right thing to do, and it also boosts personal happiness

Reading makes me want to write my own books, and just trying to understand what I see in the world around me makes me want to figure things out.

A book is a better way to develop a complicated idea, or to tell a big story and to show how ideas weave in and out of each other, which is something that comes up a lot in happiness because all these ideas are interconnected.

When I thought about why I was sometimes reluctant to push myself, I realized that it was because I was afraid of failure - but in order to have more success, I needed to be willing to accept more failure.

Look for happiness under your own roof.

Being taken for granted is an unpleasant but sincere form of praise. Ironically, the more reliable you are and the less you complain, the more likely you are to be taken for granted.

The 20-minute walk I take is better than the 3-mile run I never start. Having people over for take-out is better than never having people to an elegant dinner party.