I can build a happy life only on the foundation of my own nature.

I'm doing a lot of speaking and talking about habits, which is this subject that obsesses me. That's a lot of fun.

One reason that challenge brings happiness is that it allows you to expand your self - definition. You become larger. Suddenly you can do yoga or make homemade beer or speak a decent amount of Spanish. Research shows that the more elements make up your identity, the less threatening it is when any one element is threatened.

A blog is something that, everyday there's a new thing and that's part of the fun of it, you're just constantly moving forward. A book really gives you more time to reflect and think hard on things very, very deep.

[Benjamin Franklin]identified thirteen virtues he wanted to cultivate--temperance, silence, order, resolution, frugality, industry, sincerity, justice, moderation, cleanliness, tranquility, chastity and humility--and made a chart with those virtues plotted against the days of the week. Each day, Franklin would score himself on whether he practiced those thirteen virtues.

Nothing,' wrote Tolstoy, 'can make our life, or the lives of other people, more beautiful than perpetual kindness.

One of the best ways to make yourself happy is to make other people happy. One of the best ways to make other people happy is to be happy yourself.