The Counterintuitive Secret to a Happy Life

Stephanie Harrison shares 5 key insights from New Happy: Getting Happiness Right in a World That’s Got It Wrong.

What does it take to be truly happy?  Many of us have been led to believe that it means making fundamental changes to ourselves, achieving material success, and accomplishing all this under our own power. But there’s another framework, one that Stephanie Harrison lays out in the new book New Happy: Getting Happiness Right in a World That's Got It Wrong. Stephanie is the founder of The New Happy, which produces a newsletter, a podcast, art, and other programs to help people achieve lasting happiness. Read or listen to her big ideas below.

The 5 Key Insights:

1. Everything you know about happiness is a lie.

2. A happier life starts with unwinding Old Happy.

3. The real secret to happiness is counterintuitive.

4. You possess unique gifts that need to be shared.

5. Your happiness has the power to change the world.

1. Everything you know about happiness is a lie.

When I was in my early twenties, I had everything that I thought would make me happy. I had a prestigious job, lived in New York City, and had complete freedom. Yet, I was absolutely miserable. At first, I ignored my emotions. Then, over time, I started to experience more challenges: getting physically ill, struggling with my mental health, and feeling lonely. One day, I found myself lying on my bedroom floor sobbing hysterically, wondering why I was so desperately unhappy.

Then, I had a moment of clarity. What if there wasn’t something wrong with me? What if I had been lied to by the world around me? Perhaps everything I had been told about what I needed to do to be happy was wrong.