Five Things To Make Your Life (and Writing) Happy

Five Ways to Write Happy
Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation
Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation
Five Things To Make Your Life (and Writing) Happy
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Things are a little hectic and crazy for us trying to create the podcast this week and we ended up – cough – recording it all while driving in the car, crossing international borders. Also, Shaun totally maybe breaks a law and you can hear it on the Random Thoughts part of the audio.

But here goes: 

For 80 years (or so) Harvard scientists studied people and their ability to be happy and healthy. What are the factors that seem to derail happiness and health? What puts us off track?

Some were no brainers – Don’t Smoke. Don’t drink.

Some were things we have no control over – Have a happy childhood.

But there were some other interesting things like:

Educate yourself – The more you learn? The actual act of getting educated? It makes you smarter and happier and healthier.

That’s true for writers, too. The more we learn about writing and the process, the better we get at it, the happier we are with the end results.

Be Smart in relationships – Emotional intelligence, having friends and a support network throughout your life, cultivating new friendships when old ones wane. That’s a key to happiness and healthy.

Just like relationships are the key to a book. They are the key to survival.

Generosity – The people who give back? Those people are happiest and healthiest. Be a mentor, a guide, a coach.

And finally that leads us to….

WRITING TIP OF THE POD

When Bad Stuff Happens, Don’t Have a Tantrum – When bad things happen to you, and problems arise, act like a grownup, not a passive-aggressive punk. Use altruism, suppression, humor and sublimation to deal with those pitfalls and rejections instead of blame, shame, and aggression.

 

DOG TIP FOR LIFE –

Sometimes it’s better to stay at the kennel – You might think it sounds awful, but it’s good to have the occasional stay-cation where you don’t have to protect your peeps and the homestead and just hang with your doggy friends.

So, invest in yourself and give yourself a little alone time.

SHOUT OUT

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Night Owl” by Broke For Free.

WRITING NEWS

I’m heading to Freeport, Maine on Sept. 28 and then Houston and Virginia Beach pretty soon to promote my picture book biography of Moe Berg. It’s called The Spy Who Played Baseball. 

My Post copy 6

 

ENHANCED, the follow-up to FLYING is here! And they books are out of this world. Please buy them and support a writer.

 

The last TIME STOPPERS BOOK is out and I love it. You should buy it because it’s empowering and about friendship and bias and magic. Plus, dragons and elves.

Timestoppers3_005

How to Get Signed Copies: 

If you would like to purchase signed copies of my books, you can do so through the awesome Sherman’s Book Store in Bar Harbor, Maine or the amazing Briar Patch. The books are also available online at places like Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

For signed copies – email barharbor@shermans.com for Sherman’s or email info@briarpatchbooks.comand let them know the titles in which you are interested. There’s sometimes a waiting list, but they are the best option. Plus, you’re supporting an adorable local bookstore run by some really wonderful humans. But here’s the Amazon link, too!

Art Stuff

You can buy prints of my art here. Thank you so much for supporting my books and me and each other. I hope you have an amazing day.

Author: carriejonesbooks

I am the NYT and internationally-bestselling author of children's books, which include the NEED series, FLYING series, TIME STOPPERS series, DEAR BULLY and other books. I like hedgehogs and puppies and warm places. I have none of these things in my life.

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