What's on Your Bookshelf?
“What’s On Your Bookshelf” is a personal and professional growth podcast exploring the intersections of passion, potential, and purpose - featuring multi-certified coach and leadership development consultant Denise R. Russo alongside Andy Hughes, Scott Miller, and Samantha Powell.
What's on Your Bookshelf?
83 - The Happiness Project - May
Ever wonder why your childhood hobbies brought you so much joy, but as adults, we often struggle to find that same happiness? Join Denise Russo and Samantha Powell on this week's episode of "What's on Your Bookshelf" as we unlock the secrets to integrating play and leisure into our busy lives. Inspired by Gretchen Rubin's "The Happiness Project," we reveal actionable steps for mid-career women, particularly millennials, to intentionally carve out time for those activities that truly make us happy.
As we discuss the complexities of people management, we also look at how to maintain our well-being amidst challenges like reorganizations and layoffs. Tune in to hear personal stories and insights on how reconnecting with past pleasures and family interactions can be a powerful tool to enhance our present happiness. By focusing on what we can control and reflecting on our initial motivations for leadership, we provide a roadmap to navigating the often tumultuous waters of mid-career responsibilities.
Finally, we dive into the art of choosing happiness through mindful leisure activities. Borrowing wisdom from Andy Warhol, we explore how both daily routines and occasional special treats contribute to our overall sense of joy. As we gear up for next week's engaging dialogue on the value of friendship, this episode serves as a heartfelt reminder to prioritize fun and leisure in our lives. Let us inspire you to start your own happiness project, filled with activities that bring you genuine joy and fulfillment.
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Welcome to what's on your Bookshelf with your hosts Denise Russo and Samantha Powell. Hello everybody, welcome back to another episode of what's on your Bookshelf. This is a life and leadership podcast where we're living out loud the pages of the books that are on our shelves. My name is Denise Russo. I'm here yet again with my good friend, co-host and partner, sam Powell. We are exploring the book the Happiness Project. This is the third book in our series on happiness for 2024. And right now we are around almost halfway. We're going to be talking about the seriousness of play and playtime. So, sam, I know we get to talk about this quite a bit with our kids and their seriousness and playtime. I'm looking forward to talking with you about what it means for us. How are you doing today?
Speaker 2:I'm doing good.
Speaker 1:I'm doing good and it's funny this.
Speaker 2:you know I read this a little bit ago but the I was at a women's networking lunch yesterday and we were talking about hobbies, you know that that we have and especially like as women, as you get to like mid-career cause. Somebody was asking you me questions about like what do I see working with mid-career professionals and things like that. And you know I was saying, you know there's there's this trend and it was the midlife crisis that you know we used to think about. But it kind of presents itself a little bit differently, I think, with these generations that are coming up and, you know, especially like the millennials that are hitting 40 now, and especially women who've been working and having careers and, you know, doing the grind and that kind of thing. So we were talking about that concept but it led us into hobbies that women have and it's like sometimes we just get so caught up in the we gotta, you know, do the nine to five, raise the kids, do whatever. And it's like, and especially in, you know, this millennial generation that's hitting this now there's a lot more shared work between partners too. So it's like we're all kind of hitting this thing where it's like how did I get here and who am I and what do I like to do.
Speaker 2:And so, as I was preparing to, you know, look at a chapter and look at my highlights I was like man, this is a really great topic. I think, in general, about play and about leisure and how it really contributes to our happiness, because you have to things you have to have had like hobbies and play activities and leisure activities that really fit the core of who you are. And that's what I loved about how she explored play during the month of May for herself, because it was really about following her first rule, which was be Gretchen right, and what things does she really things do, does she really like and does she really enjoy? And just because something's fun for one person doesn't mean it's fun for her. And it just like.
Speaker 2:I was just thinking about this conversation and as I was re looking at this chapter before we started thinking about I think this is a common thing that we all hit at some point in our lives and a lot of times it happens. I think in that, like that, we all hit at some point in our lives and a lot of times it happens. I think in that, like you know, middle, you know, mid, mid midlife crisis phase of oh, what do I really like, right, what do I really enjoy and what does kind of check that happiness bucket for me?
Speaker 1:from a leisure standpoint. Well, it's interesting the way you're describing it because, if you think about it, where people are waiting for Friday, dreading Monday, right, you try to cram in to to whatever time you get out of work on Friday, cram that in till whatever time you go to sleep on Sunday. That that's the only time that you can catch up on all the things. As an adult, you have to do Laundry, the bills, grocery, shopping and fun. But why is it that we forget that when we were growing up, fun was part of the everyday and, granted, we still also went to school, played in sports, were parts of clubs, probably went to some sort of organized something, whether it was church or something like that, and we still had time to do that. Now, granted, we didn't have some of the adult concerns, like you know, paying bills but we still had chores in our houses and things like that. So where along the way do we lose the sense of fun? And so when I was reading this chapter, it started getting to me to think about a couple things. One is the way Gretchen Rubin sets out this book if you're just joining us is there are 12 months in the year where she does something intentional and specific in that month to elevate her already happy nature. Because she says in the beginning of the book that she thought she was generally already an overly happy person. But how could she really harness in the beginning of the book that she thought she was generally already an overly happy person, but how could she really harness in the intention of her happiness? And so when I got to this chapter I thought, okay, april showers bring May flowers. And so when you think of that analogy that sort of says that something bad has happened for something good to come of it. Maybe, like all that rain brings together something beautiful. And in this one I think, when we think about how do you take the burdens that come from sometimes our work environment to have the flowers in it and appreciate with gratitude what that is.
Speaker 1:She talks about things like finding more fun and taking time to be silly and going off the beaten path. I'm a more serious person just by nature, but yet we all like to have fun to a certain degree. And so she says that there was this writer, jean Stafford, who said happy people don't need to have fun, but she showed some studies, or talked about some studies, that the absence of feeling bad isn't enough to make you happy. You have to strive to find sources that make you feel good, and if you think about what are those things that make you feel good, then those things might be for you how you define fun. And, like you know, talking to me, where I find fun is going to Disney World, and so that's a place that was, maybe very subconsciously, at a young age, a place where I had fun. I think the first time I went I was in sixth grade and I still like to go today. So finding that thing that gives you a source of feeling good is how it seems like she's defining what fun is.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, I think so. And you know she said that the research shows that regularly having fun is a key factor in having a happy life. People who have fun are 20 times as likely to feel happy. And I love that.
Speaker 2:The quote that you had pulled from the book of, like it's not good enough just to avoid not fun things, like you actually have to seek out pleasure and seek out things that are enjoyable for you, and we learned that in the how of happiness, right, you do have to go purposefully, seek out the things that are enjoyable, and for everybody it's something different, right? Like going to Disney World is, like you know, lovely thing for you. Some people hate crowds and hate amusement parks, and that's maybe not the thing for that person, right? So it's really about finding fun, and that's what she starts with is finding more fun, finding fun that works for you. And you know her number one rule of be Gretchen, right, what does she enjoy, what does she not enjoy?
Speaker 2:And I thought it was really interesting, you know, as she went through this, that she, you and she said that in finding things that were more fun for her, there was also this sadness that came along with it, of this acceptance of that means I can't be everything she was like.
Speaker 2:I'm never going to be the person who goes to the club and goes out dancing all night. There's a part of me that wants to be that person, but I'm not. That's not actually fun for me, that's not something that I really enjoy, and there's almost a little bit of like a mini grief that she found in this journey of in order to find your fun, in order to find that leisure that you love, you have to let other things go and there's a bit of sadness in that and I thought that was super interesting and very true to my own like, to my own experience when I think about all of the people I won't ever be, and letting that go so that I can focus on who I really am and what I do really enjoy and what does bring me happiness.
Speaker 1:So what you're talking about right now to me says that anybody listening could really benefit from doing an exercise, or talking with a coach is even better. But she does this on around I don't know page 116 in my version of the book, at the end, where she started asking herself some questions, and I think we all could ask ourselves these questions, which is what exactly do I find to be fun? So, if you're listening, what do you find to be fun? Like Sam said, for me I have fun at Disney World, but I will tell you I don't always have fun there. If it's burning up hot outside, which it frequently is here, it's not fun, and so I might not stay for very long. But what do you find to be fun? And then she says what did I want to do?
Speaker 1:So, to your point, when she's talking about things like do I really want to go out to a club and dance? Maybe in my younger years that I wanted to do that. But what has changed in my circumstances, in my environment, in my age, in my lifestyle? So if you're asking yourself, what did I find fun, what do I want to do? And she said, said this was the part that caught me.
Speaker 1:She said I couldn't think of much. And here's a lady who said in the beginning of the book I'm generally an above average happy person, but when she was trying to think about what she thought was fun, she said I couldn't think of much. But then she said well, there was one thing she loved to read children's literature. And so she goes on to this whole kind of dialogue around how she took some time to dive into reading some of the books that she loved and then she found some relationships to talk with other people about reading and about books and she was able to bring that thing that was fun to her and talk about it with other people that also found fun doing that themselves in a similar way.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think that that notion of when you sit down and you think about, okay, if I were to come up with the list of things, if somebody were to ask me what do you like to do for fun, and I'd answer that question Like I think that is a very common experience for people to go. I have no idea, like I don't have an answer to that. And it's funny because I had this conversation with myself a few years ago when I realized that, like my identity was so tied up in stuff I did right, like my job, and the fact that I was a wife and a mother, like these roles that were assigned to myself or that I had assigned to myself or society had assigned to me, or whatever that it was. Well, who am I outside of being a manager? Who am I outside of being a wife? Who am I outside of being a mother? Right, like if I were to strip all, if all of that would be taken away from me, who am I and what do I really really like and enjoy?
Speaker 2:And I think that is a very, very common existential crisis people go through at some point. It hits, I think, different times for all people, depending on what's going on in your life. But I've had that conversation with I don't know how many girlfriends over the years of like, oh my gosh, like right, I've just been on the hamster wheel, been in the rat race of life, and now what Like? What do I actually like? What do I really enjoy coming around to those things that are very true to you and you know, and to things like that and they don't have to be crazy big adventures and things like I know people who love to go on like hikes or go out into the woods or do whatever, and it's like I'll go along with you and go do that. But like, that's not my thing really.
Speaker 2:Right, like my thing is reading a certain genre of book that I just, like you know, read a million of them. It's going to coffee or dinner and having a conversation with a friend, really listening to their stories and what's going on with them, and things like that. Right, like, my happiness looks different than other people's and that's okay, but you got to take some time to explore that. Like you said, like you know, that's a great coaching conversation. That's a great. I think that was when I really started to explore the first time I ever had a coach and it was like, well, what's what? Who is Sam outside of, outside of these labels? And you know, what do I really enjoy and really like? And I think it's such an important thing for your happiness to figure that out really and this exploration she did, I just really, I really it really resonated with me because I felt like I had been on a similar journey and reevaluate that journey often.
Speaker 1:I love what you were saying about how you gave yourself some titles a minute ago. You said I am a manager, I am a wife, I am a mom, and then you talked a little bit about the things that you do in those roles. But then you also then segued and talked about what you enjoyed, even when you were telling the story about what, if my friend asked me to go on a hike, I don't really enjoy that. But then you started talking about what you do enjoy, and what you enjoy is something about that experience which might be maybe you don't like enjoy, enjoy hiking in the mountain, but you do enjoy the camaraderie and the relationship with your friend. And it seems like if you take that and say, okay, if your enjoyment and your fun comes from investing time with people you care about and doing something with them that they care about and that that somehow brings you fun, then maybe that's the question that that people ask themselves is, if you do have these titles of who people say you are and you don't just think about what you do, but who you are and what you enjoy about it like if you're a manager and you don't enjoy anything about that role, then why not put yourself out of your misery and put your team out of their misery and go get a different job.
Speaker 1:I talked to somebody not long ago who was a people manager and I was coaching them and they did not enjoy certain things that come with the role, like reorgs, like laying off your teammates, like having difficult conversations with underperformers. So we had a conversation around well, what was it that really inspired you to want to become a leader in the first place? And the person said I really enjoy having fun with my team when we're thriving at our best. And so we started to untangle that like well, why aren't you thriving now? What are those things that stopped you thriving at your best and how can you dig into that part of it? Because if it's within your control, then you can change it. But if it's not within your control and you can't change it, then you have a choice to make. You either stay in an environment you don't like or you change yourself into a different environment, because if it's outside of your ability to to shift the result, then you're going to stay in that environment.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I completely agree. I always say you have two options you can either change your environment or change your relationship with your environment, and those are really the only two things you can do in any given situation. And sometimes you can't change the environment, and so it's then you got to get out of it right.
Speaker 2:Or you've got to change the way you feel about it. And if that still doesn't work, then it's time to go right, like and that is so important. And I think, like when we think about leisure, it's the same kind of thing, right, like what you're either enjoying an activity or not. It's either bringing you happiness or it's not. And you've got to think about what are the things that you gravitate towards? And I think a lot of times it's going back and thinking about your life in a bigger sense too. Right, what were the things you gravitated towards when you were little? What's the natural inclinations that you had? Because sometimes, as we get into adult life, we get so caught up in all the things we have to do, right, and you had asked that question earlier of at what point do we lose some of all that stuff we used to do as kids? And I really think it's the once you're done with school setting, like whether that's high school, whether that's college, whether that's, you know, advanced degrees or whatever it's once you hit that space of I now have no structure that's given to me and now I have to find my own thing.
Speaker 2:What we all fall, the trap we often fall into, is I work and then I maybe hang out with people outside of work and like that's like, those are the things, right, it becomes just a totally different setup and some of those things aren't handed to you, right?
Speaker 2:There's no organized sports unless you seek it out. There's no clubs unless you seek them out, like, it becomes so much on you, rather than here's the list of clubs and you should sign up for one, right, here's the list of activities and you should sign up for one, like. And it's when, when the system around you stops handing you the things that I think that that's when we that's when so much of us lose what are the things we really enjoyed. And so sometimes, when you're trying to figure out what is fun for me, what is leisure for me, you've got to go back to what did I gravitate towards when things were handed to me on a silver platter, right? What were the things that I did that I really enjoyed in the past, and what's the equivalent at this stage in my life? Now, right, what does that look like? What you know, what are those things that you know, bring that same kind of feeling to me.
Speaker 1:I wonder if you can grab some of the things from the past that still are relevant for today. So she talks about, for example, something that is fun for her or that brings her joy, is talking to her sister, and so that came from something growing up right. Obviously they grew up together. They had camaraderie, a relationship, fondness for one another. Not all siblings do, I suppose, but I have had a similar experience with my brother over the last couple of months where there was a long period of time where my brother and I did not talk to each other in any kind of animosity way. But I was living out of the state and he's four years younger than me, and so he was either in elementary school when I was in middle school, or in middle school when I was in high school, or in high school where I was in college, or in college when I was in my grown up life, and so we sort of grew apart because there was that gap in our age years. But it's almost like the older you get, it seems like years shrink. And so my brother and I went on the other day there's like a certain day of the week where you could get discounted movie tickets, so he called me up kind of out of the blue and he said Do you want to go to the movies with me? And I thought when is the last time I went to the movies with my brother? Right, I'm 55. We both have kids and spouses and jobs and whatever. And so he said I can get out of work early, let's just go.
Speaker 1:So we went to the movies and it was just he and I and we were, or him and me, and we were the only people in the theater and we had the most fun because we were talking in the movie like we were sitting in our living room or we would, you know, laugh louder than maybe we would if there was somebody sitting next to us. And at the end we both looked at each other and said what if there was somebody sitting next to us? And at the end we both looked at each other and said this was so much fun, let's do it again. And it's something we hadn't done for probably when I say, like 40 years we hadn't done.
Speaker 1:So she talks about this thing where she calls her sister, but she mentioned something and I circled it in the book, because I'm sure you had to have circled it, because she mentions that she was busy doing this and that and running from chore to chore. But she picked up something from her youth which I think is your favorite book, and so she talked about picking up a fun book. That was fun for her to reread the Phantom Tollbooth. So I wondered if you stopped at that part and had any thoughts on that.
Speaker 2:I loved it because that is one of my most favorite books and because you and I did this retreat in the last I guess it was over a year ago at this point and one of the things that you had asked us to submit before the retreat was our favorite book, and so I had to like I love to read, and so to pick a favorite was really hard. But when I picked the favorite I had to think about why I picked the favorite. And again, it's the same kind of exploration about what is fun about this book for me, right, like, what is it that brings me happiness, that brings me pleasure, when I've read this book multiple times and the Phantom Soul Booth, I love it. It is a children's book or a youth-centered book, but it's got the sense of humor that I love. It's this witty, smart, you know, like where there's, you know they explore this like math land and this land of words and this land of stuff, and it's just got this like goofy, silly but witty kind of humor to it and it's what I love about it, right, it makes you think there's something a little bit different to it, and every time you have to know things about certain subjects to really get the you know why something's funny or why it's a part of it, and so I loved that.
Speaker 2:But it made me think about that exploration that we did with the retreat, because when I submitted it it was like we had to talk about it too and I had to think about what was so fun about that book for me and why I enjoyed it so much. And it kind of sent me down this little bit of introspection of, well, what is like that's what I enjoy about people. Like when I meet someone with that kind of humor, like they are my person, like like we're connected, we don't we'll joke around, like that's one of the things I love about my husband. He's very witty, he's very funny, like we don't need a whole lot of words to share a joke or to share you know that camaraderie and that's that goes into that fun bucket for me. I love things like that.
Speaker 2:I love those types of conversations, and that's part of the leisure that I enjoy is books that are like that, conversations that are like that, shows that are like that, and you know, so I love. I giggled when I saw the film too, but I was like there's no way, you don't ask me about this because we had just talked about it at the retreat last. But yeah, I think it goes back to that same thought process of if you can explore yourself and know yourself, you know you can really find the things that you you know, that you love and you enjoy.
Speaker 1:Here's the interesting thing about how you just shared your story is you and I share hundreds of titles of books with each other, like, hey, have you read this? Have you read that what's on the shelf here? We actually did that this week, where we went through dozens of books on these shelves to talk about next year's series. But there was something that was very passionate about your talking about the Phantom Toll Booth that put into my memory that that book mattered to you. So I knew, when I read this in this book, of all the books that you've talked about or shared with me, why is it that I remembered that title? And that's what's so important about having fun with other people together and experiencing life through their lens, and that's what I loved about your signature story retreats and you're interested send us a note because we're putting together a waiting list for our next event and it's a place where you can come together with people you don't know, but where you can share these ideas of fun.
Speaker 1:But also look at the things that you're passionate about or the potential that you have that you want to elevate in your career or your personal life. We're really digging into the purpose that you have for your life here on earth, and I know we're coming to a close of our time together today for this chapter, but I want to point out something important that she talks about, which is she talks about in this chapter that you can do anything you want, but you can't do everything you want. So, in other words, you have to have decisions and choices around the things that you think you want to do, like you even made a mention of it earlier about something along this lines where, if you put your mind to it, you can do anything you want, meet anybody you want to meet and have anything you want to have, with compromise or consequence right, but you have to also realize that you can't do everything you want, and so if you take out fun from your life, you're eroding or diminishing parts of the happiness that makes you whole.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I, I, I agree with that and I love that that thought process to me has been such a very important thought process in my adult life of you can do anything, but not everything. And the anything I think has an asterisk on it, and that's what she sort of explores here is like I could go be the astrophysicist, but do I want to do that Right? That was her second question is what do I like to do and what do I want to do in this? And I think that that's so important for us to realize is one we can't be everything Right and we just we can't do it all. That is not possible. We can't do it all. That is not possible.
Speaker 2:But you can do anything that you want and the want is what's key right?
Speaker 2:Like, what are you naturally inclined towards and what do you want to spend your time on?
Speaker 2:Right, like, I would love to be multilingual but I don't have a strong natural inclination for learning new languages and I have to put in so much work and it's more work than I really want to do, and so that's disqualified from the activities that I'm doing. Right, because it doesn't fit all that criteria. But I think that that's such an important thing when we think about happiness and we think about finding the activities that we love and the leisure that we love. It has to. You can't do it all and there's sadness in that right. That was some of that sadness we talked about at the beginning, that she really spent some time exploring, and that's okay. But you got to let it go and you got to think about really what do you want and what do you like and what do you enjoy, because that's, you know, that's the key to happiness finding the activities that really check the box right, that give you the star, that give you that feeling that moves you in the direction of happiness.
Speaker 1:If you, friends, are taking these episodes and living them out loud with us right now, or if you're taking them into next year and making this a part of your year long plan for happiness for your own project. It's important to hear what we're saying Happiness is a choice. The things you do and don't do for fun are a choice. She says that she had a difficult time for a few years. Happiness was something that she needed, like water in a desert, and that was a contrast to what she said in the beginning of the book, where she said I'm a very happy person, but yet here she's saying she needed it like water in a desert.
Speaker 1:But then she said something really profound, which she deliberately looked for every little thing that could lift her mood and anything to get her through her days.
Speaker 1:And so she started talking about what were those things that she was doing, and she was trying to create this prescription for happiness instead of realizing that all along the happiness was found in her attitude and choosing to be happy in spite of whatever drama that was going on in her life. And that harkens back to the book we read before this, which was solved for happy, where mo god had to solve an equation for happiness despite something very sad in his life. So if you haven't heard these episodes or you haven't read these books, we strongly encourage you to dive deep with us and we're going to plan or it's our plan that we're going through these once a week, which is 12 weeks for the 12 chapters, with the intent that in January, you can do your own deep dive happiness project and take the book, take our episodes and explore for the whole 30 or 31 days of that month doing these things and in this case, today we talked about finding more fun, definitely.
Speaker 2:And I think, like my, as we kind of end this episode here, I think one of the things that she gets to at the end is it's a quote from Andy Warhol where he says either only once or every day, If you do something once, it's exciting, and if you do it every day, it's exciting, but if you do it, say, twice, or almost every day, it's not really as good anymore. So, when we think about leisure and we think about fun, there can be fun in your everyday activities, in your habits right, going back to atomic habits, right when you're working towards an identity, when you're working towards the person that you want to be, and there's something that you do every day I write every day, I read every day, I do, I exercise every day there is happiness in those things. But don't forget, right when we think about hedonic adaptation that we talked about a lot in how of Happiness is that it's those every once in a while things, those treats for yourself that really are just a one-time thing or a once in a blue moon experience, that drive that too. So, when you're thinking about your leisure activities, when you're thinking about the things that bring you fun, think about it in those two spaces. Think about what's the joy and the fun that you do every day.
Speaker 2:For her it was like being silly and you know, going off the beating path and things like that, but for you it could be something different. But also, don't forget about those vacations that you know hey, we got to go to this one place this one time, or that you know thing. You've done one. You check the box that you experienced it and it's a memory you carry. You know, carry forward. So, as you're planning your activities, as you're planning your things, think about it in both those spaces.
Speaker 1:I like how you use the word give yourself some treats, and so for me, it's always a treat for me to be here with you, sam. Thank you so much for joining me today. Friends, that was May. Next week is June, making time for friends, and we're going to have a good conversation about friendship. So thanks for joining us. My name is Denise Russo and, on behalf of my friend, sam Powell, this has been another episode of what's On your Bookshelf.