Mudlarking on the River, Part 1

Happiness is more than just a positive state of mind—it’s a state of being that enhances your health, strengthens your relationships, and fuels both your creativity and productivity. However, though many people are aware of these benefits and try to feel happier, their efforts often fail to create consistent, long-term happiness.

In The How of Happiness, Sonja Lyubomirsky—psychology professor and recipient of the Templeton Positive Psychology Prize—addresses this challenge. Drawing from her extensive research as well as insights from leading scientists in the positive psychology field, she unpacks the factors that fuel happiness and provides practical strategies to nurture and sustain it.

In this guide, we’ll explore Lyubomirsky's thoughts on what contributes to long-term happiness and how you can amplify it in your life. Additionally, we’ll supplement her ideas with psychological research and actionable methods from other self-improvement authors and practitioners.

Anxiety is sneaky. It lives in our thoughts and habits, and it can show up as a stomachache or a 3 a.m. Netflix binge. But according to Dr. Judson Brewer, you can recognize and counteract anxiety using mindfulness—the practice of paying close attention to the present moment without analyzing or judging it.

In Unwinding Anxiety, Brewer explains how anxiety becomes a habit and how it spawns additional habits that only make things worse. Brewer draws on his background as a psychiatrist, neuroscientist, and mindfulness researcher to show why mindfulness succeeds where traditional methods like willpower, substitution, and avoidance fail.

In this guide, we’ll walk through Brewer’s three-step method for treating anxiety while expanding on the techniques he mentions and offering some additional psychological insights from experts such as Daniel Goleman and Brené Brown.

If you've ever suffered from anxiety, you know how disruptive it can be to your peace of mind, relationships, and day-to-day activities.

In this Master Guide, we’ll examine what causes anxiety and how it affects your physical health, impairs rational thinking, and fuels unhealthy habits. We’ll also provide practical advice for preventing and overcoming anxiety. Our guide compiles research and methods from a range of experts, including psychologist Daniel Goleman, emotional well-being specialist Nick Trenton, neuroscientist Judson Brewer, self-help guru Tony Robbins, and biologist Robert Sapolsky.

You’ll come away understanding what causes your anxiety, why it’s often difficult to break free from it, and what practical steps you can take to:

• Curb anxious tendencies.
• Preempt anxiety-inducing triggers.
• Prevent anxious thoughts and emotions from escalating.
• Analyze and challenge anxious thoughts.
• Learn from anxious experiences.

A little girl growing up alone in the lush marshes of the North Carolina coast. A young woman who falls in love and experiences the anguish of a broken heart. A promise of marriage. A betrayal that leads to death. In Where the Crawdads Sing, Delia Owens reveals these moments along Kya Clark’s journey to survive after her family abandons her as a child. Owens’s prose is as lush as the environment she describes, making you feel you are with Kya every step of the way. As Kya deals with discrimination and torment by the local townspeople, she must also navigate matters of the heart and decide if opening her heart is worth the risk when all she’s known is loss.

Do you ever wonder why you feel so serene sitting at the beach, watching the waves? You’re likely experiencing Blue Mind. In Blue Mind, Wallace J. Nichols argues that water has a profound impact on our well-being and health because it induces a calming, meditative state, which he calls the Blue Mind state. He explains that we’re naturally attracted to water because of how it aided our survival in the past and that we still derive benefits from water today. Nichols is a research associate and co-director of multiple environmental organizations.

In our guide, we’ll explore why humans are so attracted to water and describe the ways it reduces stress and allows the mind to heal. We’ll also discuss why it appeals to our senses, such as sight and hearing, and look at different ways of being in or around water. We’ll conclude by exploring society’s relationship with water and how it might be improved. We’ll add scientific and social context for Nichols’s ideas and discuss alternatives to the tips he offers.