Joyful: The surprising power of ordinary things to create extraordinary happiness

Instead, I began to see the world as a reservoir of positivity that I could turn to at any time. I found that certain places have a kind of buoyancy—a bright corner café, a local yarn shop, a block of brownstones whose window boxes overflow with blooms—and I started changing my routines to visit them more often.

All children live in a world rich with surprises. Each new thing, no matter how ordinary, inspires a sense of wonder and delight. But novelty naturally declines with age, and our surroundings begin to dull with familiarity.

Just as we turn to doctors and psychotherapists today, medieval people regularly consulted diviners,10 astrologers, and spiritual healers. But beginning in the sixteenth century, the scientific revolution brought a cascade of discoveries that filled in once-mysterious spaces with knowledge.

The poet Mary Oliver writes, “Attention is the beginning of devotion.”

“The hidden people—close to the sea. In unspoiled nature as far away from houses as possible.

Under the right conditions, even ordinary experiences can be infused with a sense of the supernatural. The milky rays of sunlight that beam through a storm cloud, an early morning encounter with a wild animal, or a spiral of dry leaves blown into the air by a gust of autumn wind: such fleeting glimpses of beauty are often interpreted as signs of de

Another way to surprise a friend is with a mystery vacation or excursion: tell them how long you’ll be going for and what they need to pack, but don’t reveal the destination until you both arrive at the airport. Surprising someone else can be doubly delightful because it often tempts them to return the favor just when you least expect it, creating

We have gained convenience and efficacy, but at the cost of abstraction: the changes within our bodies no longer seem connected to the world around us, giving us the illusion that we are independent of our environment and unaffected by it. Thus we have built environments that lack elements, such as color and light, that are essential to our well-be

Choosing bulbs with a CRI close to 100 will keep you and your spaces looking bright and colorful.

I noticed many moments when people seemed to find real joy in the material world. Gazing at a favorite painting in an art museum or making a sandcastle at the beach, people smiled and laughed, lost in the moment. They smiled, too, at the peachy light of the sunset and at the shaggy dog with the yellow galoshes.