I'm not a difficult person to please, at least in the short term.
I went on a bit of a (what Tene called) recreation shopping spree yesterday. While some of what I purchased is going to be returned, it was kind of eye opening to see what I'm willing to invest money and time in.
I got flower growing kits from CVS, and I looked for appropriate flowers at a nearby gardening center/nursery before giving up (I feel I should do more investigating before spending a lot on plants that I'm unsure will fare well in small containers). I have at previous times bought various other grow kits - usually to be met with failure. I'm slowly getting the hang of keeping plants alive, and I can usually figure out what I did to kill them (the two basil grow kits from Ikea that I bought, however, are total mysteries to me - I have no clue why they never sprouted).
The other things I purchased fit nicely into two categories: Office supplies and books.
I really shouldn't be allowed into a bookstore without accompaniment, as I tend to go a little wild. Yesterday I went to four bookstores - Bell's Books, Borders (where I bought 3 books), Book Buyers (where I bought 3 books), and Books Inc. I spent most of my day in these stores.
The books I bought had to do with writing, crafts, and organizational skills - The Handmade Marketplace, Little Birds, 365: A Daily Creativity Journal, Real Simple The Organized Home, Booklife, and On Writing. I'm returning The Handmade Marketplace and the Creativity Journal on Monday - After going over them with Tene I realized that they're not right for where I'm at right now, and who I want to be. The Creativity Journal has a good idea behind it, but lacks things that I actually want to do on a day-to-day basis. And, I already have a craft-marketing book, Crafty Superstar (I am considering looking into Craft Inc, as well. Handmade Marketplace was simply not what I am looking for, and had a lot of redundant - for me - information in it).
As for office supplies, well, this has always been a guilty pleasure of mine. I go a little crazy with binders and sticky notes. I don't know why, but I always have. But I have two true weaknesses. Two insidious weaknesses that don't seem like very big deals on the outset, but I swear would bankrupt me if I let them.
Pens and notebooks.
I love pens and notebooks. I think it's part nostalgia: all of my writing in Junior High and High School was done pen and paper first - and part dreamy-eyed optimism or a type of delusion or something: if I could just find the right pen and the right notebook all of my thoughts and ideas would flow to the page like water. I've also happened to catch myself thinking "But, what if I need this particular adorable notebook with an owl on it!?" So at least some part, and I'm not sure how big of a part it is, rests solely on impulse and some odd, currently empty desire to "collect" something.
I have a stack of Moleskine Cahier notebooks that have had the first few pages used and everything else is blank. I have Moleskine Volant notebooks that are similarly unused. I have eight or ten blank regular college-ruled notebooks that I got from Target when they were going all crazy selling school supplies. I have a couple more that are square-ruled. I have reams of unused lined paper.
And yesterday I bought more. I bought two more Moleskine Volants (they come in sets of two, I got grey ones), as well as two of their new "Passions" journals - Books and Wellness. On the upside - I've been meaning to start keeping both a book journal and a wellness journal for myself for ... well months now. I suspect that having a fill-in-the-blanks format, that requires no real initial effort from me will be beneficial. As for the Moleskine Volants? I'm returning them.
(As an aside I also bought two 20 oz water stainless-steel water bottles at University Art - where I got the Moleskine journals. I'm uncertain why I have an obsession with cute waterbottles - but these two make a total of nine of the things in our apartment. I'm also returning these, because they're not each worth the cost, and because, well, we already own seven.)
The only other place I stopped at was Office Max, or Office Depot ... I can never remember which. I spent a good hour or two just wandering the aisles, trying to find the best of whatever. I ended up finding my favorite go-to pen in a box of twelve, so got that. This despite the fact that earlier this week I bought a box of really cute gel pens and a fountain pen. On the positive side: I shouldn't have to buy pens for a while.
The things I acquired made me happy - but left me feeling a little unfulfilled. Sure, I had more pens than is really necessary, but was I going to use them? Even though I enjoyed acquiring them, I experienced a decent amount of consumer guilt, something that worsened after admitting my spending to Tene, who helped me to decide what to return and what to keep - which a day later, I feel a lot better about.
Saturday, February 26, 2011
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Happiness, Unhappiness, and Satisfaction
Since I began my Happiness Project I've been using OhLife to keep a personal, private journal about how I've been doing. In addition to talking about my day (which ranges from a couple of sentences
to a good 250-500 words) I also tried to keep a record of three "mood variables." Happiness, Unhappiness, and Satisfaction.
The scale I gave myself was 1-10 - With one being the lowest and ten being the highest. I figured that with such a scale, and only allowing myself to answer in whole numbers, I wouldn't be in the position where every day was, say, a three, if I were using a 1-5 scale. I don't really have perfectly neutral days. So, even though five and six are right in the middle of the scale, they're tipped just enough that I have useful information.
This was something I thought of doing while reading The Happiness Project (and I'm starting to feel like this is becoming a marketing point for that book - I swear, it isn't. The book just happens to be on my reading list right now, and is the reason that I even started this project). At one point, Gretchen Rubin talks about how she came to find her "happiness formula."
Well, I thought about this and tried to figure out how to best apply it to my own life. I simplified the terms - Happy for "feeling good," Unhappy for "feeling bad," and Satisfied for "feeling right." Then I decided to track, on a day-to-day basis, how I feel in all three categories.
This is what January looked like, for as much as I actually monitored (I ended up not posting most of January, I hope that February is a much larger graph).
I noticed a couple of things right away when I started doing this.
My happiness and unhappiness, feeling good and feeling bad, were independent scales. I could be happy and unhappy at the same time, and they didn't necessarily effect one another.
For example - early in the month I was very upset about losing Moe, one of my rats. I was distraught and unhappy about it (her sickness and decline came as a shock and a surprise). It wasn't until I rescued three rats that I felt some sort of closure about Moe. However, despite feeling a nagging unhappiness (a 1 or 2 on my scale), it didn't really change my happiness level. And being happy about something didn't necessarily make the unhappiness go away.
That isn't to say that the two had nothing to do with one another. When I was happier I was less unhappy, and when I was unhappy I tended to be less happy. But the two were different scales, not part of the same sliding scale. When I first set up the data sets I had separated them expecting something more like this:
Happiness 10 --- Unhappiness 1
Happiness 9 --- Unhappiness 2
Happiness 8 --- Unhappiness 3
etc.
But, as you can see on my graph, the numbers didn't correlate quite that well.
There was also the fact that my satisfaction had little to do with my level of happiness or unhappiness. On days that I happened to be happier, I also happened to feel more satisfied - but not because I was happy. From what I can tell, being happy tends to help me have more energy (or gives me more spoons), which makes it easier for me to motivate myself to get things done (and allows me to use up fewer spoons), which in turn helps me feel more satisfied about myself and my life.
Now I'm excited to see how the whole year will look once I'm done - and to see how much more frequent my happiness level is six or higher and my unhappiness level is five or lower.
Wed, Jan 26 2011
Jaw pain is still the same. Dentist tomorrow. Not much happened.
to a good 250-500 words) I also tried to keep a record of three "mood variables." Happiness, Unhappiness, and Satisfaction.
The scale I gave myself was 1-10 - With one being the lowest and ten being the highest. I figured that with such a scale, and only allowing myself to answer in whole numbers, I wouldn't be in the position where every day was, say, a three, if I were using a 1-5 scale. I don't really have perfectly neutral days. So, even though five and six are right in the middle of the scale, they're tipped just enough that I have useful information.
This was something I thought of doing while reading The Happiness Project (and I'm starting to feel like this is becoming a marketing point for that book - I swear, it isn't. The book just happens to be on my reading list right now, and is the reason that I even started this project). At one point, Gretchen Rubin talks about how she came to find her "happiness formula."
Suddenly ... everything slipped into place, and my happiness formula sprang into my mind with such a jolt that I felt as if the other subway riders must have been able to see a lightbulb appearing above my head.
To be happy, I need to think about feeling good, feeling bad, and feeling right.
Well, I thought about this and tried to figure out how to best apply it to my own life. I simplified the terms - Happy for "feeling good," Unhappy for "feeling bad," and Satisfied for "feeling right." Then I decided to track, on a day-to-day basis, how I feel in all three categories.
This is what January looked like, for as much as I actually monitored (I ended up not posting most of January, I hope that February is a much larger graph).
I noticed a couple of things right away when I started doing this.
My happiness and unhappiness, feeling good and feeling bad, were independent scales. I could be happy and unhappy at the same time, and they didn't necessarily effect one another.
For example - early in the month I was very upset about losing Moe, one of my rats. I was distraught and unhappy about it (her sickness and decline came as a shock and a surprise). It wasn't until I rescued three rats that I felt some sort of closure about Moe. However, despite feeling a nagging unhappiness (a 1 or 2 on my scale), it didn't really change my happiness level. And being happy about something didn't necessarily make the unhappiness go away.
That isn't to say that the two had nothing to do with one another. When I was happier I was less unhappy, and when I was unhappy I tended to be less happy. But the two were different scales, not part of the same sliding scale. When I first set up the data sets I had separated them expecting something more like this:
Happiness 10 --- Unhappiness 1
Happiness 9 --- Unhappiness 2
Happiness 8 --- Unhappiness 3
etc.
But, as you can see on my graph, the numbers didn't correlate quite that well.
There was also the fact that my satisfaction had little to do with my level of happiness or unhappiness. On days that I happened to be happier, I also happened to feel more satisfied - but not because I was happy. From what I can tell, being happy tends to help me have more energy (or gives me more spoons), which makes it easier for me to motivate myself to get things done (and allows me to use up fewer spoons), which in turn helps me feel more satisfied about myself and my life.
Now I'm excited to see how the whole year will look once I'm done - and to see how much more frequent my happiness level is six or higher and my unhappiness level is five or lower.
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