Comment by chrisweekly | Hacker News Reader

Comment by chrisweekly | Hacker News Reader

Expressing gratitude is one of the surest paths to a better day.

One of my all-time favorite books -- "How to Want What You Have" by Tim Miller, PhD -- has as its central thesis the idea that:

1. Most people are relatively unhappy;

2. The root cause is our tendency always to want More [money/power, love, recognition] -- which stems from evolutionarily adaptive traits;

3. The remedy is to live in the present moment -- which one can learn to do by deliberately practicing three closely-related things:

  1. Compassion  
  2. Attention  
  3. Gratitude

The book is (sadly, inexplicably) out of print, but it's popular enough there are plenty of used copies for sale. I first encountered HTWWYH in a 5th-edition hardcover, and it was transformative. Highest posaible recommendation.

I found it in the Internet Archive's collection if anyone wants to try borrowing a digital copy for free: https://archive.org/details/howtowantwhatyou00mill

also plenty of secondhand physical copies:

https://www.betterworldbooks.com/product/detail/how-to-want-...

I will find a copy of the book to see what I can learn from it. Until now I've learnt that one cannot attain happiness as a state. It's fleeting. I stumble across it in moments, and it's gone again. And so I try to be content, which is much more persistent.

Very similar ideas are foundational to the practice of meditation/mindfulness and teachings of Buddhism generally. Popular teachers such as Jack Kornfield, Thich Nhat Hanh, Sharon Salzburg, Pema Chodron (among many others) have great books covering these ideas.

There's a very very old saying "There's more happiness in giving than there is in receiving."

One of the key things I believe most people forget is that being a free giver doesn't mean only to participate in charity and help those in need. It means to act like this to everyone, including those around us. Most people need encouragement and to feel appreciate, and I believe culturally we don't show enough of it.

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