Though not a book about happiness, it is thoroughly beneficial at getting a certain point across. Besides listing four scientifically found factors that correlate with people’s perception of their luck, there is a meta-lesson to be learned: even things that seem clearly outside one’s control can be influenced with the right approach.

The four factors listed in the book are:

1. Lucky people notice more things (they look more broadly and thus will more likely, for instance, notice a dollar bill on the floor). This disposition extends in many directions (eg. conversations) for continued benefit.
2. Lucky people are more cognizant of their “gut feelings”. In situations where we have much experience we are able to guess correctly despite lack of rational argument (see Malcolm Gladwell’s “Blink”).
3. Lucky people persevere in their goals. A lady who kept winning many sweepstakes shared her reason: “I send out about 40 entires per day”.
4. Lucky people spring back from failure.

The book provides descriptions of studies which confirm the above four factors as related to one’s perception of “luckiness”. This book paints a convincing picture that one can change her luck by changing her approach to life.

If you don’t want to read the book but want more information, visit theluckfactor.com, a website summarizing the book.

This is one of the best books for those interested in using research-based  methods in becoming happier. The author is a well-respected figure in the field of positive psychology and writes about the findings from her lab at University of California. As with most good books on the subject she carefully provides a working definition of happiness and why it is important. The author offers 12 sections, each containing explicit exercises one can perform to become happier followed by the description of the research that supports the suggestions. Here is a brief summary, all of these have been shown to improve happiness; provided are just possible examples:

If you are interested in becoming happier – read this book: it gives concrete advice you can easily follow; as a bonus, it’s a very quick and easy read.

This website was started January 2011 and is slowly being built. Expect to see at least some valuable content by March 2011. Please post comments to keep me motivated.