Relationships on Today Purpose

Ten steps to a happier life

Wed, 22 Jul 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Ten practical shifts from Pieter Hintjens — founder of the ZeroMQ project — for becoming happier and making the people around you happier too. No money or magic required, just a change in how you see the world, yourself, and others: “Happiness… comes from your own actions” (the 14th Dalai Lama).

1. Invest in your senses

Feed body and mind well — cook your own food and make it taste good. Notice beauty on purpose: photograph what strikes you, play music that moves you, wear clothes that feel good, walk the city at night in the rain. Texture, not just achievement, is part of a good life.

Givers, takers & matchers

Mon, 06 Jul 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Adam Grant’s model of how people approach reciprocity, from The Knowledge Project.

The three styles

Takers — “What can you do for me?” Maximize their own outcome, do the minimum, chase visible projects. People don’t like working with them, and their choices are suboptimal for the group.
Givers — “What can I do for you?” Go the extra mile; without them organizations fail. But unstrategic giving leads to burnout and fatigue.
Matchers — trade evenly, keep a mental ledger of debits and credits. Feels fair but transactional; optimizes for the short term. Most people default here.

The twist

Givers sit at both extremes — they either completely fail or win biggest. The difference isn’t whether they give, it’s how:

What makes us happy

Mon, 06 Jul 2026 00:00:00 +0000

The recurring finding across everything I’ve read: lasting happiness comes far more from what you do repeatedly and who you’re close to than from your circumstances. Trying to become happy by changing your life situation mostly fails — the situation gets normalized (see hedonic adaptation).

Relationships are the strongest predictor

Deep relationships plus forgiveness are the best predictor of happiness. The happiest people don’t keep score and are “irrationally” invested in other people’s well-being (happiness notes, via Scott Galloway).
Marriage/partnership and kids correlate with happiness, but they require sacrifice and forgiveness — and honest conversations about expectations that most couples avoid (happiness notes).
Isolation is costly: living alone is associated with a large drop in male life expectancy; caring for others (even parents moving in) is associated with longer life. The brain seems to reward “adding value to your species.”

The practices of the happiest people

Sonja Lyubomirsky’s list of what chronically happy people actually do (The How of Happiness):