Choice: Uncover and Claim Your Happiness

by Melanie Steele

Every day most of us choose to be unhappy. Unintentionally, of course. We make choices all the time that hold us back. Meanwhile, the happiness available to us literally passes us by…

It’s time to choose what’s important, what truly matters, what will fulfill you. It’s time to choose what opens you up to the life you were meant to live, the way you were meant to live it. It’s time to choose happiness.

This guidebook shows you how.

CHOICE is a straightforward, engaging handbook that will help guide you through the simple and essential art of choosing happiness.

Genres: Self Help

56 pages, Paperback

First published June 17, 2013

Reviews

[Dani (The Pluviophile Writer) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Full review at The Pluviophile Reader: http://wp.me/p3VFNP-2W

3/5 stars.
ebook, 56 pages.
Read on March 03, 2014.

I stumbled upon this book through Goodreads as I found the cover and the book summary appealing. From Goodreads:

"Every day most of us choose to be unhappy. Unintentionally, of course. We make choices all the time that hold us back. Meanwhile, the happiness available to us literally passes us by…

It’s time to choose what’s important, what truly matters, what will fulfill you. It’s time to choose what opens you up to the life you were meant to live, the way you were meant to live it. It’s time to choose happiness.

This guidebook shows you how.

CHOICE is a straightforward, engaging handbook that will help guide you through the simple and essential art of choosing happiness."

The concept that the author is trying to portray is one that I have been trying to use on myself on over the last two-years. The problem I have with the summary and the book itself is that I found it wasn't really much of a guide-book. The author does a great job at detailing why happiness is choice and why you should embody this concept in your every day life but I found the brevity of the book didn't provide much guidance from that. Positivity, gratitude and meditation were three items that the author suggested in assisting in choosing happiness but she provided very little information of how to do this. For example, negative and self-destructive thoughts are a massive habit for a lot of people and in order to choose to be happy this is a habit that has to be overcome. The author was just a bit too vague on the how-to details and support for my liking. I think if the author invested a few more hours of research and added another 50 or so pages this book would have been a more efficient and structured guide.

Kudos to author for writing this still as it is a hugely important concept that has tremendous power to changes people's lives and outlooks. It's also a brave concept to write about because it would have required a lot of vulnerability on her part. The more that this idea is spread the more people can benefit from it, even if it just seems in one bit at a time.

[Erica · Rating 5 out of 5]

I started this book two days ago and already read it twice. The first was a full read-through and then I read through again underlying passages until I found I was practically underlining the whole thing! So many pieces of advice, like a friend you lean on in hard times.
I have many favorites but this part is my favorite right now:
“The moment is everything. In each one there is an opportunity to stop what we don’t want and turn it around, change course, begin anew. Each moment is a chance to take what is and turn it into what we want it to be. The moment is where we can turn regret into repair, inaction into action, negative into positive.”
I have copied this out and I’m going to carry it with me in my pocket. I’ll think of it often. I’ll be coming back to this book many times I’m sure and finding new passages to carry with me.

[Ariel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Truly helpful little book. Filled with advice and insights that can make a difference. Now to implement them is up to me... we'll see!