Connecting Happiness and Success

by Ray White

Don't wait until you reach success to become happier! Most of us are relatively happy, but we are also aware of a deep sense that we could be happier. We believe happiness will come when we reach certain goals in our lives like getting married, buying a new home, getting a raise, a promotion, or a new job. So we forego a little happiness today and this week so we can reach those goals sooner. Our challenge is the days and weeks turn into months and years. The goals we thought would make us happy turn out to be just milestones on a long journey, and our happiness does not materialize like we had hoped. Happiness in the form of a deep sense of contentment, satisfaction, and fulfillment seems to be missing. This book will help by providing a clear plan on how to choose happiness and then leverage that happiness to become even more successful. Don’t spend your life chasing success and hoping for happiness, learn how to connect happiness and success.

Genres: Self Help, Nonfiction, Business

271 pages, Paperback

First published May 27, 2014

About the author

Ray's Higher Purpose and Definition of Success are helping people be happy and successful. He wakes up at 5 am every morning to work on his blogs or books before starting the day with his paying job in advertising. Ray White has been married for 25 years and has 3 wonderful teenagers. He is a C-Level executive with 30 years of business experience helping start-ups and Fortune 1000 companies improve performance and profitability by focusing on developing successful employees. Ray speaks and teaches business classes on Leadership, Happiness,and Success at all levels of the business hierarchy from new employees to C-Level executives. Ray is on the board of Pursuit-of-Happiness.org and the University of North Texas Professional Leadership Program. You can find more information about Ray and Connecting Happiness and Success at ConnectingHappinessandSuccess.com.

Reviews

[Johanna · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Success doesn’t lead to happiness, happiness leads to success.”

It’s an odd concept. Let’s face it, it’s an unspoken rule in society that if we want to “succeed” in life, we need to work as hard as we can and do whatever it takes- and, hopefully, happiness will come afterward.

But that’s not exactly true. Author Ray White explains that happiness is not a destination, it’s a way of living. It’s also a choice; one that, when implemented, can help to catapult us into success with our business, our family, and our relationships.

In Connecting Happiness and Success, you will learn proven habits and techniques that will teach you how to be happy first, and then use that happiness to achieve even greater success down the road.

The book is divided into seven sections, with the first four explaining how you can be happier, and the final three teaching you how to become more successful. It covers topics such as learning the difference between happiness and pleasure, tips for taking control of your life, the power of gratitude, and how to be more mindful in our actions. You will also learn how happiness (and stress) impact your health, as well as those around you.

Packed full of exercises, charts, and tables, this book is an interactive guide that is both easy to follow, and simple to implement. I loved how the methods are customizable to suit your individual desires and goals, and found a lot of the concepts to be utterly fascinating. Connecting Happiness and Success is a great resource for anyone who is looking to improve an aspect of their lives, whether work, family, relationships, or simply to get more enjoyment out of life. Great for established or aspiring business owners, this book will help you put together a plan for success through happiness, instead of putting your happiness on the back burner. Highly recommended!

I received a free copy of this book from the author in exchange for an honest review.

Check out this review on my blog:EpicBookQuest.com

[Julie Baswell · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a guidebook for learning how to live happily as well as being successful. Its goal is to help understand how happiness and success are connected, and provide specific actions to take to achieve them on a daily basis.

It is generally thought that success brings happiness. The truth is that happiness should come first. Both are intertwined and the actions you take to make yourself happy will inevitably bring you success. Culture conditions us to chase success and to fight through being unhappy, rather than make happiness a daily habit.

You should do small things every day that eventually lead to milestones of success during your lifetime. You must learn to take control of your life, build positive relationships, and identify your own higher purpose. Once you define what success means to you, and prioritize your actions to achieve it, all that’s left is to implement the discipline to get you there.

I like the way the author broke each step down, and listed tasks to do. It was very easy to understand. I feel like I have a road-map for my own achievement now.

[Pía López Copetti · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book exposes the sole crucial factor on being happy: owning your actions and its consequences. More than a roadmap on how to actually be happy it explains that every single decision we make has a consequence that can lead us to a path on the so-called happiness or that can set us to a road of self-destruction. It’s on us which choices we make with the chances we get.

[Nathan Mercer · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Connecting Happiness and Success: A Guide to Creating Success through Happiness" by Ray White is one of those books you wish you would have read when you were a freshman in high school. Not that I would have understood the importance of the wisdom that was being shared, but even if I could have picked up a few of the golden nuggets shared by White it could have possibly changed many different paths I found myself taking to get me to where I am today.

"Connecting Happiness and Success" is broken down into seven concepts - any one of which probably deserve a book on their own: Pleasure vs Happiness (my favorite!), Take Control of Your Life (next favorite!), Positive Relationships, Higher Purpose and Meaning, Defining Success, Clarify and Prioritize, and Implement with Discipline.

If none of those chapters would have any use to you in your present life - congratulations. Buy the book and give it to someone less fortunate. In all seriousness, buy two books and keep one for yourself because you aren't being completely honest with yourself.

I have read quite a few books this past year for this blog - and none have been covered in highlight even half as much as this one. I lost count of the times that I thought "That's really good! I need to write that down!" Some examples:

- "(Don't miss) positive moments in life because (you) are busy trying to build a life that will be full of positive moments."

- "Think about work and vacation. How many people plan and think about their vacations while they are at work, then go on the vacations and think about work?'

- "Another part of the problem is not loving or appreciating ourselves. We know all our flaws. We see the same flaws in other people; and because we hate them in ourselves, we judge and hate them in others."

If I put all of the highlighted quotes - I would probably get in trouble for reprinting a quarter of the book. It's just that good.

I appreciate that White kept the book very readable. Books like this many times can get so technical to the point that they are useless, but this book does not have that affliction.

White also does a tremendous job supporting his book with a "Happiness App" that can be downloaded for free, a very nice website (http://connectinghappinessandsuccess....), and backs up his credentials by serving on the board of www.pursuit-of-happiness.org. Seeing all of this makes me want to quit my job and work with all of these happy people instead!

In conclusion, I would like to thank Ray White for the effort and work that went into this book. You created something that you can be proud of, that has changed the way that I look at some situations, and is truly a gift that you have given to anyone who invests the time to read it.

[Rheal · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received this book for free through Goodreads First Reads and honestly I doubt I would have read it otherwise. When I started Connecting Happiness and Success, I had a bit of trouble getting over how cliched the topic seemed to me. That being said, I think it is very well written and actually can be helpful. I have always been a very positive person and believed that we choose to be happy. I liked that the book focused so much on being happy and staying positive as a means to be successful, but I also think that it didn't focus on how happiness often is the goal. So many people think about making more money or doing well at work as the goal, but really those things are only valuable if they create a sense of happiness and improved well being.

One reason that Connecting Happiness and Success is a good self help book is that it has some pretty detailed steps and actions for the readers to take. The book doesn't simply say "be happier!" and leave it there, rather it helps the reader with tools to be more positive. Overall, this book was a good experience and I would recommend it to anyone who enjoys non-fiction or is a very self-award person.

[Richard Hill · Rating 5 out of 5]

A pretty intense read and therefore a bit slower for me to finish. I felt like much of what was said was important and quite a bit was original too. A concept that is presented in an original way - that happiness leads to success and not that success leads to happiness. This is basically the same as saying that material things don't bring happiness but a much more in depth explanation. Also included some good exercises on how to document your goals and many definitions of success.

[rooss Just · Rating 5 out of 5]

the best book!

[Victoria · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a good workshop book it list things to help you realize to be happy over the little things this will improve your quality of life change you perspective of life to a better lived one.