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Happy: The Journal — A Chance to Write Joy Into Every Day and Let Go of Perfect
"Bestselling journal from Mind ambassador Fearne Cotton, featuring ideas to help you unlock that inner happiness throughout the year." — The Telegraph
This book is open, and it's all about you! It's a retreat and a safe haven from the stresses of everyday life, a place to work through your problems and confide your worries, fears, and secrets. It offers you a chance to focus on life's positive aspects and find the things that make you happy.
Each page of this daily journal is filled with new ideas, creative prompts, and words of wisdom that will help you write a little joy into every day of the year. The ideal place to express what's happening in your life — bitter, sweet, and everything in between — this book promises to be your faithful friend and assist you in finding and unlocking your inner happiness.
"A stunning journal. The prompts are productive too as, even if I feel like there hasn't been anything noteworthy, there's still an opportunity to reflect and plan ahead." — A Cornish Geek
"A great way of winding down, taking stock, and reflecting on all the different aspects of your life. You're encouraged to dip into the pages as often or little as you like. It's also full of words of wisdom from Fearne that are sure to raise a smile. Her artwork is also completely stunning." — Book People
This book is open, and it's all about you! It's a retreat and a safe haven from the stresses of everyday life, a place to work through your problems and confide your worries, fears, and secrets. It offers you a chance to focus on life's positive aspects and find the things that make you happy.
Each page of this daily journal is filled with new ideas, creative prompts, and words of wisdom that will help you write a little joy into every day of the year. The ideal place to express what's happening in your life — bitter, sweet, and everything in between — this book promises to be your faithful friend and assist you in finding and unlocking your inner happiness.
"A stunning journal. The prompts are productive too as, even if I feel like there hasn't been anything noteworthy, there's still an opportunity to reflect and plan ahead." — A Cornish Geek
"A great way of winding down, taking stock, and reflecting on all the different aspects of your life. You're encouraged to dip into the pages as often or little as you like. It's also full of words of wisdom from Fearne that are sure to raise a smile. Her artwork is also completely stunning." — Book People
- GenresJournalNonfiction
256 pages, Paperback
Published December 28, 2018
About the author
Fearne Cotton
69 books389 followersFearne has been presenting live TV since the age of 15 when she was spotted by ITV’s ‘Disney Club’.
Her warmth, natural interview skills and ability to make presenting live TV seem effortless and has given her the opportunity to present a variety of shows over the years.
Fearne is currently back in her role as team captain on the 16th series of Celebrity Juice, a show that continues to be a ratings winner for ITV2. Other shows include Children in Need Rocks, The Happiness Project, Fearne & Gok: Off The Rails, The BBC Music Awards, Top of the Pops with Reggie Yates, ‘Fearne and McBusted’ and a Coldplay special for Sky Arts amongst many others.
In addition to TV Fearne is hugely credible in the music genre. In 2005 she joined Radio 1 where she spent 10 incredible years, initially co-hosting morning shows with Reggie Yates and then moving onto the UK Top 40 show before taking over the prestigious weekday morning slot in 2009; here she mixed big celebrity interviews with exclusive acoustic performances in the Live Lounge. The show attracted over 4 million listeners and in 2012 she won a Sony Gold Award for the show.
Alongside TV & Radio Fearne is incredibly creative and has designed several seasons of a home wear range for very.co.uk, curated 13 seasons of her own very.co.uk clothing range and previously released her own make-up and toiletry ranges for Boots. Fearne currently enjoys working alongside Cath Kidston and Garnier Olia and is also a brand ambassador for BaByliss, where she creates a series of ‘Get the Look’ videos and tutorials, recreating her go-to styles using BaByliss tools.
In social media, Fearne has over 7 million Twitter followers and a combined Facebook and Instagram following of over 2.2 million with live, innovative content around her programming and off-air projects, ranking her amongst the world’s top 250 most influential Tweeters.
An enthusiastic cook, Fearne released her first cookbook in June 2016: Cook Happy, Cook Health. Her next book, Happy, talks about her own experiences of happiness (including some of the not-so-happy ones), and was published February 2017. Fearne's third book, Cook. Eat. Love, was published in June 2017.
Work aside, Fearne is a mother of 2 and continues to find time to support a range of charities with seemingly no challenge too big for her, whether it be climbing Kilimanjaro for Comic Relief, or trekking the Inca Trail for Breast Cancer Care. Fearne is an ambassador for The Prince’s Trust and also a patron for Post Pals, Tyler’s Trust and Coppafeel!, the latter of which she curates the charity’s music festival, FESTIFEEL.
Her warmth, natural interview skills and ability to make presenting live TV seem effortless and has given her the opportunity to present a variety of shows over the years.
Fearne is currently back in her role as team captain on the 16th series of Celebrity Juice, a show that continues to be a ratings winner for ITV2. Other shows include Children in Need Rocks, The Happiness Project, Fearne & Gok: Off The Rails, The BBC Music Awards, Top of the Pops with Reggie Yates, ‘Fearne and McBusted’ and a Coldplay special for Sky Arts amongst many others.
In addition to TV Fearne is hugely credible in the music genre. In 2005 she joined Radio 1 where she spent 10 incredible years, initially co-hosting morning shows with Reggie Yates and then moving onto the UK Top 40 show before taking over the prestigious weekday morning slot in 2009; here she mixed big celebrity interviews with exclusive acoustic performances in the Live Lounge. The show attracted over 4 million listeners and in 2012 she won a Sony Gold Award for the show.
Alongside TV & Radio Fearne is incredibly creative and has designed several seasons of a home wear range for very.co.uk, curated 13 seasons of her own very.co.uk clothing range and previously released her own make-up and toiletry ranges for Boots. Fearne currently enjoys working alongside Cath Kidston and Garnier Olia and is also a brand ambassador for BaByliss, where she creates a series of ‘Get the Look’ videos and tutorials, recreating her go-to styles using BaByliss tools.
In social media, Fearne has over 7 million Twitter followers and a combined Facebook and Instagram following of over 2.2 million with live, innovative content around her programming and off-air projects, ranking her amongst the world’s top 250 most influential Tweeters.
An enthusiastic cook, Fearne released her first cookbook in June 2016: Cook Happy, Cook Health. Her next book, Happy, talks about her own experiences of happiness (including some of the not-so-happy ones), and was published February 2017. Fearne's third book, Cook. Eat. Love, was published in June 2017.
Work aside, Fearne is a mother of 2 and continues to find time to support a range of charities with seemingly no challenge too big for her, whether it be climbing Kilimanjaro for Comic Relief, or trekking the Inca Trail for Breast Cancer Care. Fearne is an ambassador for The Prince’s Trust and also a patron for Post Pals, Tyler’s Trust and Coppafeel!, the latter of which she curates the charity’s music festival, FESTIFEEL.
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
January 8, 2019
What a little gem! I love the idea of journaling but I struggle with knowing where to start. Happy: The Journal is a guided daily journal with thoughtful prompts to get you writing, reflecting and planning.
I immediately ordered a hard copy of this journal so I could get started. It starts in January and leads you through the year with timely journaling prompts that have a great balance between gratitude, reflection and goal setting. There is a adequate space to write without it feeling overwhelming. This is a great guided journal for someone who wants to get started with daily journaling and I highly recommend. Thank you to NetGalley and Dover Publishing for this copy, all opinions are my own.
I immediately ordered a hard copy of this journal so I could get started. It starts in January and leads you through the year with timely journaling prompts that have a great balance between gratitude, reflection and goal setting. There is a adequate space to write without it feeling overwhelming. This is a great guided journal for someone who wants to get started with daily journaling and I highly recommend. Thank you to NetGalley and Dover Publishing for this copy, all opinions are my own.
December 18, 2018
Fearne Cotton gives the best description of this journal on the cover: “A chance to write joy into every day and let go of perfect” It is a journal that is so much more than blank pages. I don’t know about you, but I have journals that have more empty than full pages. January starts out fine, but about spring my inspiration gives way to spring, then summer and dribbles down to nothing the rest of the year.
Happy will inspire and encourage you to not only journal, but will help you embrace the joy in your life. Sometimes the joy in everyday life is hard to find when you are living it. Looking back to crazy days when my kids were little and money was tight I can see the joy now, but then it was hard to embrace.
There are no blank pages staring at you when you open Happy. January 1st begins with the simple instruction: “Time for that cosmic order list. Write out your wish list for the year ahead….but as if each one WILL happen.” How cool is that!? Every page has some type of inspiration to keep you feeling positive about your day, and consequently your life.
Some days you are asked to doodle a picture. Don’t worry, no one will see it if you make a stick figure or paint a Picasso. This is your journal to keep to yourself or share. Too often we are too hard on ourselves. This journal may give you the inspiration and encouragement to believe in yourself and become someone who is happy more often than not. Who knows what goals you can accomplish in 2019 and beyond? Sometimes we just need that Happy push to make some dreams come true.
There are also full pages of important things to contemplate each month – I like to think of them as profound billboards – throughout the book. A few of my favorites include the following:
“The first step in getting what you want is getting rid of the things you don’t want”
“Happiness is handmade”
“Don’t call it a dream, call it a plan”
With January right around the corner, this is the perfect time to order this book. But there isn’t a year anywhere on this book so if you start it in August and let it roll into a different year, go for it! These are your dreams, your goals and your joy to find in your own way.
DISCLOSURE OF MATERIAL CONNECTION: I have a material connection because I received a review copy from Dover Publications in exchange for a fair and honest review.
Happy will inspire and encourage you to not only journal, but will help you embrace the joy in your life. Sometimes the joy in everyday life is hard to find when you are living it. Looking back to crazy days when my kids were little and money was tight I can see the joy now, but then it was hard to embrace.
There are no blank pages staring at you when you open Happy. January 1st begins with the simple instruction: “Time for that cosmic order list. Write out your wish list for the year ahead….but as if each one WILL happen.” How cool is that!? Every page has some type of inspiration to keep you feeling positive about your day, and consequently your life.
Some days you are asked to doodle a picture. Don’t worry, no one will see it if you make a stick figure or paint a Picasso. This is your journal to keep to yourself or share. Too often we are too hard on ourselves. This journal may give you the inspiration and encouragement to believe in yourself and become someone who is happy more often than not. Who knows what goals you can accomplish in 2019 and beyond? Sometimes we just need that Happy push to make some dreams come true.
There are also full pages of important things to contemplate each month – I like to think of them as profound billboards – throughout the book. A few of my favorites include the following:
“The first step in getting what you want is getting rid of the things you don’t want”
“Happiness is handmade”
“Don’t call it a dream, call it a plan”
With January right around the corner, this is the perfect time to order this book. But there isn’t a year anywhere on this book so if you start it in August and let it roll into a different year, go for it! These are your dreams, your goals and your joy to find in your own way.
DISCLOSURE OF MATERIAL CONNECTION: I have a material connection because I received a review copy from Dover Publications in exchange for a fair and honest review.
December 16, 2017
I won't be making entries until the new year but on looking through this book/journal is a brilliant accompaniment to the Happy book, a way of following certain prompts and writing thoughts around feeling happiness and mindfulness each day
January 4, 2024
I love the production quality of this book: the months are each a different pleasing color of paper (each page is colored paper, why don’t more books have colored paper? It’s awesome), the paper is high enough quality to take a fine nib fountain pen without bleed through, there is plenty of room to write a few sentences every day unless you write very large, and there are extra pages in the back for expounding on themes that resonated with you or taking notes. It is very reasonably priced from Dover publications.
I enjoyed using the book daily for the past year, but with the big caveat that I am severely disabled by severe myalgic encephalomyelitis, one of the most debilitating illnesses a person can get. I used to read and write all the time, but now I can manage at most a few sentences a day. This diary was a good fit for only being able to write a sentence or two a day, but very often the prompts were impossible for me. The author definitely assumes that you are able bodied, and even for most people with illnesses or disabilities, this won’t be an issue (again, M.E. is much more incapacitating than most other medical conditions), but it left me out much of the time. I kept thinking “that’s a great idea, but I cannot do that” as I can’t leave my house, socialize, or basically do anything I want to do. The author also assumes on a handful of occasions that you are a mother, a person with close friends, and are a Christian. I am none of those things, but at least there were only a few prompts that assumed the reader is those things.
I definitely recommend this book to people who like journals with daily prompts, as it’s a great idea overall, even if you can’t respond to every prompt (and if you’re not someone with severe ME, I bet you’ll be able to respond to nearly all of them).
I enjoyed using the book daily for the past year, but with the big caveat that I am severely disabled by severe myalgic encephalomyelitis, one of the most debilitating illnesses a person can get. I used to read and write all the time, but now I can manage at most a few sentences a day. This diary was a good fit for only being able to write a sentence or two a day, but very often the prompts were impossible for me. The author definitely assumes that you are able bodied, and even for most people with illnesses or disabilities, this won’t be an issue (again, M.E. is much more incapacitating than most other medical conditions), but it left me out much of the time. I kept thinking “that’s a great idea, but I cannot do that” as I can’t leave my house, socialize, or basically do anything I want to do. The author also assumes on a handful of occasions that you are a mother, a person with close friends, and are a Christian. I am none of those things, but at least there were only a few prompts that assumed the reader is those things.
I definitely recommend this book to people who like journals with daily prompts, as it’s a great idea overall, even if you can’t respond to every prompt (and if you’re not someone with severe ME, I bet you’ll be able to respond to nearly all of them).
December 31, 2018
I'm really excited to start this! Yes, I haven't started it yet. So why is it marked as "Finished", you ask? Well, because I've read the preface and feel I've skimmed the journal enough to feel I have a good enough grasp on it to rate it.
You see, this is an actual journal. It starts on January 1st and has entries for everyday of the year. Entries have writing, drawing, or idea prompts such as "Recall a moment that was full to the brim of pure love. I love reminiscing about good times drenched in love. Happiness floods in." (February 11) or "Create something today. It can be a drawing, a story or an idea in your head for something new. Get creative, and feel the flow." (September 5).
This seems like a really nice way to reassess and take stock of yourself throughout the year. Like I said, I'm really excited to start on January 1st and see how it goes. It looks really promising.
So think of this review as more of an initial reaction. At the end of 2019, I plan on doing an updated review with my final thoughts.
**I received this copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review**
You see, this is an actual journal. It starts on January 1st and has entries for everyday of the year. Entries have writing, drawing, or idea prompts such as "Recall a moment that was full to the brim of pure love. I love reminiscing about good times drenched in love. Happiness floods in." (February 11) or "Create something today. It can be a drawing, a story or an idea in your head for something new. Get creative, and feel the flow." (September 5).
This seems like a really nice way to reassess and take stock of yourself throughout the year. Like I said, I'm really excited to start on January 1st and see how it goes. It looks really promising.
So think of this review as more of an initial reaction. At the end of 2019, I plan on doing an updated review with my final thoughts.
**I received this copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review**
January 16, 2019
I received this book as an ARC from Dover Publications in exchange for an honest review. Opinions and thoughts expressed in this review are completely my own.
I was excited to read this book because it reflected implementation of positive and happy thoughts in your everyday life. I also love that there is a positive quote after everyday of the week to get your mind set on a positive outlook right before you journal. Also I love how the pages were designed with bright pastel colors. It reminds you of a bright beautiful sunny day and there is nothing more positive than that.
We will consider adding this book to our Self-Help section at our library. That is why we give this book 5 stars.
I was excited to read this book because it reflected implementation of positive and happy thoughts in your everyday life. I also love that there is a positive quote after everyday of the week to get your mind set on a positive outlook right before you journal. Also I love how the pages were designed with bright pastel colors. It reminds you of a bright beautiful sunny day and there is nothing more positive than that.
We will consider adding this book to our Self-Help section at our library. That is why we give this book 5 stars.
July 9, 2020
This is such a wonderful book about how the author dealt and still dealing with anxiety and depression.
It is so good that you can learn from the person living it and not just by specialists. It taught me new techniques to deal with things and to have a positive atittude all the time even if it is difficult, and to surrond myself in love - from friends, family.
Lovely book!
Thank you for sharing your path and to help us to learn from it!
You can check my favourite quotes on my twitter and instagram - claraiferreira
It is so good that you can learn from the person living it and not just by specialists. It taught me new techniques to deal with things and to have a positive atittude all the time even if it is difficult, and to surrond myself in love - from friends, family.
Lovely book!
Thank you for sharing your path and to help us to learn from it!
You can check my favourite quotes on my twitter and instagram - claraiferreira
January 14, 2018
Again not really finished but I am trying to complete an entry every day - so far so good and finished it enjoyable, thought provoking, calming (which is what I wanted to achieve), inspirational and a help in the daily stresses of life.I am finding it really calming to write my thoughts & feelings as well as achievements however small down - its helping to declutter my mind! Love the tips, comments & illustrations. I hope I continue to use this.
January 17, 2018
This journal is truly amazing. Helps to get your thoughts in order and put things into perspective. This is going to be on my Christmas wish list every year!!
November 1, 2019
I love the idea of this book but I just didn’t get on with it.
September 11, 2020
I think this would make a good gift. It was useful to be able to dip into it, and did have some insightful ideas.
January 10, 2021
An uplifting/self development book. It got me in a positive mindset.
January 14, 2019
Honest and in-depth advice for reaching your full potential. This advice is presented in easy to follow language that can be broken up and applied in pieces at a time.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews