The Happiness Year: How to Find Joy in Every Season

by Tara Ward

The Happiness Year encourages you to explore different ways of discovering happiness through each season and shows you how to nurture this in your everyday life. Seasons tend to be associated with certain spring with hope, summer with sociable relaxation, autumn with harvesting, winter with hibernating. The Happiness Year features a host of tips and exercises to encourage you to break away from certain patterns, including mindful breathing and meditation exercises to help you recharge and reflect, as well as simple projects and seasonal affirmations.

This uplifting book is for anyone seeking joy and wanting to explore the true meaning of happiness.

Genres: Nonfiction, Self Help, Lifestyle

128 pages, Hardcover

Published January 10, 2023

Reviews

[Jo Kneale · Rating 5 out of 5]

A lovely little book: each season has its pleasures, and Tara helps you to find the ones that are meaningful to you.
With every season looking at how to connect, to create, set intentions and reflect on the meaning of the season for you, this is not one of those self-help books full of ready made lists for you to follow (don't get me wrong: I love those too).

It's not a hard read and, yes, most of the ideas are common sense, but the book takes a more holistic look at finding happiness throughout the year, with ideas for journaling, meditating and exploring the sensory stimulations of each season.

The book is a beautiful experience as well, with good quality thick paper and a smooth hardback cover but most of all a range of full and half page illustrations by Ukrainian artist, Anastasia Stefurak. These are well worth perusing for the little details. The window view for each season had me from the start, catching some of the feeling and symbols for each one.

I've read the whole book a couple of times now, to review it for my blog, but I'll be popping back at the beginning of each season to read up on the ideas and to adopt a couple of affirmations for each season. For Winter, I am adopting "Every day I renew myself" and "I nurture myself every day."

If I have to make any criticism, it is that I would have liked the option to download the meditations and guided visualisations as sound or video files. That's just an itch, though, not a major missing point.

[Naomi · Rating 3 out of 5]

2,75*

Prachtige illustraties, maar veel te zweverig advies

[Nadia · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF, I find self-hugging, affirmations etc completely ridiculous.

[Eileen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ein wunderschönes Buch über die vier Jahreszeiten. Es bietet Tipps und Erklärungen, wie man die Jahreszeiten für sich gut nutzen kann, um zu entspannen, zu reflektieren und Freude zu empfinden. Daher finde ich den Titel des Buches auch sehr gelungen.

Beendet habe ich es heute mit dem Winter, der aktuell auch herrscht und daher das Thema „slowly“ beinhaltet. Es ist sehr entschleunigend und bietet eine große Vielfalt an verschiedenen Möglichkeiten zB meditieren, malen, Zeit mit Freunden, Rezepte etc.

Auch die anderen Jahreszeiten fand ich passend gestaltet.

Mir hat das Buch sehr gefallen. Ich werde es zum Wechsel der Jahreszeiten auch wieder zur Hand nehmen und wieder darin blättern, um ein wenig me time zu genießen und ein paar Minuten abzuschalten.

[Jonathan Farrell · Rating 4 out of 5]

A cozy read which examines each season along with its unique pleasures. A guide to connect, to create, set intentions and reflect on the meaning of the season for you. The illustrations are a beautiful addition that helps bring each season to life. Easy to read, re-read, and reference. I'll be pulling this one out again at the start of each season for some gentle reminders.

[Cassie Stevens · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a beautiful book with the most amazing illstructions to support the content. It would be perfect for a coffee table book or a gift for someone.

I love the concept but it was focused on the seasons around a northern hemisphere so they didn't quite align for me being in the southern.

It was an easy read with lots of suggestions on to create joy and happiness including meditations and activities throughout the year.

I personally loved the affirmations for each season.

The sweetest little book. :)

[Carla C · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Happiness Year by Tara Ward is a beautifully illustrated book that combines feel-good advice with meditation and mindfulness practices for each season. The stunning illustrations bring the essence of spring, summer, autumn, and winter to life, making the reading experience truly come alive.

[Michayla Peters · Rating 2 out of 5]

Overall, I was not impressed by this book. It seemed very formulaic. It was a nice reminder of things to do in order to increase happiness throughout the year. I did like the structure of the book and the artwork. I just felt like it was repetitive and I didn’t receive any new information.

[Svetlana Ivanova · Rating 1 out of 5]

Beautiful illustrations, loved them..the book itself is just common sense ideas put together in 4 chapters.

[Donna]

Divided by seasons, Tara Ward’s “The Happiness Year” offers suggestions, prompts, affirmations, and rituals to connection with each season.

[Chrysti Becker · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some good tips and takeaways. It all seemed familiar though.

[Allison Buie · Rating 2 out of 5]

The illustrations and the simple idea of ritual building before each season of the year is great.. However, this book was just missing any kind of real substance beyond that.

[MADHAVI SONI · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nice ,calm Book to read

[Angela Ellis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read each section over the course of the year. Love stuff like this.