Stumbling on Happiness

By: Daniel Gilbert

Narrated by: Daniel Gilbert

A smart and funny book by a prominent Harvard psychologist, which uses groundbreaking research and (often hilarious) anecdotes to show us why we’re so lousy at predicting what will make us happy–and what we can do about it.

Most of us spend our lives steering ourselves toward the best of all possible futures, only to find that tomorrow rarely turns out as we had expected. Why? As Harvard psychologist Daniel Gilbert explains, when people try to imagine what the future will hold, they make some basic and consistent mistakes. Just as memory plays tricks on us when we try to look backward in time, so does imagination play tricks when we try to look forward. Using cutting-edge research, much of it original, Gilbert shakes, cajoles, persuades, tricks and jokes us into accepting the fact that happiness is not really what or where we thought it was.

Among the unexpected questions he poses: Why are conjoined twins no less happy than the general population? When you go out to eat, is it better to order your favourite dish every time, or to try something new? If Ingrid Bergman hadn’t gotten on the plane at the end of Casablanca, would she and Bogey have been better off?

Smart, witty, accessible and laugh-out-loud funny, Stumbling on Happiness brilliantly describes all that science has to tell us about the uniquely human ability to envision the future, and how likely we are to enjoy it when we get there.

©2006 Daniel Gilbert (P)2006 Random House, Inc. Random House Audio, a division of Random House, Inc.

Critic reviews

“Stumbling on Happiness is an absolutely fantastic book that will shatter your most deeply held convictions about how your own mind works. Ceaselessly entertaining, Gilbert is the perfect guide to some of the most interesting psychological research ever performed. Think you know what makes you happy? You won’t know for sure until you have read this book.”–Steven D. Levitt, author of Freakonomics

“Everyone will enjoy reading this book, and some of us will wish we could have written it. You will rarely have a chance to learn so much about so important a topic while having so much fun.”–Professor Daniel Kahneman, Princeton University, Winner of the 2002 Nobel Prize in Economics

“This is a brilliant book, a useful book, and a book that could quite possibly change the way you look at just about everything. And as a bonus, Gilbert writes like a cross between Malcolm Gladwell and David Sedaris.” –Seth Godin, author All Marketers Are Liars

Insightful, funny must-read

Gilbert's book is fascinating, funny, and inspirational and should be read by everyone who wants to know more about human behavior or who wants to stimulate their brain a little. One of the first studies Gilbert mentions is one that showed how learning new information actually makes us humans happy. This was certainly the case for `Stumbling,' especially when you add all the witty personalized remarks about one's brother-in-law eating cheese dip on the couch and various other anecdotal comments to help prove his points. On the other hand, while most of the book focuses on fascinating psychological findings and scientific studies, he doesn't tie them in concretely to his ultimate conclusion of why people aren't happy when they think they're supposed to be.

Ironically, Gilbert falls into a trap, which he criticizes within his own book. Two-thirds into the book, the author notes that the ending of an event leaves a more permanent mark than the event as a whole, and this is the case especially when one is disappointed at the end of an event. Gilbert uses `Schindler's List' as an example of how the monologues at the end ruined a great film up until then. The author's memory of the entire film was negative due to this. Unfortunately, after a nearly flawless book, `Stumbling' suffers from a similarly marring section near the end. After fully explaining every point he has until the end, when the last section arrives, Gilbert throws in undeveloped ideas about making money and having children as the root of unhappiness in today's society. It's one of those instances where you can instantly come up with questions that would put his points in doubt.

I was conscious of his overpowering ending theory, however, and I refused to let this cloud my judgement of the entire book as a whole. What `Stumbling' can offer is too good to be tarnished by a last-minute unfounded theory.

Overall, however, this is a very good book.

Stumbling into Chaos

Alright, it wasn't chaos but I was so determined to understand where Daniel Gilbert wanted to take me that I went out and also bought the book as a guide to follow along while listening because the audiobook was a jumble of ideas, maps, models, data and concepts for me. I don't reccommend buying the hard copy book as well, it's just that I have a very stubborn streak when it comes to understanding what I invest my time and attention in, and, also, I never give up. The book is not about getting to happiness, but in a way it can take you to a point where you could see that getting to happiness is a wasted and unimportant effort anyway. Yeah, I know, it doesn't make sense, but it's the kind of book that becomes one piece of the larger puzzle in a quest to understand ourselves. Not a self help book by any means and I enjoyed it but not in the conventional sense of entertainment but more so in an ideas-retraining session. It was work for me and I consider myself a fairly erudite chap.

Wow

Incredible insights into how misguided our predictions on what will make us happy are. This book really encouraged me to change the way I was thinking.

Dan Deserves a Nobel

First:
Great Author. Great Narration.

Second:
Based on research and evidence Dan makes the case for how to be happy, and understand happiness. This is more than a self help book, it is a map to understanding the human condition and making the most of this whole "life" thing we are all trying to get a hang of.

No self help guide

By serendipity you sometimes collide with something that is both funny and scientifique not to mention thought-provoking ideas. In the 1980's the professors in my university didn't have that wittiness and eloquence of professor Daniel Gilbert.

good book. content is very interesting. narrator ir clear and easy to follow. brings up a lot of questions

Wowzers

Wow, what a book… I need to listen to that again, there was such a wealth of information. I always thought this book was going to be a lot more woowoo self-helpy, but was super science and studies and hella interesting. Amazing amount of nuggets you can think about and then work into your life.

Author reading the book was great and very entertaining. Overall with it being a lot more science-y, it was also never boring and delightfully funny.

Recommending to myself for a second (and third and forth and fifth…cont’d) listen

And to all y’all that are definitely in the self-help arena, but maybe need a little more science to help piece together some weirdness we all do (even when we know better)

Dry but worth reading

Honest assessment of human's shortcomings of imagination. He tells us how to overcome them but that we probably will not.

IDK

I don’t know? I thought the writer would be providing a better understanding,
towards ‘Happiness’, the Name. This book however, only left me with the notion, that we should not ‘imagine our future’ happiness. That left me feeling uncertain and UN-Happy.
Will be RETURNING this book.

Very insightful and inspiring

It might be very personal, but I found this book very insightful and inspiring. It doesn’t really solves anything and the points made could just be a few out of a bunch, but it gives you new perspectives on how our minds work and could bring to personal better strategies to cope with it and be happier with our realities. Maybe even shaping our lives a little bit more accordingly. Thanks Daniel!