Happy Ever After [eBook - NC Digital Library] : Escaping The Myth of The Perfect Life

'A passionate, provocative book. It isn't just a self-help book. It is a manifesto for a better society' Sunday Times 'One of the most rigorous articulations of the new mood of acceptance...a persuasive demolition of many of our cultural stories about how we ought to live' Oliver Burkeman, Guardian Paul Dolan, the bestselling author of Happiness by Design , shows us how to escape the myth of perfection and find our own route to happiness. Be ambitious; find everlasting love; look after your health ... There are countless stories about how we ought to live our lives. These narratives can make our lives easier, and they might sometimes make us happier too. But they can also trap us and those around us. In Happy Ever After , bestselling happiness expert Professor Paul Dolan draws on a variety of studies ranging over wellbeing, inequality and discrimination to bust the common myths about our sources of happiness. He shows that there can be many unexpected paths to lasting fulfilment. Some of these might involve not going into higher education, choosing not to marry, rewarding acts rooted in self-interest and caring a little less about living forever. By freeing ourselves from the myth of the perfect life, we might each find a life worth living. In his provocative new book, Paul Dolan, the bestselling author of Happiness by Design, uncovers the truth behind the harmful narratives that have dictated our lives for far too long. Drawing on pioneering research and data, Dolan reveals that these narratives, more often than not, can lead us to feel anxious, inadequate and trapped. With straight-talking wisdom, he invites us to reappraise the values we hold dearest, to free our minds from the shackles of convention and to write our own version of the good life, based on maximising positive, meaningful experiences that can generate new social benefits, not least greater tolerance for different ways of life. By escaping narrative traps, he shows, you can make your own happy ending