The road to happiness

I know what you're thinking. "But Harry, you're the AVGrump. What do you know about being happy?" Here's a little secret: the grump part was bestowed upon me and I consider myself more of a realist than anything else. I'm actually a pretty happy guy as a general rule. And I'm going to be sharing some ideas that have helped get me there. Today is all about not living like a slob, and taking some pride in your surroundings.

You've heard it from people before. Clean your room. Pick up after yourself. Were you born in a barn? Something we all should be thinking about is how we present ourselves to others. As I've spent the past year living on my own a few things have become clear. One of the big ones is clutter where you live tends to lead to clutter in your life in general. You need a place of order to retreat to when the world is crazy. Where you live should be calming, not just one more thing to get through until you can sleep.

Speaking of sleep, make your bed! It's a simple thing that takes like 2 minutes, but can set the tone for the day, and makes you feel better at night when you get ready to crawl into it. Think about staying in a hotel, and how nice it is to have a fresh made bed every evening. It's dirt easy to do this on your own and have that feeling every day. And as silly as it sounds, it's an accomplishment that you can achieve first thing in the morning, and sets you on a path to getting more accomplishments done throughout the day.

The same goes for the rest of your living area. I'm not saying you need to have a museum level clean and organize system in place, but you need to keep things tidy. It improves your mental state more than you would think. If you've got a bunch of stuff cluttering up your floors and living spaces, take as serious look at it and determine if you REALLY need it. Have you used it in the past year? The past 5 years? Ever since you bought it? Whatever your cutoff, it may be time to get rid of some things, and let someone else get the use out of them that you aren't. And it frees up space. If you live in an apartment, that's invaluable since space is at a premium. And besides, don't you want to be able to invite someone over to your place sometime and not be embarrassed? Keep it clean, and you won't have to do the 15 minute super clean when someone is coming over, and have that room that no one but you can really go in and survive. A weekly once over of cleaning the bathrooms, vacuuming the floors, running a duster over everything, and general tidying will make the rest of the week that much more enjoyable.

I'll be doing more tips on being happy in your life as these posts go on, so stay tuned and learn what I have learned.