A study to be published in next month’s Journal of Research in Personality has found that having lots of money, good looks, or fame won’t necessarily improve your life.

The new study by three University of Rochester researchers demonstrates that pursuing money, beauty and success can actually make you less happy.

The study shows that it is important to have goals but that not all goals are created equal.

Pursuing goals of wealth and fame don’t necessarily contribute to having a satisfying life.

What’s more important is growing as an individual, having loving relationships, and contributing to your community.

The research tracked 147 alumni from two universities during their second year after graduation.

They assessed participants in satisfaction with life, self-esteem, anxiety, physical signs of stress, and the experience of positive and negative emotions.

The research showed that the more committed a person is to a goal, the greater the likelihood of success.

But the analysis showed that getting what you want is not always good for you.

Reaching materialistic and image-related goals can actually decrease your wellbeing.

The study found that these people experienced more negative emotions like shame and anger and
more physical symptoms of anxiety such as headaches, stomachaches, and loss of energy.

By contrast, people who valued personal growth, close relationships, community involvement, and physical health were more satisfied when they reached their goals.

They experienced a deeper sense of well-being, more positive feelings toward themselves, richer connections with others, and fewer physical signs of stress.

According to the researchers, striving for wealth and fame doesn’t satisfy deep human needs.

But building lasting and caring relationships does.

My dad passed away a week ago after a long battle with cancer.

I’m still understanding what it means to me and my life to lose a parent.

I only began truly appreciating my parents, and all they have done for me, when I became a parent myself almost 6 years ago.

As parents we often do what we do without much recognition.  And I certainly took my parents for granted.

But when I knew my dad had terminal cancer, I realised it was an opportunity to think about what my dad meant to me, and to recognise his impact on my life.

And it was also an opportunity to tell him - before it was too late.

A year ago I wrote my dad a gratitude letter.  I wrote about why I was grateful that he was my dad.  Then I gave him the letter.

It was the same letter that my brother read out at my dad’s eulogy.  But fortunately, this was a eulogy that my dad had already heard.

In the gratitude letter, I told him that:

He taught me the value of setting goals, and working hard to achieve them.

He instilled in me a strong sense of family and the importance of being there for each other.

He had been himself - and he taught me the importance of me being myself.

I also told him that I loved him very, very much.

My parents have always been around to help and support me.  Always.

Whenever I needed anything I could call or visit.

Now I can’t go and visit my dad anymore.

If I need him, I’ll have to reach him in my dreams or in my thoughts or in my heart.

It is a huge loss. But I am very grateful that he was my dad.  Very grateful indeed.

Antwerp train station in Belguim erupted in song and dance recently.

This is a truly joyous video.

And makes commuting so much more palatable.

By Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

Hah. It’s really quite preposterous for me to offer up a tips list on this subject. A tendency to fly off the handle is one of my most disagreeable and persistent traits, and something I battle with - largely unsuccessfully - every day. For me, anger is the most tempting of the seven deadly sins. At best, you could describe me as “edgy.”

This list shows the strategies I try to use to keep myself patient and mild-mannered, but I certainly can’t claim that they’ve been wholly successful. I still lose my temper far too often; however, I do think I’m doing a better job than I would be if I weren’t following these tips:

1. Pay attention to my body.

Being too cold, too hot, and especially being too hungry, makes me far more irritable.

2. Don’t drink.

I basically gave up drinking because alcohol makes me so belligerent.

3. Acknowledge the reality of other people’s feelings

(usually this arises with my husband or daughters). Instead of snapping back answers like “I don’t want to hear a lot of whining” or “It’s not that big a deal,” I try to show that I understand what someone is saying.

4. Be realistic.

For instance, I often get irritated when someone interrupts me when I’m reading — but I should know better than to try to read the newspaper during my daughters’ Saturday morning breakfast. Of course I’m going to get interrupted.

5. Don’t expect praise or appreciation.

I often feel irritated when someone (usually my husband) doesn’t notice and praise some effort on my part. For example, when I went out of town last week, I got my older daughter completely organized for a field trip before I left. I snapped at my husband because he didn’t appreciate this Herculean accomplishment on my part.

6. Squelch my reaction.

Not expressing anger often allows it to dissipate. I have trouble with this in person, but often manage to do it if it involves email; the deliberate effort of writing an irritated email often gives me the opportunity to decide not to send it. I find it tougher to bite back an angry retort — but I’m working on it. When I can manage, acting the way I want to feel always helps me to change my feelings.

7. Make a joke.

Okay, some of these strategies are more fantasy than reality, but on the rare occasion when I do manage to make a joke during a moment of irritation, it works beautifully to lighten the mood.

8. Try not to be defensive.

Many of my most harsh reactions are triggered by some kind of accusation - that I did something wrong, that I did something rude, that I screwed up in some way. If I can admit to fault, or let it go, I can lighten my anger. My anger is tied to my pride, and pride is something I’ve been thinking a lot about lately.

In my case, as this list shows, anger stems from a tendency toward perfectionism. I want to control things, have events unfold exactly as I want, have people behave exactly as I direct, and get lots of credit for everything I do. Surprise! That’s not how the world works.

What strategies have I missed? What helps you defuse anger and irritability?

By Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project