Three quick routes to happiness and even delight

On kindredness, the Mount Everest strategy - and the best kind of exercise for instant happiness

I’ve been saving this one to share with you, for the right moment - and just realized that this is the same artist I’ve been recommending for the last 2 weeks: the wonderful Kaoru Yamada, whose work you can follow here

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Hi everyone,

Today’s Kindred Letter will be (relatively) short and sweet. I just want to share three pathways I’ve found that lead reliably to happiness and even delight.

1. Kindred discoveries. Every so often I come across an artist-writer-creative-person whose view of the world is so kindred, yet so quirkily unique, that I feel a kind of exultant thrill at the discovery, and at the knowledge that this person exists, followed by an urge to share this finding with everyone I know (in this case, you) who might enjoy it too.

So here is Boze Herrington, whom I don’t know personally but his Twitter-X bio says that he posts “quality tweets for the old soul.”

Here he is, sharing his own personal happiness trick, of remembering how unlikely it is that we’re here at all. (And Boze, if you’re reading - I’m drinking coffee as I type this, and raise my mug to you.)

And here’s another one from Boze, on dream jobs (this one seems a fitting follow-up to my most recent Kindred Letter - “Do you wonder whether you’ve achieved enough in life?”)

2. Exercise. Yes, exercise. I know that’s boring and you hear it everywhere, but did you know that doing the right KIND of exercise is more effective than medication and therapy at reducing mild-to-moderate anxiety and depression?