The Unexpected Joy of the Ordinary: In Celebration of Being Average

Product Information

In the book, we’ll combat this negativity bias, and look at all the reasons to be positive instead. She made it her mission to learn how to be default happy rather than default disgruntled – RADIO 4 – WOMAN’S HOUR I didn’t expect my quest for the ultimate extraordinary night out to birth an alcohol addiction. If I was bored, I didn’t go home. I drank more, in an attempt to salvage this faceplant of a night. Just one more drink, bar, dance. I didn’t expect to not be able to make a relationship last more than three years. My friends were getting engaged, starting families even, and had climbed on the property ladder thanks to parents handing them deposits, or the bittersweet windfall of inheritance, and in comparison, I felt like the very definition of a loser. On my 27th birthday, my mates made me a birthday book which they all wrote and drew in; all of the doodles of me starred wine and cigarettes. Later that night, I would chip my front tooth by drunkenly falling into a front door. When you first meet your partner, they're amazing, everything's fresh and new and wild. But you inevitably ‘hedonically adapt’ to them. Even if you're dating Liam Hemsworth or Mila Kunis. So as long as you know that no matter who you're with that's going to happen, then you can adjust your expectations.” Losing a parent was not, it turned out, the melodrama I expected, in which life screeched to a halt. Plus, we had this godforsaken memorial to organize now…”

Is there anything better than a self help book that just reinforces you're doing everything right (aka, stamps approval on your personal beliefs)? Well, probably a holiday in Bali is better, but you don't get many of those, whereas the pleasure of a self help book agreeing with you is there for the taking. The point of this book is to appreciate the small ordinary things in life because, you know, there's a lot of them in our daily lives, and if we ignore them in favour of always wanting the holiday, the bigger house, the better car, we will spend our time miserable and unsatisfied. Make your own satisfaction, actually appreciate what you've got and what's around you, and use the strength that brings as a springboard to change the things that actually do need changing. It’s no secret that I’m a fan of the self-help genre. I’ve read how to not give a f*** with Manson, understood the ways of a calm life with Fearne Cotton and even tried finding the clothes that spark joy with Marie. However, admittedly, nothing hit the mark as well as Catherine Gray’s The Unexpected Joy of the Ordinary; a book that puts into practice the ways to find the pleasure in the ordinary and understand the psychology behind our need for the extraordinary— or just more. And one night, I got into a bathtub with a kitchen knife at 3am, inconsolable, and willed myself to do something. I lay there for an hour, until the water was goosebump cold. For that hour, I existed in between two worlds; not wanting to live, yet not being able to do what was necessary to die. This is a tough one to review, because had I been looking for a self-help book I would likely have been more prone to valuing this book - however, it was chosen as a "memoir" for our book club. While it is the story of the author's journey towards happiness and better mental health, I'm not sure memoir is the best category for it. That being said, while there wasn't much information that was new to me here, there were some good reminders about appreciating the every day joys and finding peace with your lot in life. I appreciated some of the research that was presented (again, mostly not new to me, but nicely summarized). My book club agreed that this book is likely to be more profound for those under the age of 40, who may not be as familiar with some of the information that Ms. Gray presents. The author is ignorant and uninformed in the areas she is trying to speak on, which we learn is because she actively avoids consuming the news or anything else that might be upsetting. Her perspective is ego-centric, and she is unaware of how life outside the upper-middle class looks.

Being thankful for the little things can be life-changing

Most of life is workaday, humdrum and pedestrian. So why not embrace the joy of the ordinary? We've got nothing to lose. She made it her mission to learn how to be default happy rather than default disgruntled - RADIO 4 - WOMAN'S HOUR Thankfully, modern life isn’t nearly so dangerous. But evolution moves slowly, and your amygdala is still scanning for threats. The author, for instance, often feels threatened when she finds herself in busy subway stations. The reason is simple: her amygdala is warning her that there are no plants or water sources around, so she might have a problem finding sustenance.

Overall, I gave this book one star because I didn’t like the author’s tone or messaging. There were many assumptions and generalizations made and not enough specifics provided. It was difficult to humanize and connect with the author. Most importantly, I didn’t get the sense the author wrote this book with a sincere intention to help readers better themselves. The layout of this book was awkward to read. I stopped reading the “Odes to…” because they were tiringly descriptive and added nothing of value to the book. I found them a bit odd, and their sunny disposition was polarizing compared to the author’s otherwise bitter tone. They were also detached from the chapter goals. So, what's the answer? The Unexpected Joy of the Ordinary theorizes that the solution is rediscovering the joy in the ordinary that we so often now forget to feel. Because we now expect the pleasure of a croissant, a hot shower, a yoga class, someone delivering our shopping to our door, we no longer feel its buzz. The joy of it whips through us like a bullet train, without pause. I particularly liked the observation that the best way to cope with something non-horrific going badly wrong is to think how you'll tell it as a funny story afterwards. Again, this is because I 100% agree. Some of my favourite holiday memories with my husband are exactly this, things going ludicrously wrong, and the pair of us laughing till we cried. Do not ask me about the toilet incident in Mumbai station, or Escape from the Noto Peninsula.I’m exercising for my health and not just for weight loss. I’ve long associated the gym and exercise etc with me needing to lose weight. I love exercise so much more now that I see it in a different light. And I do genuinely feel better for moving my body- so this book has helped me to focus on that positive feeling rather than on the ‘must lose weight’ angry chimp in my head. Interesting and joyful. Lights a path that could help us to build resilience against society’s urging to compare life milestones with peers – LANCET PSYCHIATRY In recovering, I learned how to mine the wonder in the workaday. Simply by doing one thing. Writing at least five gratitudes, daily. (I nearly put myself to sleep writing that last line.) Gratitude-ing has been so done to death it has become clichéd. Yet it was one of the most transformative daily practices I’ve ever adopted. I was always wanting, striving, seeking the extraordinary, but when I was in the extraordinary, I wanted it to be more extraordinary. I thought people who were happy with their lot were dim nitwits who had had the wool pulled over their eyes, settled for the substandard and would never reach the peaks that I would scale via the crampons of my choosiness.