The Post-College Guide to Happiness Blog Tour! Guest Post and Giveaway! Win Books or a Kindle Fire!

Bryan Cohen here, guest poster and author, promoting my new book The Post-College Guide to Happiness for The Happiness Blog Tour. I'm giving away free digital review copies of the book and doing a giveaway for paperback copies, audio copies and even a Kindle Fire! Read on and check out the info below the post.

"If we are not happy and joyous at this season, for what other season shall we wait and for what other time shall we look?"

- Abdul-Baha



Choosing Now

When are we supposed to be happy? We like to set these points in our lives that author Marci Shimoff calls, "I'll be happy when" points in time. We think we'll be happy when we graduate or when we get married. In actuality, the best way to measure your future prospect for happiness is how happy you are now. Now, you may be thinking that this means you're doomed if you're not currently happy. Don't worry. You aren't doomed. But you aren't going to magically become happy because of some circumstances. If you aren't happy currently, it shows that to be happy in the future you're going to need to actively work on your levels of happiness.

Does this surprise you? I mean, most things in our lives require us to put in little bits of effort every day over time. If you want to save money, you need to avoid large bursts of spending and you need to keep an eye on what you buy. If you want to keep a healthy weight, you need to eat healthily and exercise as often as you can. If you want to be happier, you need to put in effort in several key areas. For the purposes of this blog post, I'll call them attitude, gratitude and latitude.

1. Attitude – Work on how you treat people and how you react to your circumstances. If you let your emotions overwhelm you, it's time to test out your logic and your control. Those who improve their attitudes tend to be more successful and happier.

2. Gratitude – So what if you don't have everything you want? You probably have most of what you need and you certainly have a lot more than other people. It's time to show some gratitude for your current possessions and situation. Even if things are worse than usual, you probably have a lot to be thankful for.

3. Latitude – By latitude, I'm talking about leeway. You need to work on how much you let things get to you. If you complain about the bad things that happen to you too often, you'll damage your happiness levels. If you blame your circumstances and other people for mistakes that you should own up to, you'll likewise take your joy down a notch.

If you work on these three key areas, you are much more likely to be happy in this current season. And if you put in the effort now, you'll be even happier when that big event works out in your favor later on.


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Bryan Cohen is a writer, actor and comedian from Dresher, Pennsylvania. He graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2005 with degrees in English and Dramatic Art and a minor in Creative Writing. He has written nine books including 1,000 Creative Writing Prompts: Ideas for Blogs, Scripts, Stories and More, 500 Writing Prompts for Kids: First Grade through Fifth Grade, Writer on the Side: How to Write Your Book Around Your 9 to 5 Job and his new book, 1,000 Character Writing Prompts: Villains, Heroes and Hams for Scripts, Stories and More. His website Build Creative Writing Ideas helps over 25,000 visitors a month to push past writer's block and stay motivated.



Feel free to follow along with the tour at The Happiness Blog Tour Hub Page or on the book's Facebook Page.

  GIVEAWAY

Bryan Cohen is giving away 61 paperback and audio copies of The Post-College Guide to Happiness and a Kindle Fire between now and May 7th, 2012 on The Happiness Blog Tour. All entrants receive a free digital review copy of The Post-College Guide to Happiness. Bryan hopes to give away at least 1,000 copies during the blog tour. To enter, post a comment with your e-mail address or send an e-mail to postcollegehappiness (at) gmail.com. Bryan will draw the names at the end of the tour. Entries will be counted through Sunday, May 6th.

Bryan Cohen is a writer, actor and comedian from Dresher, Pennsylvania. He graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2005 with degrees in English and Dramatic Art and a minor in Creative Writing. He has written nine books including http://www.blogger.com/%3Ca%20href=">1,000 Creative Writing Prompts: Ideas for Blogs, Scripts, Stories and More,< i>http://www.blogger.com/%3Ca%20href=">500 Writing Promptsfor Kids: First Grade through Fifth Grade, http://www.blogger.com/%3Ca%20href=">Writer on the Side: How to Write Your Book Around Your 9 to 5 Job and his new book, http://www.blogger.com/%3Ca%20href=">1,000 Character Writing Prompts: Villains, Heroes and Hams for Scripts, Stories and More. His website http://www.blogger.com/%3Ca%20href=">Build Creative Writing Ideas helps over 25,000 visitors a month to push past writer's block and stay motivated.

Feel free to follow along with the tour at http://www.blogger.com/%3Ca%20href=">The Happiness Blog Tour Hub Page or on the book's http://www.blogger.com/%3Ca%20href=">Facebook Page.