The science of happiness is the theme running through a new calendar that prod people into engaging in short, daily activities that can boost their happiness hormones.
When the pandemic turned everything upside down in April, Trina Kushnerik, a graduate from the UBC Okanagan, started working on her project, “A Happier Year.” It’s a calendar with 366 days of science-backed tips to help you live a happier life.
“The pandemic has been hard on everyone, even if people don’t realize it,” said Kushnerik, who is originally from Richmond.
“I realized thousands of researchers were figuring out what makes us happy, but this information is often stuck in boring academic papers. I wanted to find a fun way to seamlessly slip research-based activities into your day.”
Her solution was a daily calendar filled with bite-sized happiness tips.
“The calendar allows you to focus on one small action per day. You don’t have to absorb everything all at once. Each activity doesn’t take much time either, so you don’t have much of an excuse not to do it.”
Each time a reader flips to a new date/page, they are greeted with a new activity that research has shown can generate happiness. The calendar content covers a variety of topics, such as resilience, hope, gratitude and more. And each day pairs easy-to-digest information with a piece of artwork.
“I was inspired by the natural environment around me. I’ve included cactus, koi fish, ferns and dragonflies. I had a lot of friends suggest ideas of illustrations they wanted to see in the publication too,” said Kushnerik.
Now that the writing, illustration and design are done, Kushnerik is looking to publish the calendar. To make that happen, Kushnerik will launch a fund-raising campaign on Oct. 6 via the Kickstarter, a crowdfunding website that allows people to share their ideas.
Kushnerik said her goal is to reach $10,000 so she can begin printing her calendars.
For more information, visit the campaign here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/trina/a-happier-year.
