Pop quiz: which will make you more unhappy, a baseball through your window or a loose handle on your bathroom door? Did you guess the broken window? Dan Gilbert, who’s been studying happiness for decades, wants us to think again.

According to him, most people have a horrible time predicting what will make them happy and unhappy. You can check out a recent article he wrote in the New York Times to find out more. The bad news is that even knowing about how the brain distorts our thinking, it’s very hard to correct for it. The good news is that at least you can be on guard!

For those who like moving pictures instead of static text, you can also check out DanGilbert’s TED talk, which I quite enjoyed.

Good luck, and happy hunting!

I see the universe as a sales clerk at one of those high-end department stores you don’t see much anymore, the sort where it’s not YOU who does the browsing but the sales girl. You tell the sales girl what you want, and she goes into the back to find something that she thinks will fit the request. So, for example, if you ask the sales girl for a blue dress, she’ll go into the back, find one that she thinks will look good on you, and bring it out. You look at it, maybe try it on, and then either decide to buy it or tweak your request.

Obviously, the more specific you are, the better the sale girl’s first guess will be. If you don’t want to try on 40 different outfits before finding the one you want, you’d better be prepared to be specific the first time. The outfit you’ll get when you ask for “an elegant blue dress I can wear to a formal function with my boss” is going to be different from “an easy-to-care-for blue dress I can wear when travelling in Muslim countries,” which in turn is going to be different from “a blue dress I can wear to a summer barbeque.”

Unless you ask for a particular type of dress, you might find yourself surprised by what the sales girl brings out. If you were choosing for yourself, maybe you’d never have thought of wearing something sleeveless with a V-neck, but when you put it on, you might find that it flatters your shoulders. The sales girl has been doing this for a long time; she’s got a good eye for these things. There’s a pretty large stock in the back, so the longer you try things on and point out what you like and what you don’t, the closer she can come to finding the perfect blue dress for you.

The universe, obviously, supplies more than blue dresses. It supplies careers, spouses, children, and lifestyles. It provides vacations and houses and cars. It even provides mindsets, emotions, and dreams. But you’ve got to talk to it. How on earth is a sales girl supposed to know what you want if you sit with your arms across your chest and stare at the wall? How can she possibly choose correctly from the “back room” if you say, “Get me a job, any job?”

So think about your request for the sales-clerk universe. What do YOU want?

I’m not going to give you all the tips you’ve heard from your roommates and dorm buddies. You know more about hangover cures than I do, I’m sure. (And if you find one that actually works, let me know.) Instead, I’m going to give you three tips to make sure you have a great time, whether or not you’re drinking.

1. How do you want to feel?

Before you go out, think about what you want the evening to be like. Be honest. If you really want to get plastered and don’t mind dealing with the consequences tomorrow morning, go for it! If you want to keep your wits about you and only have a few drinks, figure out how you’re going to manage it beforehand, whether that’s by taking along a non-drinking friend or only putting $20 in your wallet. Thinking through your night for even five minutes before you head out the door will save you a lot of unnecessary problems later.

2. Plan your morning the night before

Pop quiz: if you knew you’d have to go to a morning workout, would you have six drinks the night before? Didn’t think so. Now, I’m not advocating Sunday morning workouts (though you can, of course), but think through what you want to do the next morning BEFORE you go out the night before. That way, you’ve got something to look forward to besides a hangover.

3. There’s more to nightlife than clubbing

Most of the time, when people hear “party,” they immediately think, “going out drinking.” But it doesn’t have to be that way. There’s tons of fun stuff to do that doesn’t involve alcohol at all, like rallies, festivals and cheering on the home team. I had an amazingly active social life in college and didn’t spend too much of it in bars. If you like bars, that’s great. If you don’t, check the posters around campus and see what else is happening.

Attention Bond Grrls “of a certain age”:

For most people, the post-college years feature far fewer “puking into the toilet” nights, and that’s a good thing. You’ve probably passed through the gauntlet and emerged on the other side. Congratulations! Just remember, the tips above are still useful for anyone painting the town red, not just the college crowd.

1. Take notes by hand and skim them the same evening. 

I know it’s fashionable to bring laptops to class, but write by hand anyway. For one, it’s easier to be freeform when hand-writing. You can write notes in the margins, draw diagrams, and focus on the main ideas, not hunting for the graphing function. The amount of notes you take is a matter of personal style, but focus on the concepts, not scribbling every word the prof is saying. Don’t worry about making your notes look nice. Just write. Every evening, spend 15 minutes skimming that day’s notes. This helps it stay in your brain and acts as an early-warning system for stuff you don’t understand.

2. Type or rewrite your notes on the weekend.

If your hand-written notes are anything like mine, they’re pretty messy. Now’s your chance to fix that. Block off a weekend afternoon and rewrite or type out all your notes from the week. Focus on aesthetics, organization, and structure. Don’t be afraid to rearrange, expand, cut, or color-code. Rewriting does two things. First, you review what you covered in class. Second, it gets your notes into a presentable, useable condition. When you’re done, throw out your hand-written notes. You won’t need them. Heck, you might even get people asking to buy your typed notes. (I did!)

3. At the end of semester, read through your notes.

I didn’t say pour over or cram. I said read. If you’ve never followed a system like this before, “just reading” might be a strange concept. But I promise if you’ve done steps 1 and 2, you won’t need to cram. Seriously! You’ll remember so much from your evening skimming and weekly rewriting sessions that a simple read-through should be all it takes to jog your memory. Now’s the time to look for bigger themes that span large portions of the course. What are the topics that come up repeatedly? What are the links from one unit to the next? Since you don’t have to decipher disorganized chicken-scratch, you can devote yourself to higher-level study and still have more time for relaxing.

And that’s it. Fifteen minutes a day and one afternoon a week to a stress-free end of semester. I dare you to try this. You’ll never go back.

Attention Bond Grrls “of a certain age”:

This is probably my most college-specific post to date, but there are still nuggets for you. No matter what you’re trying to remember or retain, daily and weekly reviews will be far more effective than sporadic info-binges. Try using this technique with updates in your field and see how much more you remember… effortlessly!

1. Save yourself for the really good desserts

If your cafeteria is anything like mine was, you could eat two desserts a day. That is the path to the Freshman 50! But you don’t want to deprive yourself. What’s a girl to do? I came up with a simple rule for myself: eat only the really good desserts. My college had a dessert night every few months with gourmet pastries. Every few weeks, we had a fancy dinner with luxury cakes. You know what, if I’m getting gourmet desserts every few weeks, I don’t mind missing out on the three-day-old apple strudel on the lunch cart today.

2. C is for coffee (That’s good enough for me)

Getting up for an 8 am class is hard. Sometimes your brain needs a little kick-start. But that doesn’t mean to grab a Venti Frappuccio. If you do, you can down 500 calories before you’re awake to enjoy it! To get your caffeine hit, get a regular coffee, load it with milk and sugar, and it’ll still be less calories than a “coffee drink.” If you want to consume 500 calories in a drink, that’s great. But just remember point #1. 

3. The new SS: soup and salad

Here’s a trick I learned from Barbara Rolls’ Volumetrics. If you eat a bowl of soup before your meal, you’ll naturally eat less of the main course. And you can eat a ton of salad, feel full, and not consume too many calories. It’s probably a good idea to eat at least one salad a day, anyway. And if someone else is preparing it, why not! A word of warning, though: stay away from the cream-based soups and go easy on the dressing. Those calories add up!

4. The janitor doesn’t cares if you finish your vegetables (or anything else)

Maybe you’re from a family where Mom wouldn’t let you have dessert if you didn’t finish your veggies. Maybe she used the “children are starving in Africa” line. This may have led you into the bad habit of cleaning your plate, even if you’re full long before that. Now that you’re on your own, no one cares! Certainly not the janitor who’s collecting the plates or emptying the garbage! Eat until you’re full, then stop. And remember, it takes the stomach 20 minutes to send the “I’m full signal” to the brain, so don’t rush for seconds right away.

5. Don’t eat out when you’re eating in

Most cafeterias I know offer some good choices… and some really bad choices. I could have had pizza and burgers twice a day for a year, if I wanted. But I bet you consider those “eating out foods” already. Think about how often you want to eat out and plan accordingly. Sure, grab a burger every now and then, but don’t make it your first pick.

Attention Bond Grrls “of a certain age”:

Okay, maybe you’re now faced with cooking your own meals. Spending hours cooking can be a time drain. But on the other hand, you can control exactly what you put in your body. You’re not subject to the whims of the Olga the cafeteria chef. Everybody can use the tricks above, not just college students. Just make sure that indulgences are special occasions, not everyday events.

Your passion is unique. I can’t tell you what it is. It might be social justice, writing poetry, or playing a killer game of basketball. Maybe your passion is green living or hosting medieval feasts. Maybe it’s swimming with dolphins. But I guarantee that there’s something in your life right now that makes you feel tingly and happy inside whenever you’re doing it, or even thinking about doing it. 

Now, what are you going to do about it?

College is great because you’re surrounded by people who are just as passionate as you are. So a lot of the institutions that people already off in the “real world” need to hunt for, you’ve got at your fingertips. Here are a few:

Find or start a student club.

No matter what your passion is, there’s probably a club set up on campus devoted to it. If there isn’t, create one! You’d be surprised how many people flock to you once you start putting the word out.

Read the campus paper.

Your campus paper will give you tons of information, not only on campus politics and local happenings, but also on upcoming events and gatherings. And if there’s something you want to say, submit a classified ad or write an article yourself!

Go to events that interest you.

Most university websites have an “upcoming events” page. Get in the habit of checking it. You’ll probably find things that interest you. No matter how you hear about interesting things — like rallies, guest lectures, or homecoming games — go! There’s no time like the present!

Meet your new friends.

If you’ve done everything (or even a few things) listed above, you’ll start running into people who share your passion. Congratulations! You’re well on the way to having a new social clique. Just remember: always be on the lookout for more opportunities. You never know when you might find one.

Attention Bond Grrls “of a certain age”:

True, it might not be as easy for you to find the resources (or the time) to pursue your passion once you move beyond the hallowed halls of academia. But it’s still possible. There are still guest lectures, groups, and specialty magazines to connect you with “birds of a feather.” Even better, the people you meet will probably have lots of experience and knowledge to share!

Trick #1: Set aside 1-2 hours a day for assignments, and plan them out now

By now, you should have already put all your exam dates and assignment due dates into your agenda or calendar program. (If you haven’t, do this right now before continuing to read.) If you have, you’ve already realized an unfortunate truth: deadlines are cowards, so they attack in groups. You might not have anything due this week, but when midterms hit, you might face two exams and three assignments in a single week.

The only way to tackle this is by planning for it now. For every assignment and exam, figure out how much time it will take you. Break it down into 1-2 hour tasks if possible. Then figure out when you’re going to do these tasks and write them into your agenda.

Got two assignments due on the same day? Which are you going to tackle first? Or are you going to stagger them? Plan it now. Write it down! Yes, you might find yourself starting a few weeks earlier than anyone else in your class, but it’ll pay off when you can go out on partying the night before the deadline, stress-free.

Trick #2: Add an extra 30%

Okay, you’ve got all your dates set for assignment prep and study time. You’re ready to go, right? Not so fast! Now I want you to go back and add more days. For every 3 days you’ve set aside, add one more. Don’t assign a specific task to these sessions, just let them sit there.

These extra days are for the inevitable printer malfunction, emergency library trip, and flaky partner. You don’t want to have a perfectly-planned schedule, only to get thrown off on day 2 because the book you want isn’t in the library or Internet connection died. Professors have heard every excuse there is, and when you say, “I  need an extension,” they hear, “I haven’t started yet.” I used to be a T.A. Trust me on this one. Don’t force your professors into that situation: plan the extra sessions.

One last tip: If you do find yourself needing an extension, ask early and be honest. I asked for one (and only one) extension during my university career, because I had been in the hospital with a serious asthma attack and had no energy for three days. I let my prof know as soon as I got out of the hospital, showed him the doctor’s note, and got a 3-day extension. Extensions are meant for these kinds of emergencies. Don’t fall back on them because of poor planning. You’ll be doing your professors (and yourself) a great service.

Attention Bond Grrls “of a certain age”:

Have you realized that all these tips apply to work life as well? Everyone has deadlines, and the sooner you start planning for them, the less you’ll need to work evening and weekend shifts to meet them.

I’m here to tell you the tricks I learned while getting my Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees. Sometimes I lived with my mom, sometimes I lived in a 1,000-person dorm in a different city. Sometimes I was single, sometimes I had a “James.” Through it all, I was a straight-A student, an executive in a student club, and a social butterfly. I tutored, wrote for a college paper, and hosted medieval feasts.

I’m here to show you how your college experience can be just as rich. I’ll teach you how to get stellar grades without pulling all-nighters. How to party without ending the night face-first in the toilet bowl. How to find a passion and surround yourself with like-minded friends. We’ll talk about lofty things like living your dreams and day-to-day stuff like dorm-room essentials.

In the end, I want to help you make your years at college be everything you want them to be.

Attention Bond Grrls “of a certain age”: 

Okay, maybe the last time you wrote a college exam the Berlin Wall was still standing and Friday night was disco fever. Don’t click away just yet! I bet you have a daughter, niece, or family friend who could use this advice. Consider passing it along, so she can have the college experience you did… or wish you did!

SO, my computer went down quite spectacularly at the end of last year. You know, the end of the year SUCKED, in fact. 2 friends with cancer. Car died. Computer died. Dog needed surgery. Blah blah blah. I’m SO done with that!

Anyway – so in “blowing up spectacularly” (sparks, smell….), somehow the computer took down the way for me to get to my WordPress Dashboard. We kept trying to sign in the way we had before (because, of course), the cookies were not going to be on the new computer, etc. – it just didn’t work.

My ever-suffering husband, however, “backsearched” through some magic computer Stuff, and wound up getting me back in this weekend.  WA-HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

SO, what’s new? First of all, I am sadly NOT going to be able to post the podcasts that I had done for the “Emergency Holiday Podcasts” – I got one up, and then KA-BOOM….! – So it’s all dated. I will re-do them, because I think they were good (especially with respect to financial stuff) – it’s just no longer Christmas!

HOWEVER, I ~am~ going to have a new contributor to the Blog – My Bond Grrl “Feisty.” She had some great ideas. She’s just at the end of college and definitely knows how to apply the fEmpowerment ideas to those of you in this “time of life”!! These are the thoughts she’s had so far: