MARSHENKULOVA: Clarify happiness for yourself, and it becomes more attainable

The word "happiness" used to sound a little vague to me. What is it? Can we put it in the pocket and carry it with us all the time? Or is it something so fragile that the second we notice it, it goes away? I have thought about it for a while. Then I asked around, and it appeared that it was vague not only to me.

So I sat down and made a list of the things that made me happy. There were plenty of them, though they were not necessarily big things. For example, an Andrea Bocelli song can fill me up with unbelievable emotions; when all those emotions are combined, they make me happy. A good silly joke can also make my day. But those are MY little things. My close friends have their own lists, and some things are very different than mine.

I decided to expand my list and explore some other things that could possibly make me happier.

A book by Gretchen Rubin, "The Happiness Project: Or Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, and Generally Have More Fun" offers many valid points. For example, Rubin says that happiness doesn't always make you feel happy. What you do every day matters more than what you do once in a while, she says. I agree 100 percent.

But in the long run, the book was a bit too westernized for me. For example, when Rubin cleaned the clutters in her own apartment, she started offering to help her friends and relatives do the same. When a person would hesitate, she insisted. Too pushy — I don't think one should impose his or her own lifestyle onto somebody else. After all, what works for me, might not work for others.

So my heart craved something in addition to that. Something I could call "mine," I guess.

Here is my list of little things that make my life happier and more meaningful. I didn't come up with it entirely myself, but a lot of wise men and women contributed to it, and I've simply applied it to myself. Some of these people are not alive, others are nameless. Maybe they'll make you a little happier, too, as they make me.

I created a list of 100 things to do before I die. My friends did, too. If you feel like it, you can exchange the lists with your friends. Every day, we have an opportunity to cross out one of the things from that list and add something new. It makes me more open for challenges in life; it makes me take more from my life than I thought I would.

What is on my list? Simple things that matter only to me. For example, I want to learn to ride a bike (yes, I'm one of those people who still can't do it); I want to go to a Celine Dion concert; I want to go  skydiving (this one might stay on the list forever, since I had an opportunity to do it several times, but still can't find the courage).

My roommate, Leyla, suggested another tool — writing a letter into the future for yourself. Then I remembered how I did it when I was 16. There were a bunch of us, exchange students from Russia, and we were told to write a letter to ourselves, which would be sent to us in half a year by the exchange program's organizers. When I got the letter six months later, it was a nice surprise.

In this exercise, you can even go further. Leyla's suggestion: Write yourself a letter as if you are five or 10 years in the future. Write like you have everything you want, describing the details of your life to an unknown (or maybe known) companion. You can also send this letter to someone you love and ask him or her to send it back to you in five or 10 years, depending on your future self. That's one of the tools of making dreams come true. In this letter, you can let your fantasy go as far as possible. There are no limits.

Another great thing that makes me happier is expressing my gratitude. It doesn't matter what you are grateful for — there are so many things, and they happen every day. Some of them pass unnoticed, but if we stop for a second, we can see how life is full of good things that happen to us. Good weather? Thank you! An extended deadline? Thank you! Something as simple as "thank you" is rewarding in many ways. It can make someone's day; it surely can make mine.

I learned about this one in high school. We created a time capsule where we put things or days that stayed in our memories. What are the things that you'd like to remember forever? Maybe, it was something that made you smile for the rest of the day, like a snail mail from an old friend. Put it in the time capsule.

After all, July 18, 2011 can be put in the time capsule just because it will never happen again. It's always our choice, if we want to make it a little more memorable.

It's clear to me that happiness doesn't just land on your doorstep; sometimes we have to work for it. The word loses its vagueness and becomes more real, when we can decode it into those many things that brighten our lives. What did you do to make yourself a little happier today? Let's not start with other people, let's start with ourselves. After all, the others feel happier around people who are content and happy themselves.

Marina Marshenkulova is a Fulbright student getting a master's degree in journalism at UNL. reach her at marinamarshenkulova@dailynebraskan.com