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

pictures. A friend was very pleased to get a photograph I had taken of her a few weeks before she gave birth; it was the only photo she had of herself pregnant with her second child. This was a tiny effort on my part, but it was significant to her.
    Cut People Slack.
    During this month of friendship, I happened to read two memoirs that reminded me of something that’s easy to forget: people’s lives are far more complicated than they appear from the outside. That’s why, as part of my resolution to “Be generous,” I meant to cut people slack.
    The “fundamental attribution error” is a psychological phenomenon in which we tend to view other people’s actions as reflections of their characters and to overlook the power of situation to influence their actions, whereas with ourselves, we recognize the pressures of circumstance. When other people’s cell phones ring during a movie, it’s because they’re inconsiderate boors; if my cell phone rings during a movie, it’s because I need to be able to take a call from the babysitter.
    I tried to remember not to judge people harshly, especially on the first or second encounter. Their actions might not reveal their enduring character but instead reflect some situation they find themselves in. Forbearance is a form of generosity.
    I reminded myself of this resolution when, as I stood calmly on a street corner with my arm outstretched for a taxi, a man came tearing up the street, flung out his arm, and jumped into the cab that, according to all New York City cab tradition, should have been mine. I started to get indignant about his unforgivable rudeness; then I thought of all the reasons that a person might be desperate to steal the first taxi he saw. Was he rushing to the hospital? Had he forgotten to pick up his child at school? I wasn’t in any rush. I should cut the guy some slack.
    In a letter to a friend, Flannery O’Connor put this precept another way: “From 15 to 18 is an age at which one is very sensitive to the sins of others, as I know from recollections of myself. At that age you don’t look for what is hidden. It is a sign of maturity not to be scandalized and to try to find explanations in charity.” “Find explanations in charity” is a more holy way of saying “cut people slack.”
    SHOW UP.
    Just as Woody Allen said that “eighty percent of success is showing up,” a big part of friendship is showing up. Unless you make consistent efforts, your friendships aren’t going to survive.
    I came to this realization during a conversation with a friend. I mentioned to her that I’d been procrastinating about making arrangements to visit some friends’ new babies. I loved seeing the babies, but I often delayed because I felt that I should spend that time working.
    “You should do it,” she said. “That kind of thing really matters.”
    “You think so?” I asked. I’d been trying to convince myself that it didn’t.
    “Sure. Not that I hold it against anyone, but I remember who visited me after I had my baby. Don’t you?”
    Well, yes. These are the gestures that deepen casual friends into close friends, and confirm closeness between good friends. I immediately made dates to see the not-so-newborns. Around the same time, I made sure to stop by the opening day of a close friend’s new clothing store. I came in about an hour after she opened, and I was the very first person to make a purchase. In each of these cases, I was very happy that I’d taken the trouble. It was fun, it made me feel closer to my friends, and it felt like the right thing to do (the First Splendid Truth in operation).
    It was important not only to see close friends but also to see people I didn’t know very well—say, by going to my husband’s office party or showing up at parents’ events at my daughter’s school. Familiarity, it turns out, breeds affection. The “mere exposure effect” is the term for the fact that repeated exposure makes you like music, faces—even nonsense syllables—better. The more often you see a person, the more intelligent and attractive you’ll find that person. I’d noticed this about myself. Even when I don’t take an immediate liking to someone, I tend to like him or her better the more often we see each other. And at the same time, the more I show up, the more that person likes me. Of course, this doesn’t always work. There are some people you just don’t like, and seeing more of them would probably just lead to more