Austen's Guide to Happiness

Universal Truths on the Simple Life

***Want to be inspired by the pre-eminent woman of the ages, Jane Austen? ***

Find answers to everyday dilemmas by delving into Jane Austen’s psychologically and philosophically imbued prose. Through harnessing her wisdom and understanding her characters and their choices you will find answers to your own everyday difficulties and be able to navigate an emotionally intelligent pathway through life. This non-fiction book is the first in a series of little books that will help you to become a Jane Austen heroine or hero in your own life. In Austen’s Guide to Happiness, Universal Truths on the Simple Life you will find ways to negotiate your friendships, how to be resilient and how to live life in the present and appreciate your everyday life. The Positive Psychology movement often tells us what to do but this book can show us how to find happiness and contentment. 

The author, Shaunagh O'Connell's obsession with Jane Austen began fifteen years ago when she was struggling with the demands of a pretty normal life. She is a mother of three, wife, teacher, friend and neighbour. She started to wonder how to become better at managing the demands of daily life and just by chance she started re-reading Sense and Sensibility and it dawned on her that Austen wrote about just this. Sure it was 200 years ago but some of the issues were the same: how to bring up children, how to juggle family life, how to keep love fresh, how to sustain friends that nurture, how to be resilient when faced with disappointment, how to be true to beliefs in equality and how to live the simple local life. (In Austen there was romance but there was also so much more.)