YOUR HAPPY PLACE is a regular column in which celebrated and celebrity mummies share their vision of happiness, plus tactics for cheering themselves up when the going gets tough.
Name: Heather Hartt-Sussman
Occupation: Children's author. Heather has published three books (one which was just released this month): Nana’s Getting Married (Tundra Books, February 2010), Noni Says No (Tundra Books, February 2011), and Here Comes Hortense (Tundra Books, April 2012).
At Home: Heather lives in Toronto with her husband and two sons.
Claim to Fame: Former entertainment journalist, Heather spent many years in LA where she was host of The Gossip Show on E! Entertainment Television, a reporter and assistant international editor for the Hollywood Reporter, and editor-in-chief of international news for TV Guide in French Canada, where she also wrote the popular column Heather Hartt in Hollywood.
Why we love her: Nana’s Getting Married is about a grandmother who falls in love later in life and the jealousy this brings up in her grandson. Said Heather in an interview with Open Book Toronto in 2010: "I wrote this for the child whose parent remarries. However, having it be the boy’s mother hit too close to home and would have sounded preachy...The NANA character allowed me to inject some humor into the situation because it’s even more wonky when your granny starts dating! So having Nana being the one dating allowed the sense of loss to be one step removed and made room for some funny moments as well."
Q: How would you describe your Happy Place?
These days I live in a Happy Place. It’s like a bubble that surrounds me. It protects me from negativity, as I am a sponge for other people’s emotions, needs and moods. However, it isn’t so dense that it can’t allow me to send happiness and love outward. I think a Happy Place has to be within you. As the old saying goes, “wherever you go, there you are.” Meditation is like my housekeeping of this Happy Place – it gets rid of any cobwebs of doubt, anger, fear, resentment, and keeps the space clean. Happiness is not static. In my opinion, it needs care and effort.
Q: What do you do to make yourself happy when life gets overwhelming?
Things that make me happy when life gets overwhelming:
Coffee with a friend
A bath
A nap
Meditation/yoga
A workout
A short trip if possible (a change of scene can do wonders)
A walk in nature (it reminds you that the panic is manufactured. Nature doesn’t panic. There are busy cycles when things bud and bloom, and latent times when ideas, plans and desires must gestate! Nature puts everything into perspective for me.)
A conversation with a child. (they know much more than we do about so many things.)
I, for one, need something to look forward to. So, finally, when I am inundated with daily tasks, I set up one thing that I know will make it all worthwhile after I get my “stuff” done.
Q: Is there a Happy person you aspire to be more like? What is it about him/her you'd like to emulate?
I glean from all over the place. No one has everything, so there is no one who is necessarily happier than me. Sometimes the saddest people: poets, comedians and artists, make us happy when they, themselves, are not (necessarily). I tend to overcomplicate, over-think, overwork, so if I turn to anyone or anything it would be my kids and my dog. Kids (and dogs) live in the moment. They are fully present. We can learn a lot about happiness by clueing in to the secret of presence. I’ll repeat. In my humble estimation, it is not out there. It is in here. And what I do is turn to the most “present” beings I know as a reminder of how to be awake and alive, and therefore, more content. It’s not the celebrity haircut, the friend’s new handbag, the relative's recent lottery win that I want to emulate. It’s noticing an old couple holding hands. It’s watching my sons eat their food and fully enjoy it. It’s watching my dog look out the window, fully content, watching the world go by. It’s the lyrics to a song, a line in a book, a break in the clouds. All this reminds me that I am innately a happy person. It is my birthright (it is all of our birthrights), and I don’t need to aspire. I already am happy. I just have to remember that. The universe provides subtle, quirky and often funny reminders. I just have to open my eyes to notice them.
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