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    The Secrets of Happy Families: Surprising New Ideas to Bring More Togetherness, Less Chaos, and Greater Joy
    The Secrets of Happy Families: Surprising New Ideas to Bring More Togetherness, Less Chaos, and Greater Joy
    The Secrets of Happy Families: Surprising New Ideas to Bring More Togetherness, Less Chaos, and Greater Joy
    Audiobook7 hours

    The Secrets of Happy Families: Surprising New Ideas to Bring More Togetherness, Less Chaos, and Greater Joy

    Written by Bruce Feiler

    Narrated by Bruce Feiler

    4/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    • Don't worry about family dinner.
    • Let your kids pick their punishments.
    • Ditch the sex talk.
    • Cancel date night.

    These are just a few of the surprising innovations in this bold first-of-its-kind playbook for today's families. Bestselling author and New York Times family columnist Bruce Feiler found himself squeezed between caring for aging parents and raising his children. So he set out on a three-year journey to find the smartest solutions and the most cutting-edge research about families. Instead of the usual family "experts," he sought out the most creative minds—from Silicon Valley to the set of Modern Family, from the country's top negotiators to the Green Berets—and asked them what team-building exercises and problem-solving techniques they use with their families. Feiler then tested these ideas with his wife and kids. The result is a fun, original look at how families can draw closer together, complete with two hundred never-before-seen best practices.

    Feiler's life-changing discoveries include a radical plan to reshape your family in twenty minutes a week, Warren Buffett's guide for setting an allowance, and the Harvard handbook for resolving conflict. The Secrets of Happy Families is a timely, counterintuitive book that answers the questions countless parents are asking: How do we manage the chaos of our lives? How do we teach our kids values? How do we make our family happier?

    Written in a charming, accessible style, The Secrets of Happy Families is smart, funny, and fresh, and will forever change how your family lives every day.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperAudio
    Release dateFeb 19, 2013
    ISBN9780062249715
    The Secrets of Happy Families: Surprising New Ideas to Bring More Togetherness, Less Chaos, and Greater Joy
    Author

    Bruce Feiler

    Bruce Feiler is the author of six consecutive New York Times bestsellers, including Abraham, Where God Was Born, America's Prophet, The Council of Dads, and The Secrets of Happy Families. He is a columnist for the New York Times, a popular lecturer, and a frequent commentator on radio and television. He lives in Brooklyn with his wife and twin daughters.

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    Reviews for The Secrets of Happy Families

    4/5

    63 ratings9 reviews

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    • 5/5
      every family can learn from this book.
    • 4/5
      I can't even think of why I started this book, but it was pretty interesting. The author takes a typical thorny family dilemma (allowances/ family dinner/ etc.) and then drills into the research about the topic and talks to experts in the field. Some chapters can surely be skipped, but for the most part it is a pretty interesting and useful book for parents with children and teens.
    • 3/5
      Better than I expected... though provoking.
    • 2/5
      Family dinners are not actually about what you eat, it's about connecting with your family. A checklist can help keep children focused in the morning. When in conflict, it is beneficial to take a cool off period and consider the other person's side of an argument. If the preceding sentences are new and novel approaches to life that you've never considered, this is the book for you. If, however, they seem blatantly obvious to anyone with an iota of common sense and a smidgen of life experience, you'll want to give this one a miss.

      On the plus side, this did confirm for me that parenting/life improvement books are a complete waste of my reading time.
    • 3/5
      The Secrets of Happy Families: Improve Your Mornings, Tell Your Family History, Fight Smarter, Go Out and Play, and Much More The author catalogs about his family and others. Each chapter he introduces different topics on how to parent your children. Mind you these are suggestions with fun stories on how each way works. For instance, have your children choose their own punishment and rewards systems or have a "morning chart". I never thought of the idea to have your child choose punishments. To have your child hold themselves accountable might work who knows. I think some of the ideas might work because they are different and not the norm. I do love the stories of other families. This book would be a good recommendation although rather long winded. I would not recommend this to a beginner.
    • 4/5
      I picked this up after hearing about a few times on various blogs. It was a fairly quick read and had some nice ideas in each chapter. Some of the ones that resonated with me dealt with 1) Family Mission Statement 2) Weekly Family Meeting 3) How to set an Allowance 4) Chore Division. There wasn't anything too revolutionary in here but it was nice to have some of my established ideas confirmed with some studies. A lot of the basics that are set in the book like communication and budgeting and eating together are already no-brainers for us. The unfortunate thing is that those basics are the hardest to build into your lifestyle if you don't have them already. I fear that many readers who don't already have these basics down might have bigger problems to fix than working on a more complex tactic like "family reunion planning". Still, it's an easy read and it wouldn't hurt for anybody planning on having a family to read through it.
    • 5/5
      I saw Feiler give a TED talk about this book, and was intrigued enough to track it down. I'm glad I did! I read lots of books about parenting, adoption, attachment, etc., and this came at some of these questions from a whole new direction. The fundamental shift that Feiler made is to define his family as a team, and start looking around for examples of great team-building. Instead of psychologists and developmental specialists, he interviewed business people, IT programers, Warren Buffet's banker, and a former Green Beret, among others. Each of these interviews gave him a few principles. or insights, which he then took home and tried out on his family. Some of the ideas were more readily received, and some were more successful, but they were all very interesting. There are half a dozen things here that I am going to be working on with my family. Highly recommended.
    • 5/5
      This a great book, in my opinion. I wish this had come along while I was raising my 5 children. Great ideas presented in an often humerous way. I read this in two sittings! This not only has good ideas for raising a family, but will be helpful in marriage.
    • 4/5
      I had a rather unconventional childhood, with parents that became parents at the age of 16 and 18, but didn't have me until 17 years after my youngest brother was born. I was always fascinated with other peolpe's families--the one's where all the kids are kids at the same time. I guess I'm still trying to figure how families like that work. Or don't. Feiler started got the idea for this book during a rough patch in his own family life, which involved his wife and young twin daughters. He's done what he's always done when writing about the topic--epic and years long research. But this time, he convinced his family to join him in experiments (at varying levels of cooperation and enthusiasm, as you might suspect). Looking beyond psychologists and family therapists, he took his research to some unlikely places to learn about improving family dynamics: Silicon Valley, the Green Berets, Warren Buffet's bankers to name only a few. He says, " I set out to write an anti-parenting parenting book." It's all about trying new things, working together, shifting power and generally trying to be a team. It's often funny and always highly interesting. I even picked up a few ideas for making things better in some non-family group situations I'm involved in, so I do not consider this book to be for parents only. I think everyone can learn quite a bit from this book, and I happily urge you to read it.