The book 10 Essentials to The Blueprint of Happiness is the author Bhanu Arora’s attempt to bring together 10 important aspects in life which directly or indirectly plays an important role in fulfilling our lives with happiness. These 10 things are very common in our life but doing them correctly is the key to happiness. They are as follows gossips, communication, action, marriage, sex, money, travel, live original life, share and remember almighty. There could be many but author, for the time being, has picked up these for his book.

The one which impressed me the most was his viewpoints on gossips. Personally, I refrain from gossiping. As a consequence I am terrible in starting small talk with people in gathering. If you exclude gossips from your conversation there is not much to say. The author advocates for gossiping with filters attach. Gossips many a times gives away some vital information which could help in self improvement, avoiding problems and mistakes and who knows some good career prospects as well. So gossiping not only helps in maintaining relationship but when used ingeniously helps in contributing in social happiness as well. Of course you have to let go of irrelevant gossips which could have negative effect as well. 

Author also explains importance of communication in relationship as imperative in life. So is the requirement of action for the implementation of idea. I also loved the chapter on money. According to him, money loves to remain in circulation. So instead of hoarding money in your safe, spend it prudently. In order to make way for more money to come in your safe.

But I didn’t find his thoughts on marriage and sex to be convincing. Of course married to a good human being and a healthy sex life with partner are essential but author doesn’t seems to be in favor of traditional marriage institution and if I am right in understanding he was arguing in favor of Live-in-Relation. Well personally I am not against of any of the two, much depends upon what suits the couple but for our Indian society old school institution goes well as parents and children stay together.

Also I don’t look upon sex among the most important ingredient for a successful married life or contribute to happiness in life in anyways. In the long term, it is not the sex but the non-sexual touch which keep the fragrance of love bloomed between the couple. Relationship thrives on non-sexual touch and not on purely sexual pleasure which last only for few seconds. Happiness start evaporating from the relation if couples starve each other from non-sexual touch which not only produces happy hormones but also gives a warm secure feeling in each other embrace. Well these are my personal opinion. I am not criticizing the author. 

The book has been written in the style similar to Robin Sharma’s Monk series self help book. Here Bhanu Arora has written various short stories which led to the final take away from that story. The stories served the purpose of build-up for the message. Presenting the lessons in this way made the book one interesting read but. Initially this setting seems to work. Short stories were interesting to read and lesson drawn from them were relevant to the story. But same cannot be true for all the 10 Points which forms the base of the book. The lessons which the author wants to put forward not always sync with the short story. 

The story which I didn’t like much was one related to Live Original Life. Here a family goes on a vacation and suddenly they come to know about demonetization. The head of the family seems to be well informed about demonetization and its effect. He kept on telling about it which seems to be a little forced upon and superfluous. Even the lesson drawn from it ‘to live your own true life’ was not clear. That entire short story and lesson drawn from it doesn’t sync well and everything was sounding Greek and Russian to me. In other words I fail to understand. 

The first chapter of the book on Gossiping was fantastic to read but as the book progresses it becomes preachy and complicated to comprehend. Lot of explanation has been given in the complex structure of sentences which hampers the flow of the language. 

The Verdict:

The rating and worth of a self help book is determined from takeaway from the book. The book has a few fresh outlooks to ponder over but not much to implement in our real life. Of course there is one major take away from the book. The book definitely changed my thoughts about gossiping and perks of socializing and now I am really looking forward to work upon my shortcoming to start small talks.  

The aspects of life on which author concentrate in the book helps in improving the quality of life, helps in achieving small materialistic happiness. These, definitely, doesn’t overall contribute to the ultimate happiness and peace of mind. In fact true happiness is above all these things.

‘I received a copy from Writersmelon in exchange for an honest and unbiased review.’