This is how to build a happy life, the Atlantic's podcast on all things happiness.

I'm Arthur Brooks, Harvard professor and happiness correspondent at The Atlantic.

In this series, I want to figure out how we can live more joyful lives.

Through scientific discussions and an exploration of what happiness is, I'll uncover the how

to's of happy living and assign you exercises to make happiness a daily practice.

Almost everybody listening to us has had the experience of striking out of their own.

Well, metaphorically perhaps, but maybe physically as well, where you leave home and you start

your own career, you start your own individual life, it's intensely isolating.

It's really not what you're expecting. I remember this in my own life.

I got started a little bit earlier than others because of my exit from college at age 19,

and I went out of my own to work. What did I expect when I moved across the country and got

my own little house? I thought it was going to be growing up in a way. I was going to have

a ton of friends and a lot of relationships and a lot of laughs, maybe just not under the

thumb of my parents quite frankly, but it wasn't like that at all. Sure, I wasn't under the thumb

of my parents, but I was super lonely. I didn't have any friends. I didn't really know how to make

friends. I don't think it turned out that I thought the only skills I needed to learn were skills

involving work and making money. The real skills I needed as an adult were the skills of establishing

new friendships with total strangers. That's not something I was very good at.

I've written a lot in my column about the four simple rules that pretty much guarantee a happier

life to almost everybody, faith and family and friendships and work. Let's start off with the

first, which is your faith. Whether you're pursuing a life philosophy that's traditionally religious

or not, let's just call it faith for short. That's really important because it turns out that if

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