Eight Million Ways to Happiness: Wisdom for Inspiration and Healing from the Heart of Japan

'A Japanese cultural historian shares a path to joyful living drawn from her nation’s unique approach to spirituality and nature, offering a blend of memoir, cultural reporting, and practical guidance for anyone struggling to find balance in our turbulent modern world.

Everyone’s in the pursuit of happiness, but few know how to attain it. Millions around the world have turned to Japan for advice on finding their Ikigai, or summoning The Courage to Be Disliked. Japan’s spiritual traditions hide in plain sight, forming the basis of so much of what we love about the country’s culture. Without Japan’s spiritual sustenance, Jiro wouldn’t dream of sushi; Hayao Miyazaki’s films wouldn’t spirit us away; and Marie Kondo wouldn’t spark joy.

In her book Eight Million Ways to Happiness, Hiroko Yoda offers the culmination of her decade-long odyssey into the spiritual heart of her homeland. Readers follow Hiroko as she trains as a Shinto shrine-dancer, partakes in Buddhist funeral rituals, ascends holy mountains with Shugendo ascetics, and meets one of Japan’s last living itako, a traditional mystic. Her stories—personal, cultural, and historical—offer life lessons for readers of any background.

Hiroko awakens readers to the idea of a traditional spiritual flexibility that seamlessly coexists with the modern secular world, fortifying us through life’s inevitable ups and downs. We are all subject to forces beyond our control, but we are also part of a bigger natural system that can strengthen us—if we learn how to reconnect with it.

Hiroko Yoda is a certified Shinto cultural historian, and a former Tokyo editor for CNN Go and a field producer for National Geographic TV. Raised in Japan, she earned her master’s degree from American University in Washington, DC, then launched the localization company AltJapan and embarked on a career of building bridges between East and West. Her writings have appeared in The New York Times, The New Yorker, Wired, and Vice, and she’s appeared on CNN, PBS, BBC, and 99% Invisible. She is the coauthor of illustrated books about Japanese folklore, including Yokai Attack! and its sequels. She lives in Tokyo.