I’m currently reading The Scandinavian Guide to Happiness, and I’m only on the first chapter, and already I feel like this book picked me.

The chapter is about lagom. And if I had to explain lagom to someone who has never heard of it before, I wouldn’t just say it means moderation. That feels too simple. It feels bigger than that.

To me, lagom feels like a spirit.

It feels like this quiet voice that guides you through how you take care of yourself. Your body. Your mind. Your home. Your work. It’s almost like a lens you put on that makes you look at everything and ask, “Is this too much? Is this too little? Is this actually helping me?”

When I first read the definition, I already knew I was in trouble. I was like, okay… this is going to make me feel a little guilty.

And it did.

The first moment I actually felt seen though, really seen, was when the book mentioned allergies. Paying attention to what your body reacts to. Not forcing yourself to eat things that hurt you. Being mindful of intolerances. That part made me pause. I thought, wow, this is real life. This isn’t just poetic philosophy. This is practical. It felt personal.

But then we got to work.

And that’s when I felt fully called out.

There’s a section about excessive work hours, about how working twelve hours a day helps no one. My first reaction was honestly, “Easy for you to say.” Must be nice. That was my attitude at first.

But as I kept reading, I had to admit something.

That’s me.

I am the person who works way too much. And not just physically. Mentally. My laptop hasn’t closed in years. It literally sits next to my bed. If I wake up in the middle of the night, stressed, what do I grab? My laptop. That’s how blurred my boundaries are.

So when the chapter talks about home being for rest, about not letting work consume your entire existence, it almost sounded foreign to me. I started thinking about people who leave work at work. I genuinely don’t even know what that feels like anymore.

Lagom, in my mind, sounds like it’s saying, “Enough is enough.”

It’s saying, good enough is good enough.

You don’t have to keep tweaking. You don’t have to keep fixing. You don’t have to keep turning something over and over trying to perfect it. You can stop. You can close the laptop. You can say, I did what I could today.

That hit me.

Because I don’t do that.

And then there’s society. When I think about where “too much” shows up right now, I think about content creation. There is so much of it. Endless scrolling. Endless videos. Endless output. It feels like quantity has overtaken quality.

I remember when content online felt playful. People were just being creative. Now, it often feels like everything is for financial gain. Post more. Produce more. Monetize everything.

And honestly, it mirrors work culture.

I try not to scroll much. I tell myself, if I’m not loving, laughing, or learning, I need to log off. That’s my little rule. But even then, after a while it starts to feel like clutter. Too much noise. Too much input. And I don’t love that feeling.

So when the book talks about slowing down, I started asking myself, what does that actually look like for me?

For me, slowing down would look like actually observing my day off. I’ve tried to build one into my week. The first week I did it, I was so proud of myself. After that, it slowly started disappearing. I would tell myself, just one thing. Just one email. Just one edit. And before I knew it, I was working again.

Lagom would not approve of that.

If lagom had one rule for my workaholic brain this week, it would be to work within a six-hour window. That’s it. Try it. See what happens. People in Scandinavia experiment with shorter workdays, and they seem pretty happy. I could at least attempt it.

I also realized how much I’ve let go of things that used to ground me. I used to meditate. I used to journal. I loved writing with pen and paper. It brought balance. It calmed me down.

Now my evenings are mostly screens. TV. Laptop. Phone. And I enjoy watching something before bed, especially with my husband. It feels relaxing. So I don’t think I’m ready to remove that completely. But maybe lagom here means adjusting, not eliminating. Maybe it means less screen, not none.

I also had to admit something that was uncomfortable. I don’t think I spend enough quality time with my husband. We spend time together, yes. But often we’re working. Or staring at screens. That’s not the same as being present.

The chapter reminded me that time doesn’t stretch. It doesn’t wait. That stayed with me.

When it came to food, I actually felt relieved. The tone wasn’t preachy. It was direct. Eat more vegetables. Pay attention to what your body tolerates. Don’t overload yourself with what hurts you. I bake a lot. I eat baked goods. Sometimes that leans heavy. But I appreciated the honesty of it. It wasn’t dramatic. It was practical.

Overall, I thought I was picking up a light, charming book with a few nice sayings.

Instead, I picked up something that quietly reined me in.

It didn’t yell at me. It didn’t shame me. It just held up a mirror and said, you might be doing too much.

And if I’m honest, I probably am.

I’m not perfectly practicing lagom. I’m barely hanging on. But I love that this book came into my life right now. In the middle of chaos. In the middle of noise. In the middle of my overworking tendencies.

It feels like the right book at the right time.

And I’m only one chapter in.