What happens when the girl next door meets the Buddha? She might ask him for the secret of happiness - or maybe just some advice on cleaning her closet.

Nicole Beland shares the wisdom gleaned from her encounter with Buddhism in a new book called Girl Seeks Bliss: Zen and the Art of Modern Life Maintenance (Plume, $13). One review described the book, by the 31-year-old magazine journalist, as "Buddhism made easy for the girl on the go."

Ms. Beland, author of the "Girl Next Door" column about sex and relationships for Men's Health magazine, is a former senior editor for Cosmopolitan and Mademoiselle. She discussed her views on women and Buddhism with Special Contributor . Here are excerpts.

It's for women in their 20s and 30s whose lives are crazy, busy and at times overwhelming. It's for women who are curious about Buddhism, curious about Zen, but maybe a little skeptical about New Age-type things. I'm a very urban, practical person - I don't sit around in groups chanting. I wanted to approach Buddhism from a philosophical angle, to find out what people are getting out of Buddhism. How does it make their lives calmer and more satisfying?

If you strip away the cultural traditions that have grown up around Buddhism over the centuries, you get a simple philosophy that makes perfect sense to me and to most people.

"Everyone gets unhappy" is Truth No. 1 in Buddhism. And Truth No. 2 is, "We are unhappy because we crave things we don't have." Truth No. 3: "You can learn to control that craving so you won't be so unhappy." And of course the fourth truth is that Buddhism is the path to do that.

Once you accept that unhappiness is really about wanting things you don't have - whether it's because you don't have more time, or you haven't met your significant other, or you don't have the perfect outfit - [and] you accept that and address your frustrations and sadness and anger, then you will make yourself happy. Even more so than if you were to get all the things you want. Because we never stop wanting.

Buddhism teaches that you are not going to be able to help other people until you make yourself happy. If you're a selfish person and you just want to get, get, get, you're not going to be a compassionate person.

If you realize the genuine way to be happy isn't getting more, it's learning to be content with whatever comes your way, that will make you the most generous, outwardly focused person.

Young women focus far too much on appearance and trying to live up to some impossible ideal. They're always comparing themselves to friends and people on TV and the movies. Young women spend so many hours just feeling terrible about themselves, and that's something that Buddhism can help with.

With Buddhism, you start to see beyond your body and even your thoughts. When you sit in meditation, you get a sense of yourself that is very profound and that has nothing to do with what you look like.

Meditation takes a lot of practice; there's no getting it quickly. It's about getting past the superficial, which is something that young women can benefit by doing.

I have a little trick. It's easy to look at another woman and compare yourself, or judge her by what she's wearing. So whenever you feel yourself being judgmental, simply imagine that woman is your sister or best friend. Whatever negative thing you're thinking, if you imagine her as somebody you really care about, who has flaws and who is vulnerable, suddenly your heart goes out to her and you don't feel so negative. You see her as someone who can be a really positive part of your life, and you see how stupid it is to judge ourselves by our bodies.

People get this image, like in Batman Begins, of monks meditating in a temple high on a mountain, impervious to everything around them. And that is a part of Buddhism. There are some who spend all day meditating and who are very detached from our way of life. That's all very "woo-woo," but it's not very practical if you need to pay the rent.

There have always been two types of Buddhists: the monks who devote themselves entirely to meditation, and the householders who live normal lives but follow the basic tenets of Buddhism.

You can be down here in the thick of traffic, but if you have a little bit of Buddhist perspective, and can say what really matters, then you gain an incredible amount of control over your feelings and behavior.

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