Quotes from Laura Vanderkam

happiness research finds that small, frequent gestures have a greater impact on our overall well-being than bigger, infrequent events.

Everything has an opportunity cost. Money is completely fungible, and so every penny spent on one thing could be spent on something else. The question all of us need to ask ourselves is whether that something else might actually make us or our loved ones happier.

A better question when asked to take on something in the future: "Would I do this tomorrow?

What makes you happy when it comes to money? Write these categories down and keep them in your wallet, or wherever you pay bills.

Calling something "work" doesn't make it a more noble use of time than anything else. Work that doesn't advance you toward the life you want is still wasted time.

I find this doable if I "plan tight, then plan light"—a mantra that many Tranquility by Tuesday participants reported finding helpful. This means designating times on Monday and Tuesday for all of the week's high-priority tasks. The minutes at the beginning of the week will feel a little full, but this is balanced by leaving the schedule more fluid later in the week. Any must-dos and want-to-dos should

Think of a typical full-time worker, who's in the office from nine to five daily, but takes thirty minutes for lunch, leaves an hour early on Friday, and comes in an hour late on Tuesday due to a dental appointment. That puts her at 35.5 hours for the week. One errand tacked on to the end of lunch one day or a longish midmorning break will pull her under that thirty-five-hour threshold that defines "full time.

If you take nothing else from this book, I hope you remember this: Success is possible, even in the midst of a complex and occasionally chaotic life. You do not need to wait for some less-hectic future time to become the person you want to be. With a different perspective, and a focus on doing what you can, you can be that person now.

So here's my take: If you are fantasizing about a spa day or an uninterrupted cup of coffee, please schedule these things into your life. And then create back-up slots too. I promise it will all fit. As you build the habit of creating a resilient schedule, there will be fewer crises, and more space will open up. Then you can use this space however you want.

Resilient schedules help us see time as abundant, not scarce.

Sociologists have studied these questions as well. It turns out that there is a fundamental flaw in the data used to support the claim that we suffer from time poverty and overwork: we lie.

No comiences a usar tu tiempo libre sin un plan porque, entonces, lo perderás mientras se te ocurre qué hacer", nos recomienda Huckabee.

Life won't always work as anyone wishes. That's the reason for the next chapter, which talks about creating a resilient schedule. An ideal schedule will also have to change over time as life changes. But if you know the ideal schedule, at least for now, then you can make decisions with that schedule in mind. As your experienced time gets closer to your ideal time, you'll be happier. That's a great thing to experience—as many times per week as possible.

Your turn THREE TIMES A WEEK IS A HABIT Planning questions: List some activities you'd like to do more frequently in your life. Choose one specific activity to focus on for the next week. When did you last do this activity?

Looking forward to the next week, when could this happen? List at least three times. What obstacles might prevent you from doing this activity three times a week? How can you address these challenges? Implementation questions: What activity did you choose to focus on three times this week? Did you spend more time on your chosen activity this week than in previous weeks? If so, how much more time did you spend on it? What was the impact of aiming to do this activity three times per week?

What challenges, if any, affected your ability to do this activity three times this week? How did you address these challenges? Did you need to modify this rule to work for you? How? How likely are you to continue using this rule in your life?

We keep our houses somewhat clean, but not as clean as we did in 1965, when stay-at-home moms spent, on average, 37.4 hours per week spiffing up their abodes (and married moms overall, including employed ones, spent 34.5 hours on such chores).

We do the things we have to—sleep, work, feed the children—and don't make time for the things we want to do. Or we don't appreciate how well we are doing, and so we feel squeezed and claustrophobic in our own lives.

Do not worry. You have always written before and you will write now.

Create your "List of 100 Dreams." This was the exercise from Chapter 2 that the career coach Caroline Ceniza-Levine does with her clients. Come up with as many answers as possible to the question of "What do I want to do (or do more of) with my time?

For the longer projects, create a list of actionable steps, and how long each might take, in terms of hours if you can. A lifetime is simply 168 hours, repeated again and again, and creating a completely unedited list of anything that might be pleasurable or meaningful will help you figure out what matters to you, and hence should go in your schedule.

Sometimes the answers are profound—for example, win a Nobel Prize—and sometimes they're more basic, such as "cook dinner for my family two nights per week.

When it comes to time, the perfect is a disarmingly subversive enemy of the good.

Fill in your 168 hours with blocks of core-competency time. Broadly, figure out what hours you would like to be working, sleeping, nurturing your family and friends, and nurturing yourself—for example, engaging in structured leisure activities such as exercise, volunteering, or participating in religious activities. For longer-term projects on your "List of 100 Dreams," schedule in the blocks of time associated with each actionable step.