Quotes from Gretchen Rubin

now is always the best time to begin.

A happy home wasn't a place that I could furnish, but an attitude of mind I must develop.

day three days a week for six weeks

Eventually, I decided to count my daily walk or cross-country ski as a treat—my time for myself in a day otherwise filled with responsibilities. Somehow, that made it much easier to make it a priority.

For most of us, the real aim isn't to enjoy a few pleasures right now, but to build habits that will make us happy over the long term. Sometimes, that means giving up something in the present, or demanding more from ourselves.

The reward of a thing well done is to have done it. —Ralph Waldo Emerson, "New England Reformers

About 30 to 50 percent of happiness is genetically determined; about 10 to 20 percent reflects life circumstances (such as age, gender, health, marital status, income, occupation); and the rest is very much influenced by the way we think and act. We possess considerable power to push ourselves to the top or bottom of our natural range through our conscious actions and thoughts.

Any beginning is a time of special power for habit creation, and at certain times we experience a clean slate, in which circumstances change in a way that makes a fresh start possible—if we're alert for the opportunity.

A feeling of control is a very important aspect of happiness. People who feel in control of their lives, which is powerfully bolstered by feeling in control of time, are more likely to feel happy.

One lives in the naïve notion that later there will be more room than in the entire past. —Elias Canetti, The Human Province

For instance, studies show that when mothers listen without offering advice or criticism while their children explain solutions to problems, the children markedly improve their problem-solving ability.

To be happy, I need to think about feeling good, feeling bad, and feeling right, in an atmosphere of growth.

My happiness project was both. I wanted to perfect my character, but given my nature, that would probably involve charts, deliverables, to-do lists, new vocabulary terms, and compulsive note taking.

Underreact to a problem

This interest in pattern and surprise gives us our love of both familiarity and novelty. When we experience something familiar—a song, a favorite snack, an episode of The Office—our brains process it more easily, which may make us like it more. Nevertheless, to enjoy ourselves, we usually try something new. Novelty is more work but also more interesting, which is why new forms of music, art, and fashion catch our attention.

One day, I'd stop twisting my hair, and wearing running shoes all the time, and eating exactly the same food every day. I'd remember my friends' birthdays, I'd learn Photoshop, I wouldn't let my daughter watch TV during breakfast. I'd read Shakespeare. I'd spend more time laughing and having fun, I'd be more polite, I'd visit museums more often, I wouldn't be scared to drive.

If I never do something, it requires no self-control for me; if I do something sometimes, it requires enormous self-control.

It wasn't the amount of stuff; it was the engagement with that stuff [that mattered for happiness].

One of my Secrets of Adulthood is that we're more like other people than we suppose and less like other people than we suppose.

note: people weigh their highest on Sunday;14 their lowest, on Friday morning.)

I used to think I was pretty typical, but now I see that I'm extreme. I can't judge people according to what works for me.

Because we're quite susceptible to "goal contagion," we may rapidly pick up someone else's habits, so it's helpful to be around people who are good role models.

I didn't want to be like the novelist who spent so much time rewriting his first sentence that he never wrote his second.

Many assume that offering a reward will help people to jump-start a healthy habit, which will then persist after the reward fades away. Not so. Often, as soon as the reward stops (and sometimes before it stops), the behavior stops.