Quotes from Gretchen Rubin

Eliminating clutter makes the burden of daily life feel lighter...

So convenient a thing it is to be a reasonable creature, since it enables one to find or make a reason for everything one has a mind to do. —BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, Autobiography

discouraging as he'd been, hadn't actually hit on my real worry about my project: Was it supremely self-centered to spend so much effort on my own happiness?

My research had revealed that challenge and novelty are key elements to happiness. The brain is stimulated by surprise, and successfully dealing with an unexpected situation gives a powerful sense of satisfaction.

Besides clarity of values, another kind of clarity supports habit formation: clarity of action. The more specific I am about what action to take, the more likely I am to form a habit. A habit to "be more mindful," for instance, is too vague to be a habit, but "have a moment of gratitude every time I walk into my apartment building" or "take a photo of something interesting every day" are concrete actions that can become habits.

Our hearing anchors us in the world; it tells us what's happening behind us, above us, in the dark, and before we're born. Sound pumps me up, calms me down, and transforms my moods in just a few seconds.

To achieve greater clarity in my actions, I often invoke a "bright-line rule," a useful concept from law. A bright-line rule is a clearly defined rule or standard that eliminates any need for interpretation or decision making.

It's a very unsettling and interesting exercise to think about the people in my life and to imagine myself in a minor, supporting role. How do I fit into their fates? Am I helping?

The fact is, changing a habit is much more challenging if that new habit means altering or losing an aspect of ourselves.

Once I've spelled out the problem in words, the greater clarity usually helps me to spot a solution.

Now, I see that it's like saving money, you can't save for when you get laid off, after you get laid off; rather, you have to save while you have a job and the money is still coming in. Life is like that, you have to DO while you are able to think of what you want, what you like, what needs it will fill, how it will enhance your life, how it will help you to maintain you, so that you have some reserves when crunch time comes.

For this reason, it's all the more important to try to shape habits mindfully, so that when we fall back on them at times of stress, we're following activities that make our situation better, not worse.

When we hear our voice coming from somewhere else, it sounds higher and thinner, which is why so many people dislike hearing recordings of themselves.

colorful tin trays from my grandmother? A friend confided

eliminating clutter would cut down the amount of housework in the average home by 40 percent.

When it comes to fake food, I'm like Samuel Johnson, who remarked, "Abstinence is as easy to me as temperance would be difficult.

What you do every day matters more than what you do once in a while.        You

Studies show that if you reward people for doing an activity, they often stop doing it for fun; being paid turns it into "work.

For an extensive and fascinating discussion of the use and pitfalls of rewards, see Edward Deci, Why We Do What We Do: Understanding Self-Motivation (New York: Penguin, 1996); Alfie Kohn, Punished by Rewards: The Trouble with Gold Stars, Incentive Plans, A's, Praise, and Other Bribes (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1999); Daniel Pink, Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us (New York: Riverhead, 2009).

Now that I know I'm an Upholder, an Abstainer, a Marathoner, a Finisher, and a Lark, and have spent a lot of time thinking about what is, and isn't, important to me, I'm much better able to shape my habits.

I cleaned out my fridge, and now I feel like I can change careers!

I was comforted by the words of my model Benjamin Franklin, who reflected of his own chart: On the whole, though I never arrived at perfection I had been so ambitious of obtaining, but fell far short of it, yet as I was, by the endeavor, a better and a happier man than I otherwise should have been had I not attempted it.

Information, consequences, choice. Without lectures or micro-management or rescue.

Studies show that if you reward people for doing an activity, they often stop doing it for fun; being paid turns it into "work." Parents, for example, are warned not to reward children for reading—they're teaching kids to read for a reward, not for pleasure.