Happier with Gretchen Rubin

Ep. 439: Suggest the Default Option, Skip a Year of an Activity You Enjoy, and More Everyday Luxuries

We talk about how we can make planning easier by suggesting the default option of time and place...

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• 9 meses

Little Happier: Something Brilliant Came Out of My Mouth—Something I Didn’t Know I Knew

Looking at a ‘zine made by some friends decades ago made me realize an important truth—a truth I...

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• 9 meses

“Bonus: Commencement Address Given by Gretchen Rubin: Five Essential Paradoxes for a Happy Life”

In this bonus episode, listen to the commencement address I gave at my daughter’s Eleanor’s...

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• 9 meses

Ep. 438: Act Like a Teenager, Pick Up Your Food in Person, and “Ask Us Anything” About Writing

We talk about how we can boost our happiness by acting like teenagers (the good aspects of being...

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• 9 meses

Little Happier: Journalist Connie Chung Influenced a Generation—Without Realizing It

In the New York Times, Connie Wang wrote about why so many families had named their daughters...

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• 9 meses

More Happier: More Strength and Stamina, a New Metaphor for “Empty Nest,” and an Easy Way to Keep a Journal

We talk about why and how we’re redoubling our efforts to work on our strength and stamina. We...

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• 9 meses

Ep. 437: To Make a Good Connection, Talk More; Learn the Lesson of the Enron Corpus; and a Collection of Positive Trends

We talk about the fact that despite the widespread “reticence bias,” research suggests that we...

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• 9 meses

Little Happier: The IKEA Effect, or How We Value Things According to What They Cost Us

As IKEA, instant cake mixes, and meal-kit delivery services demonstrate, we often value things...

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• 9 meses

Ep. 436: We Use Halfway Day to Report on How We’re Doing on Our Aims for 2023: the “Happier Trifecta”

We use Halfway Day as a catalyst to reflect on how we’re doing with our aims for 2023. Each...

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• 10 meses

Little Happier: It Might Be Boring to Read About the “Land of Happy,” But It’s Probably a Nice Place t

People sometimes assume that happiness is boring—but as philosopher Simone Weil points out, while...

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• 10 meses

More Happier: Two Pleasures of Summer, Breaking in My Feet (Not My Shoes), and Benefits of Going “On Pause”

We each explain a reason why summer is making us happier, why it’s important to break in our feet...

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• 10 meses

Ep. 435: Start a New Habit on Vacation, Cultivate Everyday Luxuries, and Memorize Street Names

We discuss why it’s helpful to start a new habit while on vacation, and why taking a few minutes...

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• 10 meses

Little Happier: Where Is Timbuktu?

A man in Timbuktu laughed when he heard that that people think of the place as being very far...

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• 10 meses

Ep. 434: Ways to Understand a Child Better, a Hack for Showing Love, & Eleanor Gives High-School Advice

We discuss ways to use the “Four Tendencies” personality profiles to communicate more effectively...

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• 10 meses

Little Happier: Why Would a Sailor Decide Never to Learn to Swim?

A yachtsman refused to learn to swim, so that if ever found himself in the water, he’d cling to...

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• 10 meses

More Happier: The Happiness of Grabbing a Dishtowel, a Clutter-Clearing Triumph, and Getting Quality Screen Time

We talk about why having a dishtowel at the right moment brought me an irrational boost in...

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• 10 meses

Ep. 433: A Surprising Way to Lift Your Mood, How to Decide Where to Move & Ideas for a Rebel Father

We discuss a counter-intuitive and creative way to boost our spirits, and talk about a terrific...

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• 10 meses

Little Happier: A Jammed Zipper Teaches an Important Happiness Lesson I learned a very useful lesson from a very...

If I’m complaining about a problem and asking other people to help me solve it, I should ask...

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• 10 meses

Ep. 432: Happier Podcast Book Club: Surprise! We Talk About How “Life in Five Senses” Makes Us Happier

Happier Podcast Book Club: We have a conversation about “Life in Five Senses”—abandoned titles,...

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• 10 meses

Little Happier: An Important Lesson from a Famous Illusionist and a Fake Gorilla

The famous “Monkey Business Illusion” video and the memoir of magician Darren Brown point to a...

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• 11 meses