Gretchen Rubin Thinking Quotations

In 'Before and After,' I identify the sixteen strategies that we can use to make or break our habits. Some are quite familiar, such as 'Monitoring,' 'Scheduling,' and 'Convenience.' Some took me a lot of effort to identify, such as 'Thinking,' 'Identity,' and 'Clarity.'

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

The thing that inspires me most is reading and just observing the people around me. I think those are the two things that make me want to write.

Think about what kind of person you are and shape your habits, and your happiness, to show what's true about you instead of thinking that you can just import the right answer from the outside.

I think the big myth about habits, and happiness too, is that there's somehow a magic "one size fits all" solution. That, "If it works for you it's going to work for me," and it's just a matter of figuring out what that habit would be, whether that's do it first thing in the morning, or start small, or do it for thirty days, or give yourself a cheat day.

According to current research, in the determination of a person's level of happiness, genetics accounts for about 50 percent; life circumstances, such as age, gender, ethnicity, marital status, income, health, occupation, and religious affiliation, account for about 10 to 20 percent; and the remainder is a product of how a person thinks and acts.

If you always use your stapler in one place, keep it there, instead of thinking that all the office supplies should go in one place. I've moved a lot of things around in my house because of that.

One of the findings that really interests me is that, although we think we ACT because of the way we FEEL, we often FEEL because of the way we ACT. So an almost uncanny way to change your feelings is to act the way you WISH you felt.

There's a kind of magical thinking about these kinds of things. Throw away those bad photos before the "magic" attaches to them, so the good ones stand out.

I think self-knowledge is a key to happiness.We can build happy lives only on the foundation of our own natures, our own values, and our own interests.

I've noticed that a lot of people do much better when all their resolutions are framed as 'Yes.' Not something like, "I'm going to give up French Fries," but something like "I'm going to eat three vegetables every day." "I'm going to hug more, kiss more, touch more." "I'm going to listen to more music." They do better when they frame things in the positive. And I think this is just part of human nature.

Sometimes I think it's easier to think about being happier, for what ever that means to you then worrying about what is happiness and what would life be if I finally achieved this ultimate happiness?