Gretchen Rubin famous quotes

If I pretend to myself that I'm different from the way I truly am, I'm going to make choices that won't make me happy.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Choices #Different #Way

Happiness: "You Bring Your Own Weather To The Picnic."
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Weather #Picnics #Positive Marriage

The most reliable predictor of not being lonely is the amount of contact with women. Time spent with men doesn't make a difference.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Lonely #Men #Differences

When I thought about why I was sometimes reluctant to push myself, I realized that it was because I was afraid of failure - but in order to have more success, I needed to be willing to accept more failure.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Order #Sometimes #Accepting

Never start a sentence with the words 'No offense.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Tact #Offense #Sentences

Habits are the invisible architecture of everyday life.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Everyday #Architecture #Invisible

Negative emotions like loneliness, envy, and guilt have an important role to play in a happy life; they're big, flashing signs that something needs to change.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Loneliness #Happy Life #Play

One of the best ways to make yourself happy is to make other people happy. One of the best ways to make other people happy is to be happy yourself.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Happiness #Mma #People

I always had the uncomfortable feeling that if I wasn't sitting in front of a computer typing, I was wasting my time - but I pushed myself to take a wider view of what was "productive." Time spent with my family and friends was never wasted.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Views #Feelings #Family And Friends

Enthusiasm is a form of social courage.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Enthusiasm #Social #Form

Say “no” only when it really matters. Wear a bright red shirt with bright orange shorts? Sure. Put water in the toy tea set? Okay. Sleep with your head at the foot of the bed? Fine. Samuel Johnson said, “All severity that does not tend to increase good, or prevent evil, is idle.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Sleep #Parenting #Feet

One of my Secrets of Adulthood is: Most decisions don't require extensive research.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Decision #Secret #Research

When you work regularly, inspiration strikes regularly.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Inspiration #Strikes

Being taken for granted is an unpleasant but sincere form of praise. Ironically, the more reliable you are and the less you complain, the more likely you are to be taken for granted.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Taken #Complaining #Praise

When I find myself focusing overmuch on the anticipated future happiness of arriving at a certain goal, I remind myself to 'Enjoy now'. If I can enjoy the present, I don't need to count on the happiness that is (or isn't) waiting for me in the future".
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Goal #Waiting #Arriving

The days are long, but the years are short.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Change #Wisdom #Years

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

#Happiness #Thinking #Feel Good

Flawed can be more perfect than perfection.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Perfect #Perfection #Flawed

It's about living in the moment and appreciating the smallest things. Surrounding yourself with the things that inspire you and letting go of the obsessions that want to take over your mind. It is a daily struggle sometimes and hard work but happiness begins with your own attitude and how you look at the world.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Letting Go #Attitude #Struggle

... one flaw throws the loveliness of [everything else] into focus. I remember reading that Shakers deliberately introduced a mistake into the things they made, to show that man shouldn't aspire to the perfection of God. Flawed can be more perfect than perfection.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Mistake #Reading #Men

Act the way you WANT to feel.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Happiness #Want #Way

Laughter is more than just a pleasurable activity...When people laugh together, they tend to talk and touch more and to make eye contact more frequently.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Relationship #Laughter #Eye

Studies show that aggressively expressing anger doesn't relieve anger but amplifies it. On the other hand, not expressing anger often allows it to disappear without leaving ugly traces.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Anger #Hands #Leaving

One reason that challenge brings happiness is that it allows you to expand your self - definition. You become larger. Suddenly you can do yoga or make homemade beer or speak a decent amount of Spanish. Research shows that the more elements make up your identity, the less threatening it is when any one element is threatened.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Yoga #Beer #Self

Nothing,' wrote Tolstoy, 'can make our life, or the lives of other people, more beautiful than perpetual kindness.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Life #Happiness #Beautiful

The things that go wrong often make the best memories.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Memories #Best Memories

What you do every day matters more than what you do once in a while.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Inspirational #Motivational #Matter

September is the other January.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#September #January

Enthusiasm is more important to mastery than innate ability.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Important #Mastery #Enthusiasm

Step by step, you make your way forward. That’s why practices such as daily writing exercises or keeping a daily blog can be so helpful. You see yourself do the work, which shows you that you can do the work. Progress is reassuring and inspiring; panic and then despair set in when you find yourself getting nothing done day after day. One of the painful ironies of work life is that the anxiety of procrastination often makes people even less likely to buckle down in the future.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Writing #Procrastination #Exercise

I can DO ANYTHING I want, but I can't DO EVERYTHING I want.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Want

In the scope of a happy life, a messy desk or an overstuffed coat closet is a trivial thing, yet I find - and I hear from other people that they agree - that getting rid of clutter gives a disproportionat e boost to happiness.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Happy Life #People #Giving

We tend to overestimate what we can do in a short period, and underestimate what we can do over a long period.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Long #Underestimate #Periods

Feelings follow actions. If I'm feeling low, I deliberately act cheery, and I find myself actually feeling happier. If I'm feeling angry at someone, I do something thoughtful for her and my feelings toward her soften. This strategy is uncannily effective.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Thoughtful #Feelings #Action

Outer order contributes to inner calm.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Order #Calm

The more I examine the issue of clutter, the more effort I put into combating it, because it really does act as a weight.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Issues #Effort #Doe

It's the task that's never started that's more tiresome.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Motivational #Tasks

We tend to overestimate what we can do in a short period, and underestimate what we can do over a long period, provided we work slowly and consistently. Anthony Trollope, the nineteenth-century writer who managed to be a prolific novelist while also revolutionizing the British postal system, observed, “A small daily task, if it be really daily, will beat the labours of a spasmodic Hercules.” Over the long run, the unglamorous habit of frequency fosters both productivity and creativity.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Running #Creativity #Long

If I give more to myself, I can ask more from myself. Self-regard isn't selfish.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Selfish #Self #Giving

A 'treat' is different from a 'reward', which must be justified or earned. A treat is a small pleasure or indulgence that we give to ourselves just because we want it. Treats give us greater vitality, which boosts self-control, which helps us maintain our healthy habits.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Self #Giving #Healthy

Contemporary research shows that happy people are more altruistic, more productive, more helpful, more likable, more creative, more resilient, more interested in others, friendlier, and healthier. Happy people make better friends, colleagues, and citizens.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#People #Creative #Citizens

Turn off your email; turn off your phone; disconnect from the Internet; figure out a way to set limits so you can concentrate when you need to, and disengage when you need to. Technology is a good servant but a bad master.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Technology #Phones #Way

We can use decision-making to choose the habits we want to form, use willpower to get the habit started, then - and this is the best part - we can allow the extraordinary power of habit to take over. At that point, were free from the need to decide and the need to use willpower.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Decision #Want #Needs

Pouring out ideas is better for creativity than doling them out by the teaspoon.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Creativity #Ideas #Pouring

One of the best ways to make yourself happy in the present is to recall happy times from the past. Photos are a great memory-prompt, and because we tend to take photos of happy occasions, they weight our memories to the good.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Memories #Past #Way

Happiness comes not from having more, not from having less, but from wanting what you have.
-- Gretchen Rubin

The belief that unhappiness is selfless and happiness is selfish is misguided. It's more selfless to act happy. It takes energy, generosity, and discipline to be unfailingly lighthearted.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Selfish #Discipline #Generosity

Keep in mind that to avoid loneliness, many people need both a social circle and an intimate attachment. Having just one of two may still leave you feeling lonely.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Lonely #Loneliness #Circles

Creativity arises from a constant churn of ideas, and one of the easiest ways to encourage that fertile froth is to keep your mind engaged with your project. When you work regularly, inspiration strikes regularly.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Inspiration #Creativity #Ideas

What's fun for other people may not be fun for you- and vice versa.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Fun #People #Vices

Forbearance is a form of generosity.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Generosity #Forbearance #Form

I needed to change the lens through which I viewed everything familiar.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Lenses #Familiar #Needed

Volunteering to help others is the right thing to do, and it also boosts personal happiness
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Helping Others #Volunteer #Boost

Self-awareness is a key to self-mastery
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Keys #Self #Mastery

No one regrets having changed a lightbulb.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Regret #Changed

People are powerfully moved by imagination, belief, and knowledge. They can consider the past and future. They can make changes in their behavior out of reason, in a way that animals can’t do.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Animal #Past #People

Now is now. Here is my treasure.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Treasure

One of the most important lessons of childhood is discovering what you like to do.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Childhood #Important #Lessons

[S]tudies show that one of the best ways to lift your mood is to engineer an easy success, such as tackling a long-delayed chore.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Long #Way #Easy

It's easy to be heavy; hard to be light.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Light #Easy #Heavy

To eke out the most happiness from an experience, we must anticipate it, savor it as it unfolds, express happiness, and recall a happy memory.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Happiness #Memories #Happy Memories

There are no do overs and some things just aren't going to happen. It is a little sad but you just have to embrace what is
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Littles #Embrace

Sometimes I succeed, sometimes I fail, but every day is a clean slate and a fresh opportunity
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Opportunity #Succeed #Sometimes

I enjoy the fun of failure. It's fun to fail, I kept repeating. It's part of being ambitious; it's part of being creative. If something is worth doing, it's worth doing badly
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Fun #Creative #Ambitious

There is a preppy wabi-sabi to soft, faded khakis and cotton shirts, but it's not nice to be surrounded by things that are worn out or stained or used up.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Nice #Cotton #Abundance

It was time to expect more of myself. Yet as I thought about happiness, I kept running up against paradoxes. I wanted to change myself but accept myself. I wanted to take myself less seriously -- and also more seriously. I wanted to use my time well, but I also wanted to wander, to play, to read at whim. I wanted to think about myself so I could forget myself. I was always on the edge of agitation; I wanted to let go of envy and anxiety about the future, yet keep my energy and ambition.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Letting Go #Running #Ambition

One of the great joys of falling in love is the feeling that the most extraordinary person in the entire world has chosen you.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Falling In Love #Love Is #Joy

Money. It's a good servant but a bad master.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Money #Masters #Servant

Time waits for no ovary.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Waiting #Ovaries

Enthusiasm is more important than innate ability, it turns out, because the single more important element in developing an expertise is your willingness to practice.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Practice #Important #Elements

Look for happiness under your own roof.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Looks #Roof

Did I have a heart to be contented? Well, no, not particularly. I had a tendency to be discontented: ambitious, dissatisfied, fretful, and tough to please...It's easier to complain than to laugh, easier to yell than to joke around, easier to be demanding than to be satisfied.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Heart #Laughing #Ambitious

Work harder to appreciate your ordinary day.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Appreciate #Ordinary #Work Harder

The belief that unhappiness is selfless and happiness is selfish is misguided. It's more selfless to act happy. It takes energy, generosity, and discipline to be unfailingly lighthearted, yet everyone takes the happy person for granted. No one is careful of his feelings or tries to keep his spirits high. He seems self-sufficient; he becomes a cushion for others. And because happiness seems unforced, that person usually gets no credit.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Happiness #Selfish #Discipline

I am living my real life, this is it. Now is now, and if I waited to be happier, waited to have fun, waited to do the things that I know I ought to do, I might never get the chance.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Fun #Real #Might

[Benjamin Franklin]identified thirteen virtues he wanted to cultivate--temperance, silence, order, resolution, frugality, industry, sincerity, justice, moderation, cleanliness, tranquility, chastity and humility--and made a chart with those virtues plotted against the days of the week. Each day, Franklin would score himself on whether he practiced those thirteen virtues.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Humility #Order #Justice

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.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Religious #Determination #Thinking

Pay close attention to any flame of enthusiasm.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Flames #Attention #Pay

Guard your children's free time - from you.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Children #Your Children

Working is one of the most dangerous forms of procrastination.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Procrastination #Form #Dangerous

Focus not on doing less or doing more but on doing what you value.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Focus #Values

I can build a happy life only on the foundation of my own nature.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Happy Life #Foundation

Knowing what you admire in others is a wonderful mirror into your deepest, as yet unborn, self.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Mirrors #Self #Knowing

We are happy when we are growing.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Growing

We've all heard of Dr. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross's five stages of grief: denial, anger, bagaining, depression and acceptance.  By contrats, I realized, happiness has four stages.  to eke out the most happiness from an experience, we must anticipate it, savor it as it unfolds, express happiness, and recall a happy memory.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Memories #Grief #Acceptance

You can choose what you do, you cant choose what you like to do.
-- Gretchen Rubin

Now that I've relinquished my fantasies of all the people I wish I could be, and stopped feeling guilty about [them], I have more time for the things that I truly enjoy.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#People #Feelings #Wish

Be a storehouse of happy memories.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Family #Memories #Happy Memories

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.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Happy Life #Thinking #Keys

It's so easy to wish that we'd made an effort in the past, so that we'd happily be enjoying the benefit now, but when now is the time when that effort must be made, as it always is, that prospect is much less inviting.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Monday #Past #Effort

Act the way that you want to feel.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Anxiety #Want #Way

He is my fate. He's my soul mate. He pervades my whole existence. So, of course, I often ignore him.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Fate #Soul #Mates

I grasped two things: I wasn't as happy as I could be, and my life wasnt going to change unless I made it change.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Two #Made

We must exercise ourselves in the things which bring happiness, since, if that be present, we have everything, and, if that be absent, all our actions are directed toward attaining it.
-- Gretchen Rubin

#Exercise #Our Actions #Action