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Gretchen Rubin

Better Than Before: Mastering the Habits of Our Everyday Lives Hardcover – March 17, 2015

by Gretchen Rubin (Author)

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NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The author of The Happiness Project and “a force for real change” (Brené Brown) examines how changing our habits can change our lives.

“If anyone can help us stop procrastinating, start exercising, or get organized, it’s Gretchen Rubin. The happiness guru takes a sledgehammer to old-fashioned notions about change.”—Parade

Most of us have a habit we’d like to change, and there’s no shortage of expert advice. But as we all know from tough experience, no magic, one-size-fits-all solution exists. It takes work to make a habit, but once that habit is set, we can harness the energy of habits to build happier, stronger, more productive lives.

In Better Than Before, acclaimed writer Gretchen Rubin identifies every approach that actually works. She presents a practical, concrete framework to allow readers to understand their habits—and to change them for good.

Infused with Rubin’s compelling voice, rigorous research, and easy humor, and packed with vivid stories of lives transformed, Better Than Before explains the (sometimes counterintuitive) core principles of habit formation and answers the most perplexing questions about habits:

• Why do we find it tough to create a habit for something we love to do?
• How can we keep our healthy habits when we’re surrounded by temptations?
• How can we help someone else change a habit?

Rubin reveals the true secret to habit change: first, we must know ourselves. When we shape our habits to suit ourselves, we can find success—even if we’ve failed before.

Whether you want to eat more healthfully, stop checking devices, or finish a project, the invaluable ideas in Better Than Before will start you working on your own habits—even before you’ve finished the book.

Print length

320 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Crown
Publication date

March 17, 2015
Dimensions

6.41 x 1.04 x 9.53 inches
ISBN-10

0385348614
ISBN-13

978-0385348614
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Popular Highlights in this book

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Habits make change possible by freeing us from decision making and from using self-control.
Highlighted by 5,460 Kindle readers
Self-measurement brings self-awareness, and self-awareness strengthens our self-control.
Highlighted by 3,359 Kindle readers
In other words, habits eliminate the need for self-control.
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Editorial Reviews

Review

“We are totally comfortable calling Gretchen Rubin’s new book, Better Than Before: Mastering the Habits of Our Everyday Lives, life-changing.”
—Better Homes & Gardens

“If anyone can help us stop procrastinating, start exercising or get organized, it’s Gretchen Rubin. The happiness guru takes a sledgehammer to old-fashioned notions about change.”
—Parade

“It’s exciting to find a self-help book that’s not only full of eye-opening insight but also provides practical tips to help you procrastinate and stress less, exercise and eat more healthfully, and spend time on activities that matter. We’re really glad that Gretchen Rubin, author of The Happiness Project, decided to investigate her affinity for habits, because in the process she’s come up with a great guide to help us lay the foundation of a more satisfying life. Best of all, Better Than Before is a really fun read—Rubin’s friendliness, candor, and humor mirror a lively conversation with a best friend.” —Apple iBooks

“The Happiness Project lays out life’s essential goals…Her new book, Better Than Before: Mastering the Habits of Our Everyday Lives, serves as a kind of detailed instruction manual on how to achieve them.” —New York Times Sunday Book Review

“In Better Than Before: Mastering the Habits of Our Everyday Lives, Gretchen Rubin picks up where [William] James left off, integrating a wealth of insight from psychology, sociology, and anthropology in an illuminating field guide to harnessing the transformative power of habit in modern life.”
—Brain Pickings

“Change can be good. Particularly if it helps us live longer, healthier, indeed, happier lives — the objective of Rubin’s latest project.”
—Chicago Tribune

“Author Gretchen Rubin says most people fall into one of four motivation types. Knowing yours is key to taking on new habits.”
—Lifehacker

“Gretchen Rubin… [is] lighthearted and inviting—full of insights that sound familiar and advice that sounds less like what you should do and more like what you want to do.... With her focus on taking first steps and creating early successes, this is a refreshing take on how to change stubborn patterns that limit what we can enjoy about our lives.” —Audiofile Magazine

“Do you have a bad habit you’re trying to shake, or a good one you wish you could cultivate? Gretchen Rubin is one of the most charming and erudite authors of her generation. Here, she uses her gifts to help you eat right, sleep well, stop procrastinating, and start enjoying all that life has to offer.”
—Susan Cain, New York Times bestselling author of Quiet

“Gretchen Rubin combines deep research and observations from her own life to explain how habits emerge and—more important—how they can change. It’s indispensable for anyone hoping to overhaul how they (almost unthinkingly) behave.”
—Charles Duhigg, New York Times bestselling author of The Power of Habit

“Filled with insights about our patterns of behavior, Better Than Before addresses one of life’s big and timeless questions: how can we transform ourselves? In a way that’s thought-provoking, surprising, and often funny, Gretchen Rubin provides us with the tools to build a life that truly reflects our goals and values.”
—Arianna Huffington, founder of The Huffington Post and New York Times bestselling author of Thrive

“Is there a habit in your life you’d like to change? If so, here’s your first step: Read this book. It’s loaded with practical, everyday tips and techniques that will guide you to success.”
—Dan Heath, New York Times bestselling coauthor of Made to Stick, Switch, and Decisive

“Almost everyone wants to be ‘better’—slimmer, smarter, better looking, more interesting, more productive—and we want to know we’re improving, we want the reinforcing evidence. Gretchen Rubin’s new masterpiece, Better Than Before, shows us how. Unlike other books on habits, Rubin’s book gives us the specific tools and a blueprint for getting back on track—the fast track.”
—Brian Wansink, Ph.D., New York Times bestselling author of Slim by Design and Mindless Eating

“With bold and original insights, Gretchen Rubin reveals the hidden truths about how to change our habits—from resisting junk food and hitting the gym to ending procrastination and saving money. Better Than Before is a gem, and the first habit you should form is reading a chapter every night.”
—Adam Grant, Wharton professor and New York Times bestselling author of Give and Take

“Gretchen Rubin’s superpower is curiosity. Luckily for us, she’s turned her passionate inquiry to the topic of making and mastering habits. Weaving together research, unforgettable examples, and her brilliant insight, Better Than Before is a force for real change. It rearranged what I thought I knew about my habits, and I’m better for it.”
—Brené Brown, New York Times bestselling author of Daring Greatly andThe Gifts of Imperfection

About the Author

Gretchen Rubin is one of today’s most influential and thought-provoking observers of happiness and human nature. She’s the author of many books, including the blockbuster New York Times bestsellersOuter Order, Inner Calm; The Four Tendencies; Better Than Before; and The Happiness Project. She has an enormous readership, both in print and online, and her books have sold more than 3.5 million copies worldwide, in more than thirty languages. On her top-ranking, award-winning podcast Happier with Gretchen Rubin, she explores happiness and good habits. She is also a CBS News contributor, providing weekly solutions for living a happier life. Gretchen Rubin started her career in law and was clerking for Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor when she realized that she wanted to be a writer. Raised in Kansas City, she lives in New York City with her husband and two daughters.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

The Fateful Tendencies We Bring into the World

The Four Tendencies

It is only when you meet someone of a different culture from yourself that you begin to realise what your own beliefs really are.

--George Orwell, The Road to Wigan Pier

I knew exactly where my extended investigation of habits would begin.

For years, I’ve kept a list of my “Secrets of Adulthood,” which are the lessons I’ve learned with time and experience. Some are serious, such as “Just because something is fun for someone else doesn’t mean it’s fun for me,” and some are goofy, such as “Food tastes better when I eat with my hands.” One of my most important Secrets of Adulthood, however, is: “I’m more like other people, and less like other people, than I suppose.” While I’m not much different from other people, those differences are very important.

For this reason, the same habit strategies don’t work for everyone. If we know ourselves, we’re able to manage ourselves better, and if we’re trying to work with others, it helps to understand them.

So I would start with self-knowledge, by identifying how my nature affects my habits. Figuring that out, however, isn’t easy. As novelist John Updike observed, “Surprisingly few clues are ever offered us as to what kind of people we are.”

In my research, I’d looked for a good framework to explain differences in how people respond to habits, but to my surprise, none existed. Was I the only one who wondered why some people adopt habits much more, or less, readily than other people? Or why some people dread habits? Or why some people are able to keep certain habits, in certain situations, but not others?

I couldn’t figure out the pattern--then one afternoon, eureka. The answer didn’t emerge from my library research, but from my preoccupation with the question my friend had asked me. I’d been pondering, yet again, her simple observation: she’d never missed practice for her high school track team, but she can’t make herself go running now. Why?

As my idea hit, I felt the same excitement that Archimedes must have felt when he stepped into his bath. Suddenly I grasped it. The first and most important habits question is: “How does a person respond to an expectation?” When we try to form a new habit, we set an expectation for ourselves. Therefore, it’s crucial to understand how we respond to expectations.

We face two kinds of expectations: outer expectations (meet work deadlines, observe traffic regulations) and inner expectations (stop napping, keep a New Year’s resolution). From my observation, just about everyone falls into one of four distinct groups:

Upholders respond readily to both outer expectations and inner expectations.

Questioners question all expectations, and will meet an expectation only if they believe it’s justified.

Obligers respond readily to outer expectations but struggle to meet inner expectations (my friend on the track team).

Rebels resist all expectations, outer and inner alike.

As I struggled to find a name for this framework, one of my favorite passages, from Sigmund Freud’s “The Theme of the Three Caskets,” floated into my head. Freud explains that the names of the three goddesses of fate mean “the accidental within the decrees of destiny,” “the inevitable,” and “the fateful tendencies each one of us brings into the world.” The fateful tendencies each one of us brings into the world.

I decided to name my framework the “Four Tendencies.” (The “Four Fateful Tendencies,” though accurate, sounded a little melodramatic.)

As I developed the framework of the Four Tendencies, I truly felt as though I were discovering the Periodic Table of the Elements--the elements of character. I wasn’t making up a system; I was uncovering a law of nature. Or perhaps I’d created a habits Sorting Hat.

Our Tendency colors the way we see the world and therefore has enormous consequences for our habits. Of course, these are tendencies, but I’ve found, to a degree that surprises me, that most people do fall squarely into one camp, and once I identified the Tendencies, I got a kick from hearing the people within a given Tendency make the same kinds of comments, over and over. Questioners, for example, often remark on how much they hate to wait in line.

UPHOLDERS

Upholders respond readily to outer expectations and inner expectations. They wake up and think: “What’s on the schedule and the to-do list for today?” They want to know what’s expected of them, and to meet those expectations. They avoid making mistakes or letting people down--including themselves.

Others can rely on Upholders, and Upholders can rely on themselves. They’re self-directed and have little trouble meeting commitments, keeping resolutions, or meeting deadlines (they often finish early). They want to understand the rules, and often they search for the rules beyond the rules--as in the case of art or ethics.

One friend with an Upholder wife told me, “If something is on the schedule, my wife is going to do it. When we were in Thailand, we’d planned to visit a certain temple, and we went--even though she got food poisoning the night before and was throwing up on our way there.”

Because Upholders feel a real obligation to meet their expectations for themselves, they have a strong instinct for self-preservation, and this helps protect them from their tendency to meet others’ expectations. “I need a lot of time for myself,” an Upholder friend told me, “to exercise, to kick around new ideas for work, to listen to music. If people ask me to do things that interfere, it’s easy for me to tell them ‘no.’ ”

However, Upholders may struggle in situations where expectations aren’t clear or the rules aren’t established. They may feel compelled to meet expectations, even ones that seem pointless. They may feel uneasy when they know they’re breaking the rules, even unnecessary rules, unless they work out a powerful justification to do so.

This is my Tendency. I’m an Upholder.

My Upholder Tendency sometimes makes me overly concerned with following the rules. Years ago, when I pulled out my laptop to work in a coffee shop, the barista told me, “You can’t use a laptop in here.” Now every time I go to a new coffee shop, I worry about whether I can use my laptop.

There’s a relentless quality to Upholders, too. I’m sure it’s tiresome for Jamie--sometimes, it’s even tiresome for me--to hear my alarm go off every morning at 6:00. I have an Upholder friend who estimates that she skips going to the gym only about six times a year.

“How does your family feel about that?” I asked.

“Well, my husband used to complain. Now he’s used to it.”

Although I love being an Upholder, I see its dark side, too--the gold-star seeking, the hoop jumping, the sometimes mindless rule following.

When I figured out that I was an Upholder, I understood why I’d been drawn to the study of habits. We Upholders find it relatively easy to cultivate habits--it’s not easy, but it’s easier than for many other people--and we embrace them because we find them gratifying. But the fact that even habit-loving Upholders must struggle to foster good habits shows how challenging it is to form habits.

QUESTIONERS

Questioners question all expectations, and they respond to an expectation only if they conclude that it makes sense. They’re motivated by reason, logic, and fairness. They wake up and think, “What needs to get done today, and why?” They decide for themselves whether a course of action is a good idea, and they resist doing anything that seems to lack sound purpose. Essentially, they turn all expectations into inner expectations. As one Questioner wrote on my blog: “I refuse to follow arbitrary rules (I jaywalk, as long as there are no cars coming, and I’ll go through a red light if it’s the middle of the night, and there’s no other traffic in sight) but rules that I find based in morality/ethics/reason are very compelling.”

A friend said, “Why don’t I take my vitamins? My doctor tells me I should, but usually I don’t.”

She’s a Questioner, so I asked, “Do you believe that you need to take vitamins?”

“Well, no,” she answered, after a pause, “as a matter of fact, I don’t.”

“I bet you’d take them if you thought they mattered.”

Questioners resist rules for rules’ sake. A reader posted on my blog: “My son’s school principal said that kids were expected to tuck in their shirts. When I expressed surprise at this seemingly arbitrary rule, the principal said that the school had many rules just for the sake of teaching children to follow rules. That’s a dumb reason to ask anyone, including children, to follow a rule. If we know of such rules we should seek and destroy them, to make the world a better place.”

Because Questioners like to make well-considered decisions and come to their own conclusions, they’re very intellectually engaged, and they’re often willing to do exhaustive research. If they decide there’s sufficient basis for an expectation, they’ll follow it; if not, they won’t. Another Questioner said, “My wife is annoyed with me, because she really wants us both to track our spending. But we’re not in debt, we spend within our means, so I don’t think that getting that information is worth the hassle. So I won’t do it.”

Questioners resist anything that seems arbitrary; for instance, Questioners often remark, “I can keep a resolution if I think it’s important, but I wouldn’t make a New Year’s resolution, because January first is a meaningless date.”

At times, the Questioner’s appetite for information and justification can become overwhelming. “My mother makes me insane,” one reader reported, “because she expects me to need tons of information the way she does. She constantly asks questions that I didn’t ask, wouldn’t ask, and generally don’t think I need to know the answers to.” Questioners themselves sometimes wish they could accept expectations without probing them so relentlessly. A Questioner told me ruefully, “I suffer from analysis paralysis. I always want to have one more piece of information.”

Questioners are motivated by sound reasons--or at least what they believe to be sound reasons. In fact, Questioners can sometimes seem like crackpots, because they may reject expert opinion in favor of their own conclusions. They ignore those who say, “Why do you think you know more about cancer than your doctor?” or “Everyone prepares the report one way, why do you insist on your own crazy format?”

Questioners come in two flavors: some Questioners have an inclination to Uphold, and others have an inclination to Rebel (like being “Virgo with Scorpio rising”). My husband, Jamie, questions everything, but it’s not too hard to persuade him to uphold. As an Upholder, I doubt I could be married happily to someone who wasn’t an Upholder or a Questioner/Upholder. Which is a sobering thought.

If Questioners believe that a particular habit is worthwhile, they’ll stick to it--but only if they’re satisfied about the habit’s usefulness.

OBLIGERS

Obligers meet outer expectations, but struggle to meet inner expectations. They’re motivated by external accountability; they wake up and think, “What must I do today?” Because Obligers excel at meeting external demands and deadlines, and go to great lengths to meet their responsibilities, they make terrific colleagues, family members, and friends--which I know firsthand, because my mother and my sister are both Obligers.

Because Obligers resist inner expectations, it’s difficult for them to self-motivate--to work on a PhD thesis, to attend networking events, to get their car serviced. Obligers depend on external accountability, with consequences such as deadlines, late fees, or the fear of letting other people down. One Obliger wrote on my blog, “I don’t feel a sense of accountability to my calendar, just to the people associated with the appointments. If the entry is just ‘go for a jog’ I’m not likely to do it.” Another Obliger summarized: “Promises made to yourself can be broken. It’s the promises made to others that should never be broken.” Obligers need external accountability even for activities that they want to do. An Obliger told me, “I never made time to read, so I joined a book group where you’re really expected to read the book.”

Behavior that Obligers sometimes attribute to self-sacrifice--“Why do I always make time for other people’s priorities at the expense of my own priorities?”--is often better explained as need for accountability.

Obligers find ingenious ways to create external accountability. One Obliger explained, “I wanted to go to basketball games, but I never went. I bought season tickets with my brother, and now I go, because he’s annoyed if I don’t show.” Another said, “If I want to clean out my closet this weekend, I call a charity now, to come and pick up my donations on Monday.” Another Obliger said, with regret, “I signed up for a photography course, because I knew I needed assignments and deadlines. I took several classes, then thought, ‘I love it, so I don’t need to take a class.’ Guess how many photos I’ve taken since? One.” Next semester, he’s taking a class.

The need to be a role model often prompts Obligers to keep good habits. One Obliger friend eats vegetables only when his children can see him, and another told me, “I knew I’d never practice piano, so I waited until my kids could take lessons--and now we do it together, and I have to practice, because if I don’t, they won’t.” Obligers can sometimes do things for the sake of others that they couldn’t do for themselves. Several Obligers told me, practically in the same words, “If it weren’t for the children, I’d still be stuck in a bad marriage. I had to get the divorce for my kids.”

The weight of outer expectations can make Obligers susceptible to burnout, because they have trouble telling people “no.” An Obliger explained, “I drop everything to proofread my colleagues’ reports, but I’m terrible about making time to finish my own reports.”

Obligers may find it difficult to form a habit, because often we undertake habits for our own benefit, and Obligers do things more easily for others than for themselves. For them, the key is external accountability.

REBELS

Rebels resist all expectations, outer and inner alike. They choose to act from a sense of choice, of freedom. Rebels wake up and think, “What do I want to do today?” They resist control, even self-control, and enjoy flouting rules and expectations.

Rebels work toward their own goals, in their own way, and while they refuse to do what they’re “supposed” to do, they can accomplish their own aims. One Rebel told me, “My master’s thesis was ten pages shorter than recommended, and I convinced the department to add an unconventional adviser to my panel. So I got it done and did well on it--but on my terms.”

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Crown; NO-VALUE edition (March 17, 2015)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 320 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0385348614
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0385348614
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.18 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.41 x 1.04 x 9.53 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #216,079 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #2,392 in Happiness Self-Help
- #3,014 in Success Self-Help
- #4,856 in Personal Transformation Self-Help

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Gretchen Rubin

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Gretchen Rubin is one of today’s most influential and thought-provoking observers of happiness and human nature.

Her previous books include the #1 New York Times bestseller THE HAPPINESS PROJECT, as well as the bestselling books BETTER THAN BEFORE, HAPPIER AT HOME, THE FOUR TENDENCIES, and OUTER ORDER, INNER CALM. Her latest book is LIFE IN FIVE SENSES.

She’s the host of the popular, award-winning podcast "Happier with Gretchen Rubin," where she and her co-host (and sister) Elizabeth Craft explore strategies and insights about how to make life happier. As the founder of The Happiness Project, she has helped create imaginative products for people to use in their own happiness projects.

She has been interviewed by Oprah, eaten dinner with Nobel Prize-winner Daniel Kahneman, walked arm-in-arm with the Dalai Lama, had her work reported on in a medical journal, been written up in the New Yorker, and been an answer on Jeopardy!

Gretchen Rubin started her career in law, and she realized she wanted to be a writer while she was clerking for Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor. Raised in Kansas City, she lives in New York City with her family.

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Artist Strong - Carrie Brummer

Do you wish to build a better artist habit into your life? Applying this book to creatives...

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on February 6, 2017

Verified Purchase

Do you wish to build a better artist habit into your life?

Many of you talk about finding time or making time for your art every day. If you want to learn how your personality influences the way you cultivate habits, you are in the right place. I’ve recently read Better than Before by Gretchen Rubin and here are today’s Top Takeaways:

You are likely an obliger or questioner.
Most people fall into these two tendencies. More rare are rebels and upholders. Want to discover your tendency? Take Rubin’s free quiz to find out.

Habits are something we cultivate to forget about.
Do you think about brushing your teeth every morning? No, you likely just do it. Why? Because it’s a habit: it’s part of a routine so you don’t have to think about it. Habits give our brains a bit of a break and get us repeating behaviors without a whole lot of work.

No one is “bad” at habits.
It’s like if you struggle to create a habit that a) the topic just isn’t that important to you or, b) you are NOT using strategies that suit your tendency. For example, I’m an upholder. Calendars and lists work really well for me. They are not so useful for rebels, who do not enjoy following rules or systems.

Strategies for habit formation must suit your tendency.
Obligers have difficulty meeting internal expectations but do fine meeting outside expectations, thus, it would be useful for an obliger to join our FB Group and announce an art intention. Because we would all know said intention and goal, s/he knows we can ask about the project and see if they are following through on the goal/project/task.

I don’t have to think about brushing my teeth every morning, I just know to do it.

Let’s apply the tendencies to our creative practice.

One of the biggest obstacles you all face is making time for your art. So, how can you utilize your tendency to help you create more time for your art?

Obligers need someone to check in on them or someone to make art alongside. Knowing they have to “report in” or that someone else is counting on them to be there with them making art will make it easier to make art!

Questioners need to understand how making regular time for their art will yield results. Or, why a certain time of day would best suit their desire for daily art practice. Understanding and buying into the logistics and idea behind a goal will help them create the habit.

Upholders love checklists. My accountability calendar is great for this. I know it holds me accountable to a near daily art practice and I love the feeling of ticking off a box saying, “Yes! I did this!”

Rebels need to create from a place of freedom. Art needs to be a space to express freedom. If the idea of daily practice empowers them and their art to feel independent and free, this can motivate consistent work.

How can habits cultivate your creativity? A review of the Book Better than Before by Gretchen Rubin and apply it's ideas to creative process.

Who knew that by developing habits we might set ourselves free to be our unique, valuable, creative self?!

How can the tendencies impact the way we share or sell our art?

If you wish to get a large social media following, or regularly sell your art, it would be wise to consider the tendencies of your potential audience and buyers.

Obligers are not strong at follow through for things just for themselves, unless they have burnt out on saying yes to others. They need to know how purchasing your art, or sharing your art will help others. Can it be a gift for someone? Do you contribute money from each art you sell to a cause? Or, do you have a special message that can spread goodwill? These ideas will likely appeal to an obliger.

Questioners will want to know the answers to any potential objections to buying or sharing your work. How does shipping work? Where is it shipped from? How long does it take to arrive? And some other, more big picture questions could include: why is the artwork valuable? Why should people care about your art? Think of every question someone could ask you about your art and have answers at the ready for your questioner audience.

Upholders will likely want to know about your accolades and achievements. Where have you exhibited your art? What awards have you won? Is the work part of a larger project or goal? How is that going? How does the way you work on the art show your special dedication and service to the work itself? To progress in the arts? Upholders are driven by achievement and will likely connect if you frame conversations about your work in this way.

Rebels operate from a place of freedom. How does your work convey a sense of personal independence, expression and freedom? As soon as their is a “should” or some rule to abide by rebels want to break the rule or ignore the “should.” How does your art break rules or push the boundaries of “the system?”

Many tendencies need the support and help of others in their life to develop and keep habits. Be sure to know the tools that will help you succeed. And use them.

How you can help each tendency.

Obligers need your expectations. Check in with them and ask about their art. It will help them make more of it.

Questioners need your reasoning. If you offer feedback about an artwork, don’t just say what you see, explain why you think it’s important.

Upholders need your help to slow down and savor the little things. They can be too busy achieving to enjoy their art. Give them homework that involves art PLAY.

Rebels need no expectations. Don’t tell them how to do something or what should be done. Instead ask: what will set you free?

(From my article on ArtistStrong)

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Mike Mertens

Individual Flourishing, Human Happiness – and developing a path to making habits serve our lives and well-being

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on March 21, 2015

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I really loved this book by Gretchen Rubin. It is a very fast-paced, well-written book that gives many practical suggestions on how to leverage habits to serve our long-term well-being and happiness.

She begins with the importance of self-knowledge. She lays out a simple framework based on how individuals generally respond to internal and external expectations (Upholders, Questioners, Obligers and Rebels) and then makes some distinctions for each of us to think through in order to better understand ourselves. She does not offer a one-size-fits–all solution. Rather, she advocates that we use self-knowledge to understand how we can apply habits in the service of our lives.

After self-knowledge, she discusses 4 Pillars of Habits. These are:
• Monitoring – self-measurement brings awareness and it prevents us from fooling ourselves.
• Foundations – we need to focus on “first things first” and she notes the areas that will most directly strengthen self-control – sleeping, movement, eating and drinking right, unclutter. One of my favorite ideas from this section was the one-minute rule (if you can do a task in less than a minute, do it) – and I have already used it to my benefit
• Scheduling – scheduling makes us confront the time limits of the day and realize that we need to make choices. It can even help by making sure we schedule time for leisure. Her is a great quote: “How we schedule our days is how we live our lives.”
• Accountability – we must actually follow the habit

The best time to begin is now. She discusses the danger of “tomorrow logic” – the key is to take the first step and then make the temporary permanent. Throughout the book she offers many “secrets of adulthood”, 2 of my favorites are on how to make habits more convenient:
• “The biggest waste of time is to do well something that we need not do at all”
• “Make it easy to do right, and hard to go wrong”

She has a lot of useful ideas on how to make sure we keep habits on track. Here are a few that I found useful:
• Anticipate and minimize temptation – plan for failure (a good technique in this regard that is not covered in the book is Gary Klein’s idea of the pre-mortem – he discusses it for projects but the same concept could be applied to habits)
• Use If-then planning to stick to good habits
• Avoid Loopholes – she notes 10 categories of loopholes including moral licensing (permission to do bad because I was good), the tomorrow loophole, and the one-coin loophole (which is quite fascinating)

She also covers the danger of rewards. We can see a reward as a finish line and that marks a stopping point. Continuous progress is the opposite of a finish line. Making the habits we want rewarding in themselves is important if we want them to last a lifetime.

We need clarity of values and clarity of action to support habit formation – when we have conflicting goals, we don’t manage ourselves well. This is one of the reasons that self-knowledge is so important. We need to be clear on our values so we can understand how to connect the habit to the value that it serves. We want habits that serve our lives – as she notes early in the book “habit is a good servant but a bad master.”

I really enjoyed reading this book and I recommend it highly. I have already starting working some of the ideas into the fabric of my life (such as the one minute rule). I am thinking about a question she posed late in the book: “What change would add more happiness to my life?” – that is an important question for each of us to ask so we can develop that habits we need across a lifetime in order to achieve our own self-fulfillment. My thanks to Gretchen Rubin for writing a valuable work for “mastering the habits of our everyday lives.”

Note #1: I took extensive notes while reading the book over the last three days and I was able to begin using ideas right from the start. This is a book I will definitely be coming back to in the future.
Note #2: Remember that her framework notes general tendencies, details will vary for each individual
Note #3: She provides lots of great personal examples throughout the book
Note #4: I recommend the reader also consider these other books on self-control, habits and mindsets: Willpower by Baumeister and Tierney, The Willpower Habit by McGonigal, Mindset by Dweck, The Power of Habit by Duhigg.
Note #5: One’s values are very important but how to think about what one should value is not covered in the book – I think the virtue ethics tradition aligns nicely with this work (for example, Aristotle)
Note #6: There are great quotes at the start of each chapter – several from Samuel Johnson and Montaigne have me more interest in their writings as well.

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Blondie

Superficial on a psychology level

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on August 14, 2019

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I struggle with this book, it operates in the principles of either/or, you are a starter or a finisher, you love simplicity or abundance, novelty or familiarity. People are more complex than that. It can depend on a whole host of factors (situation, mental state, recent events etc). So it kind of lost me quite quickly. Perhaps it goes in to say not everybody is one thing or another all the time, but for me this was not signposted clearly enough.

9 people found this helpful

Maccer

Habits

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on November 27, 2018

Verified Purchase

Habits are fascinating indeed and this is the first time I have read a serious view of them.Interesting and I guess to many people very helpful.At my advanced years I have already discovered most of the suggestions given.The author’ s own personality is a bit too dominant in my opinion. However an informative book

7 people found this helpful

mans1503@hotmail.com

Does what it says on the tin!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on October 30, 2022

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I bought this book a while ago but still find that bits stick in my mind to help me. I love how Gretchen Rubin writes as she doesn't pretend that she is perfect or that you can/will be perfect too. She realises that we are all human and all different and encourages you to celebrate that and work with it rather than trying to get yourself in a box that might be the wrong shape.
An easy read and deifinitely recommended!

Pyronik

It's an easy, interesting read

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on June 8, 2018

Verified Purchase

I am still reading this. Key for me is her explaining that we all need what works for us, that we're all different. It's not a just a "here's what I did & this is what works". It's an easy, interesting read. I read the 4 tendencies first which I think definitely helps, & I would recommend doing that.

7 people found this helpful

Mrs. M. S.

Worthwhile purchase

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on April 6, 2017

Verified Purchase

Interesting book, well researched and written, haven't finished reading it all the way through yet but is already making me think differently about why I struggle to break old habits and make new ones

9 people found this helpful

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