Speaker 1: Hello there, it's Amantha. I'm currently on a Christmas break,
Speaker 1: so I've handpicked a bunch of my favorite episodes from
Speaker 1: the last year to share with you. Okay, on with
Speaker 1: today's best of episode. You probably know that creating good
Speaker 1: habits can help make you more productive, but can habits
Speaker 1: make you happier? For me, I quit sugar seven years ago,
Speaker 1: which makes me a whole lot happier because I no
Speaker 1: longer have to worry about that awful sugar crash that followed.
Speaker 1: And my daily exercise habit definitely makes me happier too,
Speaker 1: as does an evening reading habit that I've recently started
Speaker 1: to build.
Speaker 2: But could I be doing more?
Speaker 1: Is there a way that I could level up that happiness?
Speaker 2: And could I be making decisions in.
Speaker 1: A different way to bring me even more happiness? Well,
Speaker 1: today I get to ask those very questions of my
Speaker 1: own personal happiness guru Gretchen Ruben. Gretchen is the host
Speaker 1: of the popular weekly podcast Happier with Gretchen Rubin, and
Speaker 1: she's the author of several books, including the international bestseller
Speaker 1: The Happiness Project. I'm Doctor Amantha Imba. I'm an organizational
Speaker 1: psychologist and the founder of behavioral science consultancy Inventium, and
Speaker 1: this is how I work a show about how to
Speaker 1: help you do your best work.
Speaker 2: I've been a.
Speaker 1: Fan of Gretchen's for over a decade, and the first
Speaker 1: thing I wanted to know was what does someone who
Speaker 1: was dedicated over ten years of their life to thinking
Speaker 1: about and researching happiness do in their own life to
Speaker 1: be happier. What are the habits in Gretchen's life that
Speaker 1: contribute most to her happiness.
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, I love a great habit, So I
Speaker 3: have a lot I've contributed to my happiness. I would
Speaker 3: say getting to sleep on time and waking up at
Speaker 3: the same time every day. I'm a real morning person,
Speaker 3: so I do my hardest work early in the morning,
Speaker 3: and I like it when it's kind of quiet, and
Speaker 3: so I always get up at the same time every day.
Speaker 3: One of these people who's a super low carb person,
Speaker 3: I have a crazy sweet tooth. And the way that
Speaker 3: I dealt with that was just by quitting sugar and
Speaker 3: basically all carbs. So that's not a habit that everybody
Speaker 3: would want to follow, but that's a habit I love.
Speaker 3: I write every day. That's just to always stay in
Speaker 3: my work. That's a habit. I kiss my husband first thing,
Speaker 3: before I get out of bed in the morning, before
Speaker 3: I check my phone, or before my feet hit the ground.
Speaker 3: That makes me happy. I have a lot of habits
Speaker 3: that make me happy.
Speaker 1: I want to ask about your writing habit and also
Speaker 1: your reading habit. Let's start with your writing habit. What
Speaker 1: does that look like? Can you set the scene is
Speaker 1: to you know, if we were watching you do that,
Speaker 1: what would we observe in terms of how you formed
Speaker 1: that habit?
Speaker 3: Well, you know, I write books, and so the rhythm
Speaker 3: of my day really depends on where I am in
Speaker 3: a book cycle. So right now I'm doing editing. Means
Speaker 3: most of it's already written, but I'm doing editing, which
Speaker 3: tends to be like you're working on the things that
Speaker 3: aren't working. It tends to be a little bit hard,
Speaker 3: but you have stuff to work with. So it's like,
Speaker 3: say from six in the morning until like nine or ten.
Speaker 3: Then I'm really focused on editing things that are really hard,
Speaker 3: and then after that I start doing things more like
Speaker 3: doing interviews or working on a podcast episode, or like
Speaker 3: things that are intellectually challenging but don't take the same
Speaker 3: level of concentration and sort of as my day goes on,
Speaker 3: if I can, if I have control, I will kind
Speaker 3: of do increasingly less taxing tasks. But I write every
Speaker 3: day and I read every day. For me, reading it's
Speaker 3: like my it's kind of my cubicle and my playground.
Speaker 3: I love to read. I read for fun all the time.
Speaker 3: But then I also read a ton to give myself
Speaker 3: ideas and you know, and for research. So both of
Speaker 3: those things are are part of reading for me.
Speaker 1: And do you have a specific method when you're reading
Speaker 1: in terms of, you know, making notes or references? What
Speaker 1: does that look like?
Speaker 3: Well that is a great question because actually I spend
Speaker 3: a huge amount of time with notes. And so when
Speaker 3: I read, I'll mark up a book, you know, in
Speaker 3: the if it's a library book, I do it, you know,
Speaker 3: with like sticky notes, and if it's my book, I'll
Speaker 3: just massively mark it up. And then once I'm done
Speaker 3: with the book, I'll go back and then sort of
Speaker 3: go through and take all the notes and so like
Speaker 3: I have list of quotations, I do one Sudden's aphorisms.
Speaker 3: I have multiple documents on multiple subjects that I might
Speaker 3: be tracking. So doing notes is really fun but it
Speaker 3: actually does take a lot of time, and so that
Speaker 3: is part of my kind of my reading regimens. So
Speaker 3: I have to sort of work that in as well.
Speaker 3: But like that's something I would do later in the
Speaker 3: day because it's taxing, but it's not that taxing. I
Speaker 3: sort of have to figure out where it plugs into
Speaker 3: all my stuff. But I, you know, it's basically copying
Speaker 3: or digesting something from it's from a source.
Speaker 1: And what about at the end of the day, do
Speaker 1: you have habits or rituals to disconnect from work or
Speaker 1: reconnect with family or anything like that.
Speaker 3: I guess what am I habits are sort of quitting time.
Speaker 3: So I will sort of say, like, oh, in ten minutes,
Speaker 3: it's quitting time, and I'll take ten minutes and I
Speaker 3: tidy up my office. So you know, if I got
Speaker 3: out papers, I'll put them back in a file or
Speaker 3: I'll put it back on my courtboard, and I'll throw
Speaker 3: away my trash and I'll put the I get pens out.
Speaker 3: I don't know why this happens to me, but like
Speaker 3: I get pens out of my pen cup, like fifty
Speaker 3: pens that I put the pens back at the pen cup,
Speaker 3: and I like this because you know, for most people,
Speaker 3: like for me, outer order contributes to intercolm and I
Speaker 3: find that when I just take ten minutes to clean up,
Speaker 3: it sort of clears my mind and it does act
Speaker 3: as that kind of transition. And then when I come
Speaker 3: back in in the morning, it feels like it's so
Speaker 3: much easier to sit down because I'm not finding my
Speaker 3: way through a bunch of like piles of books that
Speaker 3: I took the notes on, or you know, articles to read,
Speaker 3: or you know, just the stuff that accumulates sweat, sweater
Speaker 3: that I took off. You know, I get put all
Speaker 3: that stuff away. So I do like a ten minute
Speaker 3: closer every night and then and then I feel like, okay,
Speaker 3: I'm ready to call it a day.
Speaker 1: How did you form that habit? Because I feel like
Speaker 1: there'd be a lot of people listening, going, oh, like
Speaker 1: that sounds wonderful. But for some reason, I just leave
Speaker 1: my desk a mess at the end of the day
Speaker 1: because that's the easiest thing to do.
Speaker 3: Well, you know, So I have my four tendencies framework,
Speaker 3: and one of the things about me that I've learned
Speaker 3: is I'm in upholder in that framework, and habits tend
Speaker 3: to come pretty easily to upholders, like that's one of
Speaker 3: the that's one of the nice things about being in
Speaker 3: a folder. There's downside, so that is one of the upsides.
Speaker 3: So that kind of thing. Once I was sort of like, oh,
Speaker 3: I want to make this a habit. It wasn't that
Speaker 3: hard for me. And I will say that it's not
Speaker 3: a particularly difficult habit. It's just ten minutes, and it's
Speaker 3: not cleaning. It's not like going through your files and
Speaker 3: deciding like what to keep. It's literally just putting things away.
Speaker 3: I find that very kind of soothing. It's like something
Speaker 3: that you can put on your to do list and
Speaker 3: cross it off right away.
Speaker 1: I'm actually curious, what are some habits that you've tried
Speaker 1: over the years that didn't really work for you?
Speaker 3: Okay, meditation, which I've tried twice, and of course people
Speaker 3: will tell you that like the fact that you that
Speaker 3: meditation doesn't work for you just means that you need
Speaker 3: meditation all the more. But I just have to say
Speaker 3: I've given it two solid tries. I know, I know
Speaker 3: and respect so many people who I'm friends with, Dan Harris,
Speaker 3: who is the ten percent Happier app and book, and
Speaker 3: he really convinced me. My college roommate meditates for like
Speaker 3: two or three hours a day and like more if
Speaker 3: she can squeeze it in. So I have people in
Speaker 3: my life really making a case for meditation, so I
Speaker 3: have really tried it. It's just not a tool that
Speaker 3: works for me. So I've tried meditation, gratitude journal. I
Speaker 3: was very annoyed by my gratitude journal, which apparently is
Speaker 3: not that uncommon. So that didn't work for me. What else?
Speaker 3: I used to balance on one foot in the elevator
Speaker 3: as a way to work on my post my balance,
Speaker 3: which I just kind of forgot about and got out
Speaker 3: of the habit of it. And but I do, I
Speaker 3: do think I should try to have some balance exercise
Speaker 3: for some reason, I didn't like the elevator one, but
Speaker 3: maybe some other. I always try to put my socks on,
Speaker 3: like you know, one fit at a time as a
Speaker 3: balanced thing. What are some other ones that didn't work
Speaker 3: for me? Usually I try ones that I think will work,
Speaker 3: so I have a pretty good hit rate, you know,
Speaker 3: because I don't try the things that don't that I
Speaker 3: don't think will work well.
Speaker 1: I'm very curious about meditation and gratitude because I feel
Speaker 1: like the two of the most commonly talked about strategies
Speaker 1: for happiness and well being.
Speaker 3: And yeah, well, let me say I'm not saying gratitude.
Speaker 3: I'm not. I have other ways that I try to
Speaker 3: remind myself to be grateful, because I do think that's
Speaker 3: really important. But the like write down three things you're
Speaker 3: grateful for, like the gratitude journal, that form didn't work.
Speaker 3: So I'm not saying gratitude isn't important. I'm just saying
Speaker 3: the gratitude journal as.
Speaker 1: A tool absolutely with gratitude. What's your current ritual habit
Speaker 1: around gratitude?
Speaker 3: So I live in an apartment building where we have
Speaker 3: like two doors that you have to go through to
Speaker 3: get in and out of the building. So I always
Speaker 3: try to use that as like a like as a
Speaker 3: transition point to be like, oh, how happy I am
Speaker 3: to be going out into New York City, my favorite city,
Speaker 3: Or then when I'm home, Oh, how happy I am
Speaker 3: to be coming home to my like cozy apartment. So
Speaker 3: I try to use sort of the forced pause of
Speaker 3: going through those two doors as a way to remind
Speaker 3: myself to be grateful right now for this year. For
Speaker 3: my next book, which is about the five senses. I've
Speaker 3: been going to the Metropolitan Museum every day, which is
Speaker 3: like so much fun when it's open if person was
Speaker 3: closed for a long time. But every time I go
Speaker 3: there also because you know, they take your temperature and
Speaker 3: then you have to like get your ticket and all that,
Speaker 3: I'm always like, oh, you know, how fortunate I am.
Speaker 3: I never, never, never want to forget how fortunate I
Speaker 3: am that I can go to the met every day
Speaker 3: and so and like everything that the metal offers, everything
Speaker 3: that it stands for. So I think I kind of
Speaker 3: use physical transitions as and then people often do it
Speaker 3: before meals. That's the thing a lot of people do.
Speaker 3: So I think it's great to have something that you use.
Speaker 3: Or another thing that I've heard people do, which I
Speaker 3: think is great is like use it as your password
Speaker 3: or your like screen saver or liker your lock screen
Speaker 3: photo so that you're reminded of it. I think those
Speaker 3: are all great things to do. I just personally did
Speaker 3: not like the right I don't and I don't like
Speaker 3: the like do it at the dinner table. That's not
Speaker 3: my family. I mean, my family's not going to cooperate
Speaker 3: with the like, let's all talk about three things we're
Speaker 3: grateful for. There, you know, that's not the family I
Speaker 3: got great, They're not going to do that with me.
Speaker 3: So I just wanted to be clear about gratitude. I'm
Speaker 3: sure gratitude, just not so enthusiastic about the journal.
Speaker 2: Not the journal. I love the password idea.
Speaker 1: I don't think I've heard that before, and that's inspiring
Speaker 1: me actually to change some of my passwords, which it's
Speaker 1: just such.
Speaker 3: A dreary thing.
Speaker 1: Your passwords, Yes, yeah, you have to enter them several
Speaker 1: times a day, I'm mac I do. Now with meditation,
Speaker 1: how do you know when to give up on a
Speaker 1: habit like you did with meditation?
Speaker 3: That is the million dollar question. I think that is
Speaker 3: really that is such a hard question because there are
Speaker 3: cases where you're like, if I would stick with it,
Speaker 3: maybe I would really have a breakthrough, you know, maybe
Speaker 3: I really would pass into a place where it would
Speaker 3: become easier, or I would I could feel this enthusiasm
Speaker 3: and you really want to give it a try, and
Speaker 3: I think so. I think I wish that I could
Speaker 3: develop kind of like a test for that, because it really,
Speaker 3: it really did. It was really very hard for me
Speaker 3: as well. And actually I form habits pretty easily, and
Speaker 3: so stopping meditation was just as hard for me as
Speaker 3: starting Like I really had to kind of say, Okay, Gretchen,
Speaker 3: this is not working for you. We're going to take
Speaker 3: this off the daily to do list. It took a
Speaker 3: fair amount of effort. I just think it was like
Speaker 3: I just I wasn't like whatever was supposed to be happening,
Speaker 3: I was not experiencing it. I wasn't experiencing any sense
Speaker 3: of progress or any sense of change.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 3: It wasn't like I could imagine that I would get
Speaker 3: to a level where it just felt. It just was
Speaker 3: like this just is a tool that doesn't fit my hand,
Speaker 3: but I think it can't. I think sometimes things do
Speaker 3: get easier. Like I mentioned quitting sugar. I think that's
Speaker 3: something where once you've stopped for a while, it gets
Speaker 3: much much easier because you lose that craving for sugar,
Speaker 3: and you could just kind of you lose your taste
Speaker 3: for it a bit. So that's the kind of thing
Speaker 3: where it might be really hard and then get easier.
Speaker 3: But it's sort of like there's no there's no sign
Speaker 3: that you'll think you know, nothing comes in the mail
Speaker 3: to tell you Okay, time to give up or whatever. Yeah,
Speaker 3: it's frustrating if.
Speaker 2: Only it did.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and yeah it's funny with with sugar. I quit
Speaker 1: sugar about seven years ago and me too. Yeah, Yeah,
Speaker 1: you're absolutely right.
Speaker 2: It does.
Speaker 1: It gets a lot easier, and then it just kind
Speaker 1: of it becomes the default. I remember us out for
Speaker 1: Dino with my work team last not and does it came,
Speaker 1: And it's just kind of like I just have no
Speaker 1: desire for it.
Speaker 3: So people don't get that, Like I think it's really
Speaker 3: hard to understand. It's like to me, I'm like, it's
Speaker 3: like uncooked rice. It's not that it's not food. It's
Speaker 3: not that it's gross or anything. It's just it's not
Speaker 3: the kind of thing I eat. It just doesn't the
Speaker 3: bells don't ring in your head anymore. But you know,
Speaker 3: like one of the things that I that I've really
Speaker 3: found which is true for me, it sounds like it's
Speaker 3: true for you. It's like there's abstainers and moderators when
Speaker 3: it comes to strong temptation, and for people who like
Speaker 3: to give things up altogether, like we're abstainers. It's like
Speaker 3: it's it's kind of all or nothing. Like for me
Speaker 3: with sugar. It's like, if I have one cookie, I
Speaker 3: want ten cookies and it's very hard for me to stop.
Speaker 3: But if I have no cookies, then I'm like, oh,
Speaker 3: that's not hard for me. And but like with the wine,
Speaker 3: I'm not that tempted by one. So I could have
Speaker 3: half a glass of wine. But then I have a
Speaker 3: friend who's like, I can have one cookie, but for me,
Speaker 3: it's no wine or four glasses of wine. I can't
Speaker 3: have half a glass of wine. But then moderators are
Speaker 3: people who do better when they have something a little
Speaker 3: bit or sometimes. And these are the people who are like,
Speaker 3: I just keep a bar a fine chocolate in my
Speaker 3: desk drawer, and every day I have one square every
Speaker 3: other day. That's just enough, Like you should do that.
Speaker 3: I'm like, all my whole day would be like one square,
Speaker 3: two square, two square. It's my birthday, it's rating I deserve.
Speaker 3: I just like eat the whole thing just to get
Speaker 3: it over with. So I think it is different. So
Speaker 3: from stainers, I think they're often surprised and relieved to
Speaker 3: realize what a relief it is to just say like
Speaker 3: I'm just gonna take this off the table. But then
Speaker 3: moderators really get kind of panicky and rebellious, and they
Speaker 3: do better when they're like, you know, you're just gonna
Speaker 3: have a few French fries, you know, just just gonna
Speaker 3: have a half a brownie, and that's how they do better.
Speaker 3: So again, it's like not everybody. There's no magic one size,
Speaker 3: so it's all solution. A lot of it is just
Speaker 3: experimenting and figuring out what works for us.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's such a good distinction.
Speaker 1: Is that it obviousactly like you with chocolate and wine, Chocolate
Speaker 1: could not have it here wine do not care.
Speaker 3: But also Joe, people say things like, you know, what's
Speaker 3: life without a brownie? Like and I'm like, I'm like,
Speaker 3: not eating brownies makes me so much happier than brownie's ever.
Speaker 3: Did like have a brownie if you want one, but
Speaker 3: I'd rather not.
Speaker 1: Definitely, Yes, And I'd rather not have the sugar crash.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Well and then you're just free of that like
Speaker 3: that that like crazy decision. I just I find that
Speaker 3: very boring. Yeah that is now later, well does this
Speaker 3: count one? Two? I was likeugh, just tiresome.
Speaker 2: I don't want to talk about decisions.
Speaker 1: I want to know what's your process when you have
Speaker 1: to make a big decision.
Speaker 2: What does that look like for you?
Speaker 3: Well, I'm a big pros and cons person, so I
Speaker 3: will make that list. But I have found a super
Speaker 3: useful test when I have a big decision where the
Speaker 3: pros and cons feel very balanced, and sometimes it's sort
Speaker 3: of like an apple and an orange. So no, a
Speaker 3: pros and console, this doesn't even really help you. So,
Speaker 3: like we were trying to decide, it's a family whether
Speaker 3: to get a dog, like five or six years ago,
Speaker 3: and it's sort of like there's all these pros, there's
Speaker 3: all these cons, but in the end, it's just like
Speaker 3: do you want to have a dog or do you
Speaker 3: not want to have a dog? And I couldn't figure
Speaker 3: out how to decide, and then I realized, So my
Speaker 3: test is choose the bigger life. And I think for
Speaker 3: some people a bigger life would be a life without
Speaker 3: a dog, because they're like I could travel more freely,
Speaker 3: I'd have more disposable income, I can always get a
Speaker 3: dog later, that's the bigger life. But I knew that
Speaker 3: for my family, the bigger life was to get the dog,
Speaker 3: and so we got our dog. We'd love our dog.
Speaker 3: Barnaby was exactly the right decision. And I've talked to
Speaker 3: people like I talked to someone where he and his
Speaker 3: wife were trying to decide whether they should move to
Speaker 3: be closer to family. So it's like, now we're in
Speaker 3: the big city, it's so exciting, but life is harder.
Speaker 3: We could move back home, and like that's a smaller city,
Speaker 3: so maybe we don't have the same opportunities, but we're
Speaker 3: closer to family and friends, and we're thinking about having
Speaker 3: a family, you know, And it's like pros and cons
Speaker 3: and you go back and forth. And I said, Okay,
Speaker 3: what's the bigger life. Choose the bigger life. He was
Speaker 3: instantly He's like, the bigger life for us is to
Speaker 3: move back. That's just a bigger life for us. It's
Speaker 3: more opportunity, more friends, more family, like and he just
Speaker 3: knew it right away. And then and then he was
Speaker 3: sort of like, Okay, that's kind of like all I
Speaker 3: need to know, because only you know what the bigger
Speaker 3: life is for you. But it's it's clarifying. I think
Speaker 3: I found it very clarifying.
Speaker 1: What is about the questions that you usually ask yourself
Speaker 1: when you're making decisions about how to spend your time
Speaker 1: or energy your money.
Speaker 3: Well, I always do say is this going to make
Speaker 3: me happier? And that's how I made my decisions. So
Speaker 3: with that, like anything that goes to relationships, anything that
Speaker 3: deep into relationships or broadens relationships is likely to pay
Speaker 3: off in terms of happiness. Anything that helps me learn
Speaker 3: or grow that you know, the atmosphere of growth is
Speaker 3: so important for happiness. So anything like that is something
Speaker 3: that I would be inclined to do, something where I
Speaker 3: feel like, maybe it's the fantasy self. It's like my
Speaker 3: idea of the kind of person I'd like to be.
Speaker 3: I watch out for that. That's a big warning sign
Speaker 3: for me. My big personal commandment is to be Gretchen.
Speaker 3: And then sometimes I'm like, that just feels like me
Speaker 3: kind of wanting to do something that would be a
Speaker 3: good idea if I were a different kind of person,
Speaker 3: Like by linen cocktail napkins because they're on sale. What
Speaker 3: am I thinking? There is no that is not Gretchen
Speaker 3: Linen cocktail napkins. That would not be That would not
Speaker 3: That's not something to spend my time, money or energy on.
Speaker 1: I love your twelve personal commandments. I got to say,
Speaker 1: can you can you talk about some of the other
Speaker 1: ones that I guess that you apply in your life.
Speaker 3: My stuff in well, one of them comes from my father.
Speaker 3: That's enjoy the process. And this is really helpful because
Speaker 3: you know sometimes in life, and this goes back to
Speaker 3: decision making that you were talking about. You know, sometimes
Speaker 3: we can decide to do something that we really do
Speaker 3: not want to do at the time, maybe for years,
Speaker 3: but then we think, oh, there's going to be this
Speaker 3: big payoff. So I've got to like put up with
Speaker 3: all this badness in the in the in the process,
Speaker 3: because there'll be this payoff. So I don't like being
Speaker 3: a lot lawyer, and I don't like being an associate
Speaker 3: in law firm, but in seven years i'll be a
Speaker 3: partner in that'll be great. Or I don't enjoy writing
Speaker 3: this book, but one day it'll be a bestseller and
Speaker 3: then it'll all be worth it. The problem with you
Speaker 3: when you don't enjoy the process is that a lot
Speaker 3: of times things don't work out the way we wish
Speaker 3: they did. We're not in control of outcomes. We can
Speaker 3: we can focus on process, but we can't. We can't
Speaker 3: control the outcome. And if you enjoy the process, then
Speaker 3: the disappointment if things don't go your way is less.
Speaker 3: So I write a book called forty Ways look at JFK.
Speaker 3: I loved writing that book, and it flopped. It flopped
Speaker 3: so hard. It didn't reach an audience, didn't reach its audience.
Speaker 3: That's what they tell you when your books it fails.
Speaker 3: But I loved writing that book, and you know, I'm
Speaker 3: sad that it didn't find its audience. But I don't
Speaker 3: regret it because I enjoyed it. I enjoyed the process
Speaker 3: so much. But if somebody had said, oh, you should
Speaker 3: write a book about X y Z and I had
Speaker 3: had no interest in it, and I had just forced
Speaker 3: myself to do it, thinking like, well, there would be
Speaker 3: a big payoff in the end. So if you can
Speaker 3: enjoy the process, then I always just remind myself and
Speaker 3: also just remind myself like I enjoy the process, like, Okay,
Speaker 3: maybe today I don't feel like writing this part, but
Speaker 3: I love writing. Like as my sister's a TV writer.
Speaker 3: She has a big sign in her office that says
Speaker 3: it's a fun job, and I enjoy it. To remind
Speaker 3: herself that she picked TV writing, this is what she wants.
Speaker 3: And then I think one of the most thought provoking happiness.
Speaker 3: Project resolutions for me has been to imitate a spiritual master.
Speaker 3: One of my spiritual masters is Saint Trez of Leziu,
Speaker 3: which I'm not even Catholic, but I am like obsessed
Speaker 3: with her book Story of a Soul, and in there,
Speaker 3: Saint Terrez says that when one loves, one does not calculate,
Speaker 3: and so one of my personal resolutions is no calculation,
Speaker 3: because I can be a bean counter like, well, if
Speaker 3: I did this for you, husband, then you should do
Speaker 3: this for me. And you took a nap yesterday, so
Speaker 3: it's my turn today, you know, and that's just not good.
Speaker 3: You should just give and not calculate. So no calculation
Speaker 3: comes from Saint Teres.
Speaker 1: Okay, it's nearly time for an ad break, but can
Speaker 1: I ask a favor? If you are enjoying how I work,
Speaker 1: I would love it if you could hit pause and
Speaker 1: leave a quick review for the podcast. I love getting
Speaker 1: feedback from listeners, and everyone has.
Speaker 2: Left reviews or star ratings.
Speaker 1: Thank you, thank you, thank you, you guys rock It's
Speaker 1: just awesome getting feedback, So thank you and thank you
Speaker 1: if you plan to do that today. After the break,
Speaker 1: Gretchen will be back talking about how you can make
Speaker 1: your own commandments, Gretchen's method for handling criticism, and why
Speaker 1: she picks a word of the year, and what her
Speaker 1: word is for this year and how she's using that.
Speaker 1: What advice would you give to people who are listening
Speaker 1: to these personal commandments and thinking, oh, I wouldn't mind
Speaker 1: creating my own.
Speaker 2: List, Like what was your process?
Speaker 3: Oh, I so highly recommend this exercise. Yes, so I
Speaker 3: have twelve, but you know, that's just kind of the
Speaker 3: number that I came up with. Often people have fewer
Speaker 3: or more. This is a very very creative, really compelling
Speaker 3: exercise to help you know yourself. So this isn't sort
Speaker 3: of your to do list, you know, get my haircut regularly,
Speaker 3: and it's not on the On the Happier podcast, we
Speaker 3: talk about like your twenty one for twenty one list,
Speaker 3: which is like, what are twenty one things you want
Speaker 3: to get done in twenty twenty one that's super fun,
Speaker 3: Like on mine, it was like watch mad Men finally,
Speaker 3: or you know, or things like deal with my email archive,
Speaker 3: which was like a mess that was like haunting me.
Speaker 3: Those are more like things that would be done or
Speaker 3: things you want to start. Personal commandments is more about
Speaker 3: like what are your deepest principles and what are the
Speaker 3: principles that you want to guide your whole life, So
Speaker 3: like enjoy the process or choose joy, I mean, or
Speaker 3: is something where it really is kind of a transcendent
Speaker 3: principle that you want to live by. And it took
Speaker 3: a long time. I worked on mine for months because
Speaker 3: I would add to it and then I would decide
Speaker 3: that two things were really the same thing, just in
Speaker 3: different words, so then I had to pick one, and
Speaker 3: then some sort of didn't rise to the level of
Speaker 3: being a personal commandment. But I think it's really a
Speaker 3: creative way to do self reflection and to think about
Speaker 3: your aims for yourself.
Speaker 1: I wanted I around sort of handling criticism when you know,
Speaker 1: as someone who wants to achieve and maintain happiness, So
Speaker 1: what's your approach to dealing with criticism and negative feedback.
Speaker 3: Well, one thing is if I wouldn't listen to their advice,
Speaker 3: I won't listen to their criticism. So I try to
Speaker 3: not expose myself to like drive by criticism. So like
Speaker 3: I don't read any reviews of my books and I
Speaker 3: don't read any profiles of me. I try to read
Speaker 3: about nothing because it just gets in my head and
Speaker 3: often I will overreact to it, you know, like one
Speaker 3: person says one thing. I had this with my audiobook,
Speaker 3: Like I for my book Happier at Home, Like someone
Speaker 3: had said like, oh, why is Gretchen reading her book?
Speaker 3: She's a professional actor, which is true, right, And so
Speaker 3: I thought, oh, that's what they said that for Happiness
Speaker 3: the Happiness Project. So when it came time to record
Speaker 3: Happier at Home, I thought, oh, well, I really want
Speaker 3: to do the better thing for listeners, and so I'll have,
Speaker 3: you know, have an actor do it. I won't do
Speaker 3: it myself, even though I enjoy doing it. And then
Speaker 3: all these other people were like, oh, it was so
Speaker 3: much better when Gretchen retted herself, and I was like,
Speaker 3: why did I listen to one person that that just
Speaker 3: happened across my consciousness, you know. And so I try
Speaker 3: not to open myself up because I feel like that's distorting.
Speaker 3: I have so many people who give me criticism, people
Speaker 3: that I respect and admire, and I'm like, let me
Speaker 3: stay open to their criticism. That's not easy either, but
Speaker 3: so so I don't like expose myself to that. I
Speaker 3: do read emails from everyone, and like with the Happier podcast,
Speaker 3: we get a tremendous amount of email, and I get
Speaker 3: a lot of reader email too, and of course on
Speaker 3: social media, so I definitely hear from people and with criticism.
Speaker 3: One thing I remind myself is is that a strong
Speaker 3: voice repels as well as attracts, and that's true of
Speaker 3: anyone that you can think of. Nothing is universally liked.
Speaker 3: And if I try to make myself so vanilla that
Speaker 3: everyone will like me, then no one will be interested.
Speaker 3: So I just have to accept that like I am
Speaker 3: who I am, you might find it interesting, you may not,
Speaker 3: And that's just the way things go. I can't please everyone,
Speaker 3: but I do try to stay open to it. And
Speaker 3: like when I'm going to get a big edit, as
Speaker 3: I said, I'm in that process right now. Like I
Speaker 3: will literally like have a mental imagery thing that I
Speaker 3: do where I like like imagine myself opening my heart,
Speaker 3: opening my chest to be like I'm open. My word
Speaker 3: of the year, I pick a word for the year
Speaker 3: every year. My word for this year is open. I
Speaker 3: want to stay open to hearing what people say. Often
Speaker 3: I have to think about it. I will warn people
Speaker 3: who are working with me, like I always say no,
Speaker 3: I'm always really defensive. I always say I can't do it,
Speaker 3: and then give me time, like at least twenty minutes,
Speaker 3: and then I'll be like, I see your point. I
Speaker 3: see how I can do it. That's a good point. Okay,
Speaker 3: Now I can't wait to do it because you're on
Speaker 3: a resent right and I can't wait to max sit.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 3: I just have to let myself go through that process.
Speaker 3: So part of it kind of knowing how I'll respond,
Speaker 3: and then I will kind of go into shock kind of.
Speaker 3: I often will. If I get an edit, I'll look
Speaker 3: at it and then I won't expect myself to do anything.
Speaker 3: I'll just like go to bed early and start it
Speaker 3: because I am such a morning person the next day.
Speaker 3: Because I think it is hard to get criticisms. So
Speaker 3: I always want to be at my best when i'm
Speaker 3: when I'm starting to work through it, like had a
Speaker 3: good night's sleep, kind of ready for it, not just
Speaker 3: kind of drive by.
Speaker 1: I love that image of like opening your heart, and
Speaker 1: you said that open is your word for this year.
Speaker 1: What's your process for deciding on your word for the year.
Speaker 3: Oh, it's so fun. Yeah, I've had a word one
Speaker 3: word theme for years now, and I highly recommend it again.
Speaker 3: It's sort of you know, people get so tired of
Speaker 3: making New Year's resolutions, and yet it's very valuable to
Speaker 3: set an aim for yourself and to reflect. I think
Speaker 3: around the new year, this is a way to kind
Speaker 3: of think, like, well, what's the big idea? So for me,
Speaker 3: I was going to be doing a lot of new
Speaker 3: things this year, so I really did want to stay
Speaker 3: open and remind myself, like, think about there are other
Speaker 3: ways to do things, and they're you know, just stay
Speaker 3: open in the past, Like I have a lot of
Speaker 3: material and so one year. One year my theme was
Speaker 3: repurpose because I wanted to figure out how to make
Speaker 3: new things out of stuff that I'd already created. One year,
Speaker 3: my word was lighter because I wanted to kind of
Speaker 3: it was lighten up. My sister had lighter. One year
Speaker 3: I had lighten up. So I wanted to lighten up
Speaker 3: kind of my mood. I wanted to have kind of
Speaker 3: a more lighthearted outlook and a more light hearted demeanor.
Speaker 3: I can be kind of serious and kind of charging ahead,
Speaker 3: you know. I wanted to lighten up. And then I
Speaker 3: also wanted to get rid of a lot of stuff.
Speaker 3: I wrote this book Outer Order inter Calm because I
Speaker 3: do feel like outer order contributes to interclm for me.
Speaker 3: And I thought, let me just get rid of a
Speaker 3: lot of stuff that I don't need. User love. If
Speaker 3: I lighten up my my space, I thought I would
Speaker 3: feel I thought it would help me lighten up mentally,
Speaker 3: which it did. Oh my gosh. I love. I love
Speaker 3: I have an empty shelf. I love my empty shelf.
Speaker 3: I love figuring out ways to create more order and
Speaker 3: more space.
Speaker 1: On the topic of having out of order, and I
Speaker 1: loved your book out of Order in a com I
Speaker 1: think I read it like a week after it came out.
Speaker 3: I was very excited to just vow that one. Oh
Speaker 3: thank you. It was such a fun like it's like
Speaker 3: a hype book. It's like to get you pumped up
Speaker 3: to clear clutter. Right. It's like it's not even it's
Speaker 3: not like a narrative. It's just a bunch of ideas.
Speaker 3: It was great.
Speaker 1: I want to know, what are your favorite ideas that
Speaker 1: you wrote about in that book.
Speaker 3: Ooh so many. Well, one is the one minute rule.
Speaker 3: This is that anything you can do in less than
Speaker 3: a minute, do without delay. So if you can hang
Speaker 3: up your coat instead of throwing on a chair, or
Speaker 3: even better, if you can put up hooks so you
Speaker 3: can put your coat on a hook instead of on
Speaker 3: a hand, that's even better. Or like if you can
Speaker 3: put a document in the folder instead of just leaving
Speaker 3: it out on the desk, or you know, put a
Speaker 3: wrapper into the trash. I'll just do that with that delay.
Speaker 3: That gets rid of sort of the scum of clutter
Speaker 3: on the surface of life.
Speaker 1: Now, I imagine that you're someone that gets a lot
Speaker 1: of requests for your time and that you would have
Speaker 1: to say no very frequently in your life. What is
Speaker 1: your strategy for saying no?
Speaker 2: Like, how do you say no?
Speaker 3: Well, get back to the four tendencies. This is something
Speaker 3: a poulders are good at too, which is why they
Speaker 3: can sometimes seem cold, because they find it pretty easy
Speaker 3: to say no when they want to. But I can
Speaker 3: sometimes say, like, I'll just say yes too easily because
Speaker 3: I know I can do it, so I'll just say okay,
Speaker 3: yes whatever. Actually I'm married to a questioner and so
Speaker 3: it helps me that he's like, why would you do that?
Speaker 3: So sometimes I'll ask my husband Jamie, if I should
Speaker 3: do something, or I'll think, well, what would Jamie say.
Speaker 3: I don't even need to ask him. I just need
Speaker 3: to visualize him his face being like quizzically, why would
Speaker 3: you do that? So that helps me. And then often,
Speaker 3: you know, I just you know, I am like, I've
Speaker 3: got a big writing deadline that I have to meet,
Speaker 3: and I think people are pretty sympathetic to that. People
Speaker 3: get it, and so I just say, you know, I've
Speaker 3: got a big writing deadline, so I have to I'm
Speaker 3: saying no to a lot of things. Unfortunately I can't
Speaker 3: do it.
Speaker 1: Where do you go for inspiration and new ideas, you know,
Speaker 1: particularly when you're thinking about what is the next book
Speaker 1: that you're going to write?
Speaker 3: My next book idea always has come to me magically,
Speaker 3: so that's wonderful. It just comes out of whatever I've
Speaker 3: been naturally thinking about. So I feel super lucky about that.
Speaker 3: But my inspiration comes from two things. For shirt, reading,
Speaker 3: which again like I read all the time because that's
Speaker 3: where I get ideas, or talking to other people, just
Speaker 3: talking to the people around me, and I guess reading.
Speaker 3: I read a ton of memoirs and biography, so that's
Speaker 3: kind of like talking to people as well. Or reading novels,
Speaker 3: but just talking to people. Like some of my biggest
Speaker 3: insights have come from the most casual conversations. Like a
Speaker 3: friend of mine once said to me, She's like, you know,
Speaker 3: the bunny thing about me is I'm happier when I exercise.
Speaker 3: And you know, when I was in high school, I
Speaker 3: was on the track team and I never missed track practice.
Speaker 3: So why can't I go running on my own at now?
Speaker 3: And I thought, well, that's a great question. It's the
Speaker 3: same person, it's the same behavior. One time it was
Speaker 3: no problem for you. Now you can't do it. What's
Speaker 3: going on? And I came up with like a big
Speaker 3: long list of things, And in the end that's what
Speaker 3: led me to understand my full tendencies framework. Or there
Speaker 3: were people where they would say to me, you know,
Speaker 3: because I write about kind of happiness and habits, I'm
Speaker 3: very interested in how people feel about New Year's resolutions.
Speaker 3: I talk to people about New Year's resolutions a lot,
Speaker 3: not so much for what they do, but how they
Speaker 3: think about it. And there's a kind of person that
Speaker 3: I ran into over and over where if I asked
Speaker 3: about New Year's resolutions, they would say, oh, I don't
Speaker 3: do New Year's resolutions. I'll make a resolution anytime it
Speaker 3: makes sense for me, but I wouldn't do it on
Speaker 3: January first, because January first is an arbitrary And I thought, well,
Speaker 3: that's interesting, because the arbitrariness of January first never really
Speaker 3: bothered me, but clearly for like some group of people,
Speaker 3: it was very significant. And so I was like, what
Speaker 3: do I make of that pattern? And again that led
Speaker 3: me to my four tendency. So a lot of times
Speaker 3: it's just these casual things that people say that send
Speaker 3: me off in some direction that ends up being very
Speaker 3: I mean, it comes from reading too, Like I was
Speaker 3: reading one of my spiritual masters is Samuel Johnson, and
Speaker 3: there's a line it's not even in the life of
Speaker 3: Samuel Johnson. It's like it's like a comment of his
Speaker 3: that was written down where somebody offered him wine. This
Speaker 3: is doctor Johnson, and he said they asked Hm if
Speaker 3: he would take a little wine, and he said, I
Speaker 3: can't take a little child. Abstinence is as easy to
Speaker 3: me as temperance would be difficult. And when I read that,
Speaker 3: that's when I realized, like you, I'm an abstainer like Johnson,
Speaker 3: Abstinence is easy. Temperance is hard. I can have none,
Speaker 3: but I can't have a little bit. And it was
Speaker 3: reading that line from Johnson that all of a sudden
Speaker 3: made me realize this thing about myself. And I thought
Speaker 3: I was the only one who is like this, because
Speaker 3: you know, everybody tells you, oh, moderation is pleasant to
Speaker 3: the wise, and you should follow the eighty twenty rule.
Speaker 3: All that, I thought I was the only one. Then
Speaker 3: I started asking around. It turns out huge number of
Speaker 3: people are like this. So I get my insights really
Speaker 3: from reading or from other people.
Speaker 1: Do you have a process for I guess, processing those
Speaker 1: those things that you're hearing, those observations, or is it
Speaker 1: just kind of happening in the background for you.
Speaker 3: Well, you know, it's interesting because I do have a
Speaker 3: lot of notes. So I have a quotes thing where
Speaker 3: I'll write down quotes. I have my book of Aphorisms.
Speaker 3: I have notes on all different subjects. And I also
Speaker 3: have something called notes, which is like notes that don't
Speaker 3: go anywhere else, which you would think would be miscellaneous,
Speaker 3: which I said not to do, but it's actually different
Speaker 3: for miscellaneous. But so I have all that. But what
Speaker 3: I have found is often I will feel like writing
Speaker 3: taking a note. I will feel that something is significant,
Speaker 3: but I will not understand its significance. I will be like, why,
Speaker 3: I don't understand why I'm even bothering to write this down,
Speaker 3: But I, you know, okay, fine, I'll put this down,
Speaker 3: and then later, maybe years later, I will understand its significance.
Speaker 3: And that is super exciting when I realized that I've
Speaker 3: actually been reflecting and researching something for years, even though
Speaker 3: I hadn't really grasped the subject yet, because I think
Speaker 3: a lot of times it takes me a long time
Speaker 3: to understand how things fit in. When I was writing
Speaker 3: my book about habit change better than before, I would
Speaker 3: often write down examples of things that people were doing
Speaker 3: or saying, or that I read about, and I would
Speaker 3: be like, I don't understand how this fits into this system,
Speaker 3: Like this seems kind of relevant to have it change,
Speaker 3: but I don't really understand how. And it was only
Speaker 3: when I got deep, deep, deep, deep into it that
Speaker 3: all the pieces started sliding into place. So sometimes I
Speaker 3: just sort of have to trust to the future and
Speaker 3: assume that at some point I'll understand why something seemed significant,
Speaker 3: And I do find myself pondering, Like I'll often be
Speaker 3: struck by something and I'll have to really think about,
Speaker 3: like why did that seem so meaningful to me? Or
Speaker 3: what was the lesson there? Like sometimes it takes some
Speaker 3: thinking to figure out what the lesson was.
Speaker 1: Something I think about when I read your work, and
Speaker 1: you know, when I consume other people's work that does
Speaker 1: sort of like yours and really inspire me to be
Speaker 1: better and you know, lead a kind of richer life
Speaker 1: is I think about what can I apply as a parent.
Speaker 1: I've got a seven year old daughter, and I'm constantly thinking,
Speaker 1: how does this apply to her? So I'm wondering what
Speaker 1: do you do personally as a parent, Like what are
Speaker 1: some of the things that you you know, write about
Speaker 1: for adults, but you help I guess or apply or
Speaker 1: teach to your kids.
Speaker 3: Well, one thing that has helped me tremendously as a
Speaker 3: parent and also as a a just in life with
Speaker 3: other adults is to accept the reality of other people's feelings.
Speaker 3: Because I had a bad habit of saying things like, oh,
Speaker 3: you're not hungry, or you're not cold, or you love
Speaker 3: you love going to Grandma and Grandpa's house, or you know,
Speaker 3: you're not scared of the pool. And that's whether you're
Speaker 3: a child or an adult. That is very annoying and counterproductive.
Speaker 3: And I realize now it's much better to just acknowledge
Speaker 3: the reality of other people's feelings. Like we just ate,
Speaker 3: but you still feel hungry, or you usually you love
Speaker 3: going to the swimming pool, but today you're you're just
Speaker 3: feeling very apprehensive. You don't feel like going into the
Speaker 3: swimming pool. It's like and often when you tell people
Speaker 3: that you you acknowledge the reality of how they're feeling,
Speaker 3: you feel so much better. It's like my husband, it's like,
Speaker 3: you know something, like it sounds like it was really
Speaker 3: annoying to be on hold for half an hour. Instead
Speaker 3: of being like, well, what's the big deal? Like what
Speaker 3: you know, it's not such a big deal to call
Speaker 3: the cable company. It's like that just makes you feel angry.
Speaker 3: So that's something that's really that's really helpful. I mean,
Speaker 3: one of the things that I really try to work
Speaker 3: on is just remembering that just because something works for
Speaker 3: me doesn't mean that it would work for my children.
Speaker 3: And like, one way this comes up, it's like I'm
Speaker 3: a super desk person. I need a desk. I realized, like,
Speaker 3: I need a desk like every ten feet, Like I
Speaker 3: only work at a desk. I want to be at
Speaker 3: a desk. I want a desk everywhere I go. And
Speaker 3: it was really hard for me. I was always trying
Speaker 3: to get my kids to work at a desk, like
Speaker 3: they work on their bed, they work on the floor,
Speaker 3: They work in these like positions that look so uncomfortable
Speaker 3: to me. And then I went into this was a
Speaker 3: long time, this is you know, before the before times.
Speaker 3: I went into a we work or you know, one
Speaker 3: of those places, and it had a sitting thing. It
Speaker 3: wasn't a chair, and it wasn't a sofa, and it
Speaker 3: was like a bed, only kind of in a sofa form.
Speaker 3: And I saw somebody sitting on it and that was
Speaker 3: the way my daughter worked on her laptop. And I
Speaker 3: was like, this is the way people work, you know,
Speaker 3: we work is acknowledging some people like to sit like this.
Speaker 3: This is a way that some people were I would
Speaker 3: never work like that. It looks desperately uncomfortable to me,
Speaker 3: but some people do. And then I stopped hassling my
Speaker 3: daughters to sit at a desk, because why is it
Speaker 3: any of my business, if they sit at a desk,
Speaker 3: if they get their work done, and they are perfectly
Speaker 3: content and productive, they should be able to do their
Speaker 3: work in their own way. And so part of it
Speaker 3: is just like, just because something works really well for
Speaker 3: me doesn't necessarily mean it's going to work for someone else.
Speaker 3: And if they're doing it, if they're doing fine, I shouldn't.
Speaker 3: I shouldn't I shouldn't try to persuade them to do
Speaker 3: it a different way.
Speaker 1: How about helping children foam good habits?
Speaker 3: Well, the most important thing to do is to be
Speaker 3: a good example of the there's twenty one strategies of
Speaker 3: habit change, and one of the most powerful strategies is
Speaker 3: the strategy of other people. And we pick up habits
Speaker 3: from other people in a flash, good habits and bad habits.
Speaker 2: And if you.
Speaker 3: Want your children to read, you read. If you want
Speaker 3: your children to go to bed on time, you go
Speaker 3: to bed on time. If you want your children to
Speaker 3: put put down their phone, you put down your phone.
Speaker 3: First of all, it'll make you much more convincing when
Speaker 3: you suggest that they do it, and you're just showing
Speaker 3: that behavior. And what I have found, you know, one
Speaker 3: of the truths, one of this kind of sad truths
Speaker 3: about happiness is the only people we can the only
Speaker 3: person we can change is ourselves. You know, we can
Speaker 3: only change ourselves. But what I happened is that when
Speaker 3: I change a relationship changes, and when I change the
Speaker 3: atmosphere of my household changes, and if I do something,
Speaker 3: other people sort of come along. Not always and not perfectly,
Speaker 3: but often and more often than you might think. So, say,
Speaker 3: when I started getting up, you know, like I get
Speaker 3: up at six every day, and what I found is
Speaker 3: that when I get up, I sort of start everything moving,
Speaker 3: and so I think that makes other people get up.
Speaker 3: Maybe they don't get up when I get up, but
Speaker 3: they probably get up earlier than they otherwise would. Or
Speaker 3: when I started making sure that I gave everybody a
Speaker 3: really warm hello and goodbye every time they went in
Speaker 3: and out of the apartment, that made other people more
Speaker 3: likely to do it too. We all talked about it,
Speaker 3: but it was really important that one person was really
Speaker 3: doing it. And then I think when one person starts
Speaker 3: doing it, then you sort of get swept up in it.
Speaker 3: So settying, like doing it yourself is often very important.
Speaker 3: And then also, you know, just deciding what happens if
Speaker 3: you ignore this some things, it's like, yeah, you would
Speaker 3: like their bed to be made, But is that the
Speaker 3: argument you feel like having. Is that what you feel
Speaker 3: like spending your time and energy on. Maybe not? Maybe
Speaker 3: so it might be really really important to you, but
Speaker 3: maybe not.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I like that one.
Speaker 1: Now, Gretchen Gosh, time is flown by for people that
Speaker 1: want to consume more of what you are doing.
Speaker 2: What is the best way for people to do that?
Speaker 3: Well, if you'd like to listen more, I have a
Speaker 3: weekly podcast that I do with my sister who's a
Speaker 3: TV show runner, called Happier with Gretchen Rubin, where we
Speaker 3: talk about how to be happier spoiler alert and if
Speaker 3: you go to my website Gretchenreuben dot com, I have
Speaker 3: that's a kind of a clearinghouse for everything about my books.
Speaker 3: I have a lot of free resources. I have a
Speaker 3: ton of you know, material there on habits and good
Speaker 3: and human nature and happiness generally. We talked some about
Speaker 3: the four tendancies. If people want to know their tendency
Speaker 3: and get a little report and find out what that means,
Speaker 3: they can go to quiz dot Gretchenreuben dot com or
Speaker 3: just look on my website for the quiz. Like more
Speaker 3: than three million people have taken that quiz and it's
Speaker 3: free and it's quick, and we'll tell you your tendency.
Speaker 3: And then I'm on social media everywhere as Gretchen Ruben,
Speaker 3: and I love to get insights and comments and questions
Speaker 3: from people, so I love I love to engage with
Speaker 3: readers and listeners, So hit me up.
Speaker 2: Amazing.
Speaker 1: Ama, Well, Gretchen, I've just loved talking to you. After
Speaker 1: following your work for over a decade, It's just been
Speaker 1: such a joy to chat.
Speaker 2: So thank you so much.
Speaker 3: Well, thank you. I so enjoyed the comma. I appreciate it.
Speaker 1: Hello there, That is it for today's show. If you
Speaker 1: enjoyed today's episode, why not share it with someone else
Speaker 1: that you think would benefit and maybe get some useful
Speaker 1: tips to improve the way that they work. How I
Speaker 1: work is produced by Inventing with production support from the
Speaker 1: Dead Set Studios. And thank you to Martin Nimba, who
Speaker 1: does the audio mix for every show and makes everything
Speaker 1: sound so much better than it would have otherwise.
Speaker 2: See you next time.