pairing the essential activity with a reward. Once, after a week of travel, I came home to find a backlog of voicemails to respond to. This task initially felt arduous and burdensome. My first thought was “Why do I have so many messages?”—which indicates that I must have been a bit burned-out. But then I realized I was asking the wrong question. So instead I asked, “How can I make calling these people back enjoyable?” After just a few seconds the idea came to make the calls from my hot tub. That changed the whole experience. It put me in a good mood. I told each person that I was calling from
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