The Happiness Project Quotes

“Action seems to follow feeling, but really action and feeling go together; and by regulating the action, which is under the more direct control of the will, we can indirectly regulate the feeling, which is not.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“Second Splendid Truth
One of the best ways to make yourself happy is to make other people happy.
One of the best ways to make other people happy is to e happy yourself.
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― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“It turns out that stating a problem clearly often suggests its solution.
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― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“I started thinking more about music. I thought I'd accepted the fact that, as part of "Being Gretchen," I didn't really like music, but in fact, the truth was slightly different: I thought I didn't like music, but in fact, I didn't approve of my own taste--I wished I liked sophisticated music, like jazz or classical or esoteric rock. Instead, my taste ran mostly to what might play on a lite FM station. Oh, well. Be Gretchen.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“To be happy, I need to think about feeling good, feeling bad, and feeling right.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“Feeling right” is about living the life that’s right for you—in occupation, location, marital status, and so on. It’s also about virtue: doing your duty, living up to the expectations you set for yourself. For some people, “feeling right” can also include less elevated considerations: achieving a certain job status or material standard of living.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project: Or, Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, and Generally Have More Fun

“When money or health is a problem, you think of little else; when it's not a problem, you don't think much about it. Both money and health contribute to happiness mostly in negative; the lack of them brings much more unhappiness than possessing them brings happiness.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“By doing a little bit each day, you can get a lot accomplished. We tend to overestimate how much we can accomplish in an hour or a week and underestimate how much we can accomplish in a month or a year, by doing just a little bit each day.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“Although men and women agree that sharing activities and self-disclosure are important, women’s idea of an intimate moment is a face-to-face conversation, while men feel close when they work or play sitting alongside someone.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project: Or, Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, and Generally Have More Fun

“I was comforted by the words of my model Benjamin Franklin, who reflected of his own chart: "On the whole, though I never arrived at perfection I had been so ambitious of obtaining, but fell far short of it, yet as I was, by the endeavor, a better and a happier man that I otherwise should have been had I not attempted it.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“One of the great joys of falling in love is the feeling that the MOST extraordinary person in the entire world has chosen YOU”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“By doing a little bit each day you can get a lot accomplished”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“I was surprised to learn from my research, however, that the well-known notion of anger catharsis is poppycock. There’s no evidence for the belief that “letting off steam” is healthy or constructive. In fact, studies show that aggressively expressing anger doesn’t relieve anger but amplifies it. On the other hand, not expressing anger often allows it to disappear without leaving ugly traces.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“Pierre Reverdy: “There is no love; there are only proofs of love.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“Nietzsche wrote, “All truly great thoughts are conceived while walking,” and his observation is backed up by science; exercise-induced brain chemicals help people think clearly. In fact, just stepping outside clarifies thinking and boosts energy. Light deprivation is one reason that people feel tired, and even five minutes of daylight stimulates production of serotonin and dopamine, brain chemicals that improve mood.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“Flawed can be more perfect than perfection.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“One day, I’d stop twisting my hair, and wearing running shoes all the time, and eating exactly the same food every day. I’d remember my friends’ birthdays, I’d learn Photoshop, I wouldn’t let my daughter watch TV during breakfast. I’d read Shakespeare. I’d spend more time laughing and having fun, I’d be more polite, I’d visit museums more often, I wouldn’t be scared to drive.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“Enthusiasm is more important to mastery than innate ability, it turns out, because the single most important element in developing an expertise is your willingness to practice.”
― Gretchen Craft Rubin, The Happiness Project

“My happiness project was both. I wanted to perfect my character, but given my nature, that would probably involve charts, deliverables, to-do lists, new vocabulary terms, and compulsive note taking.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“exercise-induced brain chemicals help people think clearly.”
― Gretchen Craft Rubin, The Happiness Project

“Happiness is the meaning and the purpose of life, the whole aim and end of human existence.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“When life was taking its ordinary course, it was hard to remember what really mattered.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“I didn’t want to be like the novelist who spent so much time rewriting his first sentence that he never wrote his second.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“What a wonderful life I’ve had! I only wish I’d realized it sooner.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project: Or, Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, and Generally Have More Fun

“Studies show that people tend to persevere longer with problems they've been told are difficult as opposed to easy.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“Happiness is a critical factor for work, and work is a critical factor for happiness. In one of those life-isn’t-fair results, it turns out that the happy outperform the less happy. Happy people work more hours each week—and they work more in their free time, too. They tend to be more cooperative, less self-centered, and more willing to help other people—say, by sharing information or pitching in to help a colleague—and then, because they’ve helped others, others tend to help them. Also, they work better with others, because people prefer to be around happier people, who are also less likely to show the counterproductive behaviors of burnout, absenteeism, counter-and nonproductive work, work disputes, and retaliatory behavior than are less happy people.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“I had everything I could possibly want—yet I was failing to appreciate it. Bogged down in petty complaints and passing crises, weary of struggling with my own nature, I too often failed to comprehend the splendor of what I had.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“To be happy, I need to think about feeling good, feeling bad, and feeling right, in an atmosphere of growth.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“Hugging relieves stress, boosts feelings of closeness, and even squelches pain. In one study, people assigned to give five hugs each day for a month, aiming to hug as many different people as they could, became happier.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project