Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris - From Happier with Gretchen Rubin | The Happiness Project: Revisited

Episode Date: December 15, 2023

Next year marks the fifteenth anniversary of Gretchen Rubin’s #1 New York Times bestselling book, The Happiness Project. To celebrate, she’s leading a one-time, one-year course called “The Happiness Project: Revisited.” In this bonus excerpt from the course, Gretchen and Elizabeth explore the lessons Gretchen has learned over the years, talk about her plans to do a new happiness project in 2024, and discuss how other people can do their own happiness projects. You can learn more and sign up here—plus, get 30% off through December 31st with code THPR30DEC.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hello listeners, this is Mike Corey of Against the Odds. You might know that I adventure around the world while recording this podcast. And over the years, I've learned that where I stay when I travel can make all the difference. Airbnb has been my go-to place for finding the perfect accommodations. Because with hotels, you often don't have the luxury of extra space or privacy. Recently, I had a bunch of friends come down to visit in Mexico. We found this large house and the place had a pool, a barbecue, a kitchen, and a great big living room to play cards, watch movies, and just chill out. It honestly made all

the difference in the trip. It felt like we were all roommates again. The next time you're planning a trip, whether it's with friends, family, or yourself, check out Airbnb to find something you won't forget. This is the 10% Happier Podcast. I'm Dan Harris. Hey everybody, Dan here with a bonus for you and this one involves somebody about whom I have very strong positive feelings. Gretchen Rubin, who is an author and podcaster and a great friend to me and somebody who's been incredibly helpful to me as I've worked on my career over the years, moving out of news and into whatever it is I do now. And Gretchen's got a huge anniversary coming up next year, marks the 15th anniversary of her number one New York Times best-selling book, her breakout hit, The Happiness Project

in which she spends a year basically making herself into a human guinea pig and trying out lots of strategies for happiness and habits and personal growth. And in this bonus episode you're about to hear Gretchen and her sister Elizabeth, who is the co-host of the happier podcast, the two of them co-host this great podcast called Happier. So in this episode you're going to hear Gretchen

and Elizabeth talking about all the things that Gretchen has learned over the years and her plans to do a new happiness project in the year 2024. And the cool thing is as Gretchen reboots the Happiness Project for 2024, you can do it alongside her. You can sign up for this one time, one year course called the Happiness Project Revisited. Throughout the year, you'll be able to listen along with Gretchen on audio. You'll get a 100-page personal playbook sent to you in the mail to work on your own personal initiatives in the Happiness Project.

And you'll get real-time updates from Gretchen as she proceeds. And as a listener to this show, you will get 30% off enrollment during the month of December using the code THPR30DC. That's a lot. I'll put it in the show notes, but THPR30DC. And I should also tell you where you can sign up. You can go to happiercast.com slash course. That's happiercast.com slash course. And again, all of this is in the show notes. Okay, and I thought

of me, let's listen to Gretchen and her sister Elizabeth talk about all of the things Gretchen has learned in these many years of studying happiness. I like to call her the Swiss army knife of happiness and habits. And you're about to hear why. Welcome to the Happiness Project Revisited. You are listening to the first in a series of conversations that are part of a one time, one year opportunity where I'm revisiting my previous Happiness Project and my book, The Happiness Project,

that came out 15 years ago. I'm so excited to be redoing this Happiness Project 15 years later with the same format and same themes to see how it relates and fits into my life today in 2024 and to remind myself of some of the lessons I learned from my experience. Each month I'll be talking with my sister, Elizabeth, who is also co-host of the Happier with Gretchen Movin podcast to explore those themes. To kick off the month of January and the year of 2024, this first conversation will be more like an overview. And then we'll get into

some more specific exercises for January. So, Gretchen, how did you get the idea to do a happiness project in the first place? I got the idea in a very inconspicuous moment of my life. I was stuck on a city bus in the pouring rain, so I had one of those rare opportunities for reflection that we often don't get in the busyness of our everyday schedules. I thought to myself, what do I want from life anyway? And I thought, I want to be happy. But I realized I didn't spend any time thinking about whether I was happy or if I could be happier or if it was even possible to make yourself happy.

I thought, I should have a happiness project. So I ran to the library. I got a giant stack of books to figure out everything I could about happiness. I mean, I was looking at contemporary science, ancient philosophy, books, memoirs, and immediately started researching and writing. And I got so many ideas for things that I wanted to try and that I wanted to learn about, that then I thought, wow, well, maybe this should become

my next book, and that became the book, the Happiness Project. It's hard to believe that that was 15 years ago. So much in my life has changed. I've learned so much more about happiness and I am so excited to revisit those themes, to revisit that format, and to just go deeper and deeper and deeper into this just endlessly fascinating subject of happiness. Yes. So doing a happiness project sounds exciting, but for a lot of people, myself included, it also sounds intimidating. How do you think about setting it up and then following through

it? Exactly. And that's part of what I had to figure out. And so a happiness project is an approach. And it's a way to change your life without changing your life. You don't have to do something huge and dramatic. You can find the changes that you want to make within the boundaries of the ordinary day. You know, I think for most people, that's more realistic. It was certainly realistic for me. So there are three main stages. And first is the preparation. And that's when we're asking ourselves, what brings us joy, satisfaction, engagement,

fun, what do we want more of? And then also what do you want less of? We want less anger, boredom, remorse, guilt. So what do you want more of? What do you want less of? Then second, you move to setting resolutions. And this is about making concrete resolutions that will help you make the change

that's gonna boost your happiness. And this is funny, right? Because I think a lot of times we have abstract ideas like, I want to get more joy out of life or even something like, I want to eat healthier or I want to exercise more. But the secret to a resolution and I figured this out is that it has to be something very concrete where you really know at the end of the day, did I do it or did I not do it? It has to be that concrete. And then it's the challenge of keeping resolutions.

And that's easier said than done. It's challenging. But then it's also exciting because it's the keeping resolutions that gives us the benefits. But Elizabeth, I am really excited because I am going to do a happiness project myself this year. And you know me, I am always experimenting with new habits and resolutions and exercises and adventures, but I haven't done an official happiness project since the happiness project and happier at home. And it's such a satisfying format and I have so many ideas for things that I want to do that I'm like, I'm going to do it in 2024 too. I'm going to do my own resolutions, my own themes. It is so much

fun to think about revisiting the happiness project myself. So 15 years later, are you revisiting the same topics that you chose in the original happiness project? I'm pretty much because the ones that I picked were the ones that really mattered. So I'm moving things around a little bit, but it's essentially the same themes. And as you were planning your happiness project originally, you figured out various exercises that helped you think

about what areas in your life you wanted to work on, like we were discussing, and how you would approach your aims. And these exercises are very creative and fun to do, as well as really helpful and pursuing a happiness project. Yeah, I figured out along the way, kind of by trial and error, I figured out a lot of many exercises to help get clarity and to help myself keep on track. So one is a resolutions chart and this is where you may have a chart, you have your aim, your resolution at the top, and then you can just check off every day for a lot of people.

You know, we manage what we monitor and many people benefit from don't break the chain. So resolution chart is a way to keep track of how consistently we're keeping resolution. And also just to keep it top of mind, because unless it's you and I know you can make a resolution and then forget about it. Yeah, 100%. Yeah.

Another is personal commandments. Now, this is a very creative, very thought-provoking exercise. And I came up with 12, but that was just because that's how many I happen to have. And people have 10, people might have six. This is the big overarching themes about the way you want to live your life, like the umbrella principle. This isn't something like, make my bed every day.

This is something like, be polite and be fair. My first one is begretchen. This takes time to really articulate this for yourself because it really means getting in touch with your values. Then there'll be once where you're like, those two things are really the same. So this is something that you have to ponder over the long term, but it's really satisfying.

And then another thing. And I mean, I talk about these all the time, and I don't know that everybody enjoys this as much as I do. But I have this exercise called Secrets of Adulthood, where I keep track of the secrets of adulthood, the lessons we learn the hard way. And some of them are as simple as soap and water, removes most stains, or turning something on and off,

often fixes a glitch. And then some are very deep and took me a long time to understand like I want to accept myself and also expect more from myself. Or love is unconditional and love is demanding. Those are secrets of adulthood and keeping track of those helps me keep track of my own hard one wisdom, I guess. So that's something that's not everybody's idea of fun

but for me that kind of exercise is really fun. Crutch, if people want to see these that you've done, can they find them on your website? Yeah, yeah, I have a link to that. First secrets of adulthood, I hear in the hard way. Yes. Yes. So the course is theme for January,

as you mentioned, is self-knowledge. Yes. Why is that the subject of the first month? Why do we need to, is self-knowledge. Why is that the subject of the first month? Why do we need to start with self-knowledge? Okay, this is the thing, is that we have to start with self-knowledge. And this is the step that I think so many people who study happiness skip. And I absolutely, when I started my happiness projects all those years ago, I really thought, well, I will find the best way. I'll do the research and I'll figure out the right way,

and then I'll do it, and I'll tell everybody else what I found, and it will work for everyone. But what I realized is that all of us are different. Your happiness project, Elizabeth, is very different from my happiness project because you're a different person. You have different strengths, different weaknesses, different values, different interests, different challenges. And so for each of us, we have to really start by thinking, well, what is true for me? What is it that I want? What is it that I need?

And if you don't do the self-knowledge, you're not setting yourself up for success because you might not be pursuing the aims that are really right for you or doing it in the way that's right for you. And so starting with self-knowledge, really make sure that the happiness project is really your happiness project, not just someone else's happiness project. Yeah, and it's going to work best if you know yourself better and you're honest with yourself about who you are because that's always the best practice. Yeah.

And that honesty is tricky. Like sometimes it's hard to look in the mirror. So that's one of the things that we try to do is to help everybody understand themselves better. So Gretchen, where should people go if they want to learn more about the course and sign up? Yes. If you're interested, go to happierierCast.com slash THP

revisited. So that's for the Happiness Project revisited THP revisited. And if you sign up in the month of December, you can get 30% off. You will see the promo code when you go to the website. HappierCast.com slash THP revisited. go to the website. Happyercast.com slash THP revisited. Thanks again to Gretchen Ruben for giving us that awesome audio snippet to play to you and don't forget if you sign up for her Happiness Project revisited.

You'll get 30% off enrollment for December using the code THPR30DEC. Just check the show notes. I highly recommend it. And we'll see you back here soon with a fresh episode. [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ If you like 10% happier, I hope you do. You can listen early and add free right now

by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple podcasts. Prime members can listen, add free on Amazon Music. Before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at Wondry.com slash survey.