476 Quotes by Gretchen Rubin

Rebels aren't persuaded by arguments such as 'People are counting on you,' 'You've already paid for it'...'Things should be done this way,' 'You have an appointment,' 'You said you'd do it'...'It's against the rules,' 'It's a tradition,' 'This is the deadline,' or 'It's rude.'They're much more apt to respond to being told 'This will be fun,' 'This is what *you* want'...Rebels can do anything they *want* to do.

The harder the push, the greater the Rebel push-back. I laughed when a Rebel friend told me, 'No one can tell me to do anything. I recently got an email saying "Please read" in the subject line, and I immediately deleted it.

... one flaw throws the loveliness of [everything else] into focus. I remember reading that Shakers deliberately introduced a mistake into the things they made, to show that man shouldn't aspire to the perfection of God. Flawed can be more perfect than perfection.

This is one of the many paradoxes of happiness: we seek to control our lives, but the unfamiliar and the unexpected are important sources of happiness.

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.

Although we presume that we act because of the way we feel, in fact we often feel because of the way we act.

Just because we're busy doesn't mean we're being productive. Working is one of the most dangerous forms of procrastination.

I cleaned out my fridge, and now I feel like I can change careers!

When possible, the brain makes a behavior into a habit, which saves effort and therefore gives us more capacity to deal with complex, novel, or urgent matters.