It’s time for the next installment of Happier with Gretchen Rubin.
We’re having so much fun with our Instagram project. Every day, for the month of January, Elizabeth and I are posting a photo on Instagram of something that makes us happier (giving us a boost, helping us stick to good habits, reminding us to feel grateful, etc.). Join in! Use the hashtag #Happier2017 and tag us — I’m @gretchenrubin and Elizabeth is @lizcraft.
Try This at Home: Katie suggested taking personality quizzes to get to know yourself better. We agree!
In episode 80, we talked about the “Five Love Languages” and why we found them so helpful. As a reminder, the Five Languages are:
Words of Affirmation — the love language for both Elizabeth and me
Quality Time
Receiving Gifts
Acts of Service
Physical Touch
We discuss the fascinating book by Daniel Nettle, Personality: What Makes You the Way You Are. In it, you can take the Newcastle Personality Assessor that measures the “Big Five.” You can take the test here.
Openness to experience: The degree of intellectual curiosity, creativity and a preference for novelty and variety a person has.
Conscientiousness: A tendency to be organized and dependable, show self-discipline, act dutifully, aim for achievement, and prefer planned rather than spontaneous behavior.
Extraversion: Energy, positive emotions, assertiveness, sociability and the tendency to seek stimulation in the company of others, and talkativeness.
Agreeableness: A tendency to be compassionate and cooperative rather than suspicious and antagonistic towards others; a measure of a trusting and helpful nature; whether a person is generally well-tempered or not.
Neuroticism: The tendency to experience unpleasant emotions easily, such as anger, anxiety, depression, and vulnerability. Neuroticism also refers to the degree of emotional stability and impulse control.
The Enneagram divides people into nine categories. You can take a paid test here or a free one here.
The Reformer
The Helper
The Achiever
The Individualist
The Investigator
The Loyalist
The Enthusiast
The Challenger
The Peacemaker
If you want to take more personality quizzes, there’s a wide range on the Authentic Happiness website.
Here, I wrote a post about ten books of personality quizzes that I’ve found interesting.
As always, to take the Four Tendencies quiz, go here. Understanding whether you’re an Upholder, Questioner, Obliger, or Rebel is very useful. If you want to be notified when my book, The Four Tendencies comes out, sign up here. I describe my framework as my version of a Muggle Sorting Hat.
We didn’t get a chance to talk about Myers-Briggs! Which is a very popular personality framework.
Happiness Hack: This may be controversial: my hack is to include only one issue per email, with a clear subject line. While some people try to send fewer emails, by fitting more issues into a single email, I (for one) find this confusing and difficult to manage.
Do you agree? Disagree?
If you want to read about the research I mention, about the benefits of using “search” instead of sorting emails into folders: “Stop organizing your email into folders: searching your email is way faster (study).”
Listener Question: Melanie and Rachel ask questions about book club behavior.
Speaking of children’s literature, here’s my list of my 81 favorite works of children’s and young-adult literature.
A lot of people read The Happiness Project in book groups of various kinds; if you’d like a discussion guide, look here.
Demerit: Elizabeth continues to struggle with her eye ailment, blepharitis.
Gold Star: I give a gold star to Eliza for getting me to do a better job of washing my face.
Bonus Gold Star: Elizabeth’s young-adult romance Flower just hit the shelves. She and Shea Olsen have written a novel that combines love, temptation, secrets, ambition, celebrity, college applications…delicious.
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Remember, I’m doing weekly live videos on my Facebook Page to continue the conversation from the podcast — usually on Tuesdays at 3:00 pm ET. To join the conversation, check the schedule.
As always, thanks to our terrific sponsors
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Want to know what to expect from other episodes of the podcast, when you listen to the award-winning “Happier with Gretchen Rubin?” We talk about how to build happier habits into everyday life, as we draw from cutting-edge science, ancient wisdom, lessons from pop culture—and our own experiences (and mistakes). We’re sisters, so we don’t let each other get away with much.
HAPPIER listening!
The post Podcast 99: Take Personality Quizzes, Consider Your Email Habits, and Book Club Conflicts. appeared first on Gretchen Rubin.