I remember first hearing about Gretchen Rubin from Jess Lively’s podcast The Lively Show. I appreciated her perspective, and she talked about this new book in the podcast. Her first book, The Happiness Project, didn’t sound interesting to me at all.
This book on habits, though, was really enticing. I picked it up at the airport before a 4 hour flight and immediately jumped in.
My quick take: The first half of the book is really interesting. The second half I found myself skimming more than anything. It was more her dialogue between herself and her sister than actually evaluating one’s habits. So, just my two cents.
I assumed I was an Obliger and this book confirmed it. It also helped reveal that Justin is a Questioner and a Rebel. There are so many specific examples of where those personality traits are evident in our lives. At times I laughed out loud because the book would describe one of us perfectly. When I got to the section on Loopholes I was really stunned to see that I used almost every single one of them. And I think Gretchen even points out that Obligers are most prone to Loopholes because unless someone else is holding us accountable we can easily come up with an excuse. I’m the queen of “I’ll start on Monday, when the week is fresh” or “I worked really hard so I deserve it” or “I’m spread too thin, I can’t be expected to do THAT too”. I was nodding my head to EVERY SINGLE LOOPHOLE,...