Along with all of New York City, I’m overjoyed by the triumph of the Knicks! I’ve spent a lot of time on social media since Game 5, and I’ve enjoyed every minute of the excellent Knicks victory coverage. Below are a few highlights.
Onward,
5 Things Making Me Happy
One of my favorite TV shows is Friends—a very New York City show—and the comedic timing of this exchange between Joey and Chandler is brilliant. “Yeah, the Knicks rule all.”
I loved eavesdropping on this audio and this audio between air traffic controllers and pilots on the plane taking the Knicks team back home to New York City from San Antonio. (I checked, and yes, this audio is authentic.)
One of the funniest moments: During an interview on Good Morning America, when with great earnestness George Stephanopoulos asked OG Anunoby what was going through his mind at the critical moment of the game-winning tip-in, Anunoby answered simply, “I was trying to dunk it.” If you want to see a great view of that extraordinary moment in Game Four, here’s one.
My husband Jamie is Chairman of the New York City Housing Authority, so we felt a special connection to this incredible video of a spectacular and daring homage to the Knicks on a NYCHA building. That last shot, beautiful.
I was deeply moved by this spare and surprisingly poetic post by the @NYKnicks. The photo shows team captain and MVP Jalen Brunson cradling the championship trophy. The caption reads: “our doctor, our engineer, our mechanic, our subway driver, our pilot.” I loved that description…and it reminded me of something. What? It was something I wrote, in my book Life in Five Senses, about the Metropolitan Museum as my metaphor for myself: “My visits were my attempt to reach the places in me that I hadn’t yet discovered. Through my senses, I’d found my visible storage, my masterpieces set in illuminated cases, my neglected stairwells, my fountains, my postcards, my stone vases filled with flowers. I am the laboratory, I am the notebook, and I am the museum.”
And one more thing:
June 23 is TogetherTuesday, a day for people across the country to build community and show generosity for their neighbors. Because my one-word theme for 2026 is “neighbor,” and because I’m on the board of Giving Tuesday (which organizes TogetherTuesday) I’m looking forward to it. If you’d like to participate, all you have to do is reach out to others in your community. Some ideas: check in on an elderly or isolated neighbor; volunteer at a food drive or park cleanup; write thank-you notes to teachers or first responders; organize a community potluck or block party.
Feel Your Best This Summer
I partnered with Ivim health to create a companion resource to help you design your summer. It’s a short, free worksheet to help you uncover what you want to start or stop, what might be missing in your body, and how you can move through the next few months with more intention.
This week on Happier with Gretchen Rubin
PODCAST EPISODE: 591
We discuss how perfectionism is driven not by high standards but by anxiety—and how embracing imperfection is a great way to overcome it. We also share an important reminder about hearing health and why it matters so much for our happiness and wellbeing.
INTERVIEW
Elizabeth Svoboda
Elizabeth Svoboda is an award-winning science writer and contributor to Scientific American, Discover, The Boston Globe, The New York Times, and other publications. Her new book, The Art of Pacing: A Guide to Balancing Short-Term Demands With Long-Term Thriving, is out now.
Q: Can you suggest something we might try to help ourselves to become happier, healthier, more productive, or more creative?
When you’re spiraling due to mental overload or a crisis that’s caught you off guard, take a few minutes to calm your nervous system by breathing deeply.
Once you feel a bit calmer, ask yourself, “What’s the wise choice here?” I learned this from the performance coach and former Olympian Amy Baltzell , and it’s a simple but powerful inquiry. It encourages you to tune into what you actually want and need in the moment and what you can realistically do to meet that need. In the midst of a crisis, you may decide to take the rest of the week off of work — or you may decide that what you need most is an afternoon to process and connect with a friend over tea.
Q: Do you have a Secret of Adulthood? A lesson you’ve learned from life the hard way; something you’d tell your younger self?
When an opportunity comes up, don’t make a snap decision about whether or not to accept. Instead, engage in “slow thinking,” reflecting on what you might gain or lose by opting in. By taking more time to weigh the pros and cons, you can steer clear of both regret at missing out and resentment at taking on too much.
Q: What simple habit boosts your happiness or energy?
Crafting (painting, weaving, impromptu shoe repair, you name it). I’ve always loved arts and crafts, but I’ve sometimes struggled to make time for them. Because they weren’t moving me closer to my big goals, it was easy to see them as unnecessary.
I now realize how short-sighted that was! When I’m making art, I enter an almost meditative flow state where whatever worries I’m facing drop away, and where I feel fulfilled in ways that have nothing to do with achievement or productivity. Once I emerge from my crafting reverie, I feel centered and re-energized, ready to take on whatever’s next.
Q: Is there a particular motto that you’ve found very helpful?
While writing my book, I connected with activist Abby Reyes, who has spent much of her life working to preserve the environment and helping Indigenous people protect their land from resource extraction. These causes are so close to her heart that, for years, she pushed past exhaustion and chronic pain in her determination to keep working for change.
These days, Abby delegates more work to trusted colleagues so she can rest and set a sustainable pace that supports her well-being. “The river is not going to change. The river is accelerating,” she told me. “To be of any service at all, I have to figure out how to be a whole human being while in the slipstream.”
Q: Has a book ever changed your life?
An Interrupted Life by Etty Hillesum. It’s the diary of a Jewish woman living in the Netherlands during World War II. What I find so incredible about Etty is her awareness of the fate that awaited her and her community — and her determination to be what she called “the thinking heart of the barracks” despite it all.
Etty spent about half an hour each morning in what we’d call meditation today, getting in touch with her highest and best self (she was not religious in the traditional sense, but was something of a mystic). Through those morning pauses, she developed enormous inner strength and resolve, which she later drew on to help and comfort those living in the camp barracks with her. Though Etty died in Auschwitz, her legacy challenges us to become the thinking heart of whatever worlds we inhabit.
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