This is a huge summer of travel for me. In partnership with the organization Wilderness England, my sister Elizabeth and I are hiking in Northumberland and the Lake District. I love to travel with my sister, and this is the first trip we’ve taken together since we did our live podcast tour five years ago. To prepare, I collected many items of rain gear and a stack of books set in that area.
Onward,
5 Things Making Me Happy
As a child, I spent many hours trying to get my Rubik’s cube to cooperate, and I was interested to see that this year, Rubik’s cube turns fifty.
I was astonished by the grace and power of Animaris Rex, an 18-meter-long kinetic sculpture by Theo Jansen. Propelled by the wind, it resembles a herd of beach animals that move in unison across the sand. Art + engineering + nature. Stunning.
On this week’s Very Special Episode of the Happier podcast, we share dozens of listeners’ tips and hacks for exercise. If you want to read more, here are some of my own tips.
Ever since I started working on my book Life in Five Senses, I’ve been visiting the Metropolitan Museum every day. For that entire time, as far as I know, a staircase to Floor 3 of the American Wing was closed off, so I could never see the galleries on that top floor. But on a recent visit I discovered—it’s open! I was so excited to have a new area to visit, and a hidden place revealed.
I’m a sleep zealot. Getting good sleep is one of the four elements of the “Strategy of Foundation,” one of my twenty-one strategies that we can use to make or break our habits. (The other three? Exercise, managing food and drink, and for most people, creating outer order.) When we get enough sleep, we’re healthier; more energetic; and have better immune function, memory, creativity, and focus. As for me—when I don’t get enough sleep, the first thing to go is my sense of humor and my perspective. I was very interested to read “Sleep better at every age,” which discusses how our sleep needs and patterns change over our lives.
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This week on Happier with Gretchen Rubin
PODCAST EPISODE: 490
We discuss dozens of hacks from listeners about how to create a habit of regular exercise, plus we share many of our own personal favorite hacks for exercising.
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