Demerits and Gold Stars

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Hello and welcome to Happy, a podcast where we talk about strategies and solutions for living happier lives. This week we'll talk about why you should use halfway day as a moment to reflect and perhaps adjust your aims and we will talk about how abstainers can sometimes be moderate if they want to. I'm Gretchen Rubin, a writer who studies happiness, good habits, and human nature. I'm in my hot little summer home office in New York City. And joining me today from Los Angeles is my sister , the sage, Elizabeth Kraft, and Elizabeth, I love talking about Halfway Day with you. It's so fun to hear how you're coming along with your aims. That's me, Elizabeth Kraft, a TV writer and producer living in LA. And yeah, Gretch, I think I'm doing better than I usually do on my Aims for twenty twenty six. I feel like you're really doing great this year. Maybe you'll light a fire under me, as they say. But before we jump in, we have a couple updates . Yes, Anne said, I was just listening to you and your sister talk about your dad. I lost my husband in two thousand two and my dad in two thousand eight. Two very important men in my life, very different relationships , of course . I'm listening to you talk about your dad and the things you recall , but I'm hearing those comments from a widow's point of view and hoping you understand that your mother's grief is so very different from yours. You mentioned it being the six month mark and how now it feels real . In my experience as a widow, the first year I was in a fog, although I didn't recognize it as that. Not till the second year began did I realize this is going to be my life from now on . I guess what I'm saying is please don't expect your mother to be at the same point that you two are. You lost your dad, she lost her life partner, her better half, her anchor. Well, this is a great point and many, many people have talked about the second year. Yes. This is something that we've heard from many people. I guess the lesson is never think that you're done or that it's behind you or that it's not going to continue to change. That's another thing that people say is that grief is unpredictable. It can happen in waves, it can happen when you least expect it. And it's absolutely true that everyone's having their own experience. I thought there was a lot of food for thought in what Anne said. Yes, thank you, Anne. And then Amanda said this and I love this because this is about the five senses. She said, I was thinking of you in the five senses recently when I got a package in the mail with a big roll of bubble wrap protecting the glass measuring cup inside. It was the sort with big bubbles about an inch and a half across and I started to pop it so it would fit better in the trash. As I popped it with my hands I had a, sudden memory of stepping on poppy paper as a kid. My mom always laid it out for us to walk and stomp all over when some came in the mail. I put it on the floor and started to step on it in my sock feet and the sensation of it popping under foot was such a memory. It made the memory of those times feel so much more real with the sensation under my feet again. I giggled and stepped on every last bubble. Even calling it poppy paper again made me grin. Another child hood memory a week earlier came again from the soles of my feet. We had a long rainstorm and I walked out in my bare feet after the rain had stopped and walked in the puddles on the driveway on my way to check the mail. The feel of warm air , humidity with freshly evaporating rain, and the smell of the rain always take me back, but the sensation of warm, rough, wet concrete underfoot made it more vivid than ever before. It has been years since I walked barefoot through puddles in the driveway. The slight splashing of the warm shadow puddles around my toes was a huge hit of nostalgia. Touch has been an underused sense for me, but it has been unlocking memories in a new and amazing way lately. I love this who does not love poppy paper. I will call it poppy paper from now on. I love touch. I absolutely agree. I think for many people the sense of touch is under appreciated. I love the use of touch to connect with the past as well as to the present moment. It's so beautiful. Yes, and both of what she's remembering, both of those things I remember stepping on poppy paper and being barefoot after rain and warm puddles on the feet. So I really went back in my mind with this letter too. Yeah . And on this subject of neglected sense, if you want to learn about your neglected sense, you can go to my website GretchenRubin. com and look for the quizzes and there's a quiz. What's your most neglected sense? Whatever it is that you want to do to be happier, your senses can help. So I loved, I loved that letter . Me too. One more thing, coming up, we are coming up to our episode six hundred , which Elizabeth Ooh, this is bonkers. How did we get here? Yes. Every tenth episode is a very special episode, but every hundredth episode is an even more very special episode. So what we'd like to do is highlight listeners responses about what is stuck with you the most of the things that we've talked about , what have you put to use, what has resonated with you, what have you found most useful? You know, we can all learn from each other. I think it's interesting for people to know what has worked most for others. Yeah. Maybe you'll try something if you hear that a lot of people do it or it'll just hit you in a different way. Elizabeth, a lot of times , I just don't think we can predict what people are gonna really vibe with. Yes, it can be a small thing like look behind you before you get out of a booth at a restaurant. People mention all the time or something big like raise your hand and volunteer to be the one in charge, you know? Yeah. So let us know at podcast agretchen Rubin. com we will feature those in episode six hundred . And now for this week's try this at home and it is to get ready for halfway day. So halfway day is july second. That is when we are halfway through the year. If you are listening to this episode when it drops, halfway day will be coming up for you next week. But look, even if you listen to this later , it's always a good time to stop and reflect. So there's no magic. It's just something that can be done at any time is often done at no time. So halfway day is a good reminder to reflect. But if you missed july second, don't feel like you missed it altogether. Just do it whenever what's really important the moment of reviewing your aims, thinking about what you want to do differently, what you want to do better, maybe you want to cross something off the list. I've done that in the past. So satisfying. Yeah, Gretchen. What we find is that we forget items on a list. So by reviewing it, you just remember, oh, I completely forgot I wanted to take a flower ranging class. Let me look that up. I can get myself all worked up about like a lather of intensity about how much I want something and then I will just walk away and never think of it again. It's astonishing. Let's go through everyone. Let's just do because that would take long. We have twenty six items each. Let's do some hits and bombs. That's the happier in Hollywood language. That's what you and Sarah do every week is hits and bombs. Yes. What are some of your hits? Well hits for me would be gold bracelet. One of my items was get a gold bracelet because I have like no bracelets. I now have two . I got one that's sort of a hard bengal and then my sister in law for my birthday gave me a beautiful gold bracelet . So now I have two so I feel very set on my gold bracelets. Got ahead. Now one of my items is to paint my fingernails twice a color. I've done it once. Okay , and it was super fun and satisfying. So maybe I'll end up doing that many times, but I've at least done one of the two. Well, and you're on track because you've done one before halfway day. So now you can do one after halfway day. So you're on track. Also grutch on my list is to go to two live talk LA events. That's an organ ization in LA that hosts events. You've done live talk LA organization. They have great stuff. So I've gone to one. I went to see Lena Dunham. Fantastic for her book Fame Sick, which you have if not read, I highly recommend . And then keeping on going with my Fremen Canyon Gretch. I have on the list to do Fremen once a week. I've been doing it at least once a week, sometimes twice a week and that just continues to be one of my favorite things in the world to do. Okay, so those are your hits. Those are some big hits. Almost every year listed, you have something that you want to just buy . And I like that because I could just do that. Sometimes it takes a very long time to get around to it. But then bombs, what are a few of your bombs? Well, Gretch, my biggest bomb is the Wolf Hall slow read. So last year we all did the slow read of Warrenace Pe with Simon Hazel 's footnotes and tangents and loved it so much. And I have been wanting to read Wolf Hall for years . I've started it a couple times . I started the slow read this year and I was really into it, but I just fell off and it got to the point where it's too late to catch up. It would no longer be a slow read. I would be trying to race through it to catch up . So I had to just let that go this year. I'm going to do it next year. Okay, so a quick question about Wolf Hall. Now Wolf Hall is really part of a trilogy by Hilary Mantel. Is this a slow read of all three or just I know that Simon Hazel loved silary mental? Yeah. So this was all three. This was true read all three. Yes. Well, I remember one thing that was idiosyncratically perfect about war and peace is it really did end up being a chapter a day . And there was sort of an aesthetic pleasure of it being just a chapter. Yeah . Do you think that it mattered to you that it was more like pages or something like that for Wolf? 'Cause Wolf doesn'allt fall so neat ly into a year long read that way. Yes. It was chapters, I think, or sections . I think also it started on january one, which was just like so soon after Dad died. I think o thath's I don't know. I just was so topsy turvy and upside down that I think I just didn't get into the groove. The thing about war and peace is since you were doing it, I was doing it. Our father was doing it, our mother was doing it for the second time. She's now doing it for the third time. Yeah . We were talking about war and peace the way people talk about celebrity gossip . So I think there was that feeling of like it was top of mind because it just came up a lot in family conversation. And I was doing this more on my own. So yeah, but I do want to do it. I absolutely love doing the slow reads. I get so much out of it, so I will do it. And then also Gretchen, I don't know if this is a bomb per se, but I had on my list that I want to think about Dad while I make scrambled eggs for Jack every day because you know Dad made scrambled eggs every single day. It's yes something I associate with him so closely. Scrambled eggs, sweetish pancakes, and fudge are the three things that dad could really cook. Yes. Although he cooked a lot more later in life. He did. But I stopped making Jack scrambled eggs because he burnt out on eating them and I think I burnt out on making them. Unlike Dad, I don't wanna make scrambled eggs every day for years on end . So of course I think about Dad all the time , but I am not necessarily thinking about him making scrambled eggs every morning because I'm not making the scrambled eggs. Right, right. But in general, Grutch, I think I'm doing better than usual. I think I'm on track to really tackle many of my items . So I'm very pleased with myself. And do you think that's because over time you've gotten better at setting the right aims or do you think it's just this cluster of aims is the kind of thing or maybe you're more realistic about what you could actually do? I think I have gotten a better idea of what I will do and what 's realistic. So yes, I think it's not just that I suddenly have risen up and tackled all these things. I think part of it is I've set myself a list that is manageable . And by the way, I don't think there's anything wrong with putting items on your list that aren't manageable that are pie in the sky because again , there are no rules . Yes, I agree. I will say though that sometimes I think people put things on that are really fantasy self things that they really don't have any intention of doing, that it's really just what other people think you should do. So you put it on there. Like I've talked to people and they'll say, well, I'm gonna start exercising. My kids and my wife are after me to start exercising. So I'm going to start exercising in the new year. And I'm like doesn't sound that way to me buddy. You're not talking like the kind of person who's really got a plan. So I think that there is the art of understanding why something is on the list and what is the meaning of the fact that you have put something on your list. Yes. Because you're right. It's good to be aspirational, but you don't want to be just pretending. Right. Yeah. Now how, about you, Gretch? What are some hits and bombs from your twenty six for twenty six list? Well, a major hit for me was the high school reunion with a small group of my friends and we do this every couple of years. And almost this is a classic thing. I don't know about you, but there's so many things in life that when I've actually done it, I'm like, that actually wasn't so much work. I don't understand why this felt like such a big deal . So many things if you just do one thing after the other and don't get yourself freaked out, it's not that hard. Anyway, for us, I would say the thing about this reunion is it was really committing to the date. As we say, scheduling is life and once we said this is the date , everything else fell into place pretty quickly. I would just offer that to other people that are trying to do something . Start with the date. Yes , because once you have the date , I think that is the most important thing, even more important than the place. Well, you know what happens, Gritch? I think what happens is people don't want to set a date too far in the future. It's like, oh, we don't want to wait five months for this. We'll want to do it sooner . But then they don't do it sooner and then life gets in the way and then suddenly you're past where that five months would have been yeah and you're starting the whole process over. So I would say don't be afraid to put that date far in the future . And I'll just say in case it's useful for other people, we've really landed on late April and late April seems to be a good time. It's not the holidays, it's not high summer . It's not graduation season because it seems like people always are dealing with graduations. It's after spring break. Yeah, it's after spring break. And so if you're thinking about something like this , I would say to you, if you have flexibility, begin by looking at the second two weeks of April. I have just found that to be really good. Another hit that I have that I've really enjoyed was, you know, it's twenty move six twenty six and . We're trying to move more. So I go to the med and when I'm in the med, I just wander around, I just do whatever I feel like. I look at this, I look at that, I wander, I daydream. I just do whatever I want to do. But now for ten minutes at the end, I just walk very purposely through the met. Now, I'm not speedwalking because that would be very annoying to people who are at the Met. It's not the vibe. You're not doing mall walking in the med. Yeah, but I'm walking purposely like here I am in the American wing and now I'm going to the Egyptian wing. So I'm just gonna walk there, that kind of walking. So I'm getting this extra ten minutes of walking in. And I love the feeling at the met of feeling like I don't, know exactly how to explain it, but there are places that feel it all feels like it's been occupied by me. And if I don't go to a place for a while and I feel like this way like in my own apartment, if there's a room that I don't go into . It starts feeling stale or like it's floating away or it's underserved or it hasn't been incorporated into the hole. I can't really find the right metaphor, but it's like I want to walk through every part of the mat, every room fairly regularly, so I feel like I encompass it all. Like that my fingers are all the way through the dough , but it's hard because the met is really big. And sometimes there's a new exhibit, like the Rafael exhibit. I've been there, I don't know how many times. I just go there. And so I'm not walking through some mezzanine on the American wing because I'm in the rapael part. So this habit is good because it makes me like, oh I'll walk all the way through all the Japanese rooms or whatever. So I really like that and I get the ten minutes of walking. And it's just a different way to be in the med, so I'm really enjoying that. It's funny, Gretchen, because saying you feel like if you haven't been to a room in your house, it's, you know, floating away. I can remember such a distinct sensation of going into the living room of our house on Stratford because we never used the living room. We weren't supposed to use it. It was supposed to keep it nice so we weren't supposed to go in there and mess it up. I can still sort of feel the atmosphere crackling in that room of it just feeling like it was its own sacred space . Because sometimes I would go play records in the back. Yeah. Well, that sounds very pleasant. So maybe in a way it can feel pleasant that there's something undiscovered or untapped or special , but I often feel like things feel underappreciated. I don't know. So that's good. I am halfway through my ticket twenty six, which is I want to buy twenty six tickets to things. So I have about thirteen tickets but I need to keep it up. That is a big one, Gretch. That's an undertaking. It's not as bad as I thought. It's wonderful. It's as good as I thought. They often cluster too, which is interesting. I'll have a week where I have two things. Do you have a favorite thing so far that you've seen? Somebody sent me a ticket to the Whitney Bianale party if I'm, pronoun cing that right, that was very glamorous. It was at the Whitney. It was tons of people . People were dressed in a very interesting way. We saw the art . So that was really great. That sounds great. That was one of my favorites. And then one of my aims is to drop or delegate eight things and that's because eight is two plus six . And I have been doing that . And it is very powerful to drop or delegate something. So and then you have more time for all the other things on the list . So I have been really searching to find things to drop or delegate. I'll report at the end of the year what all I found , but I think it's a really good exercise for everyone to do because we can get in the habit of doing things that either don't need to be done at all or that we don't need to do. I remember when I don't even know how old Eliza was, but she 's an amazing pediatrician so wise . And we were just chatting and I said something like, Oh, it's so annoying to make Eliza's orthodontist appointments. And the doctor said to me, well , why isn't Eliza making her own or the Dantosa appointments? And I was like, That is an excellent question . And I went home and I was like, okay, you take this on. And it was such a relief. That's great . Yeah. And how about bombs, Gretchen? Okay, well one of my bombs, this is so easy . It's so important. I completely embrace this value, but Elizabeth, as we said, I just one hundred percent forgot that I meant to do this. I have not been rating or reviewing books and podcasts. I just forgot. I forgot that I was supposed to do that. So a reminder to all of us to rate and review books and podcasts. Yeah, because it really does we really do help the writer or the podcaster. We love that. We love it. And I know that perfectly well. Yes. And I love praising things that I love. I love shining a spotlight on work that I enjoy and trying to help other people find it. I just literally forgot. This is also an example of don't let perfect be the enemy of good. I think a lot of people want to write like the greatest review . Yes, and then they just don't end up writing one because it feels like too much work. You can just say love this. Helps my commute or whatever. Right. I think that's a great point . Right. You want to say something really witty or insightful or perfectly summarize it or something. I find it very hard to describe things. Like somebody says, What is this book about? I'm always like just take my word for it, read it. You know what I mean? And so I find that very taxing. But you're right, I should not let the perfect be the enemy of the good. And then Alyssa, this is one I want to do this. And I know once I start, I'm not gonna want to stop and that is watching the TV show girls. Mm , yeah, you gotta do it. Do you think I should read fame sick first and then read girls? Or do you think I should watch girls and then read fame Seck? I think watch first because then when you read the book , all of these things she said make sense because I've seen the show. Okay, because I have the book and I'm dying to read it, but okay, I'll wait and watch the show. We're start at least. Okay , that's good. And then there were some things that both of us did, Elizabeth. We both did No spend February. Seems like a long time ago now. I didn't . It really does . But Gretch, we still from the bombs , we still need to plan a reading retreat for this year. We do. Something we love so much, and yet we have not planned it. Well, we were hoping that we could tie it to a trip that I was going to make to Los Angeles, but I don't know're going. to We have to man ufacture a trip or find a way. Yeah. Well, let us know if you do tried this at home and how reflecting on the midpoint day of halfway day works for you. What have you learned? What have you tried? Let us know on Instagram threads, TikTok, Facebook, drop us an email at podcast at Gretchen Rubin. com or as always you can go to the show notes. This is happiercast dot com slash five nine two. Coming up, we've got the happiness hacked from our listener Marley that first break . We recently had one of those projects where a room just was not working the way we wanted it to. The space felt unfinished. I kept putting off finding the right piece because I assumed it would either be too expensive or take forever to find. And then I checked Wayfare and was surprised by the selection and the praises. 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It syncs with Google, calendar, Apple, calendar, outlook, and more, so everyone can see what is happening at a glance . And it's not just about schedules. The tasks feature helps kids build routines and independence, whether it's homework, chores, or brushing their teeth. You can even assign colors to different family members, manage grocery lists, and finally eliminate the excuse of nobody told me. Families are better when they're working together. Right now, Skylight is offering our listeners thirty dollars off their fifteen inch calendars by going to myskylight dot com slash happier. Go to myskylight dot com slash happier for thirty dollars off your fifteen inch calendar. That's MY KY LIGHT . com slash happier . I'm always looking for easy ways to get more protein into my day, especially when I am super busy running from one thing to the next, that's why I've been reaching for David protein bars. What impresses me is that they don't make the usual trade off between protein, calories and sugar. My current favorites are blueberry pie and peanut butter chocolate chunk. They really feel like a treat . David's Goldline packs twenty eight grams of protein into just one hundred and fifty calories with zero grams of sugar. The texture is soft and doughy with little chunks and crisps that make it feel much more satisfying than a typical protein bar. And now David is available at Walmart Stores nationwide and on walmart. com where you can try a single bar for just two ninety seven . Don't take our word for it, go grab one for yourself. Head to Walmart today to try a bar or stock up on four counts of your favorite flavors like blueberry pie and salted peanut butter sold exclusively at Walmart. Check out Walmart. com to find a store near you . And now we have a happiness hack from Marley. Yeah, she says, I want to share with you a hack that reminds me of a few that you shared on the pod , giving something a name. I have decided to name the days of the week to help them feel more manageable as well as whimsical . The challenge with this is that something that can be done at any time often happens at no time. Life often gets busy without me noticing and we get very little downtime or time at home. I have decided to be more strategic about this. Wednesday is a good day for us to have downtime between busy Monday and a full Thursday . As it is coming into winter in Australia, I have decided to call it warm Wednesday. It is a day for warm drinks, slow mornings, staying home and being cozy, reading books, sharing poetry, working on our fiction writing and connecting with each other. I want one day of low expectations . In order to protect my Wednesday, I've decided that the day before will become chore Tuesday , in which we complete errands and pressing housework. On Wednesday I will say no to any spontaneous demands. This one day will not get filled with tasks done for other people. Friday is another open day, so this will be family Friday, another day of connection and low demands, but more focused on spontaneous outings, play, and perhaps a family movie. The busiest days of the week will become Manic Monday and Things Thursday to accept and lean into the fact that these are the high demand days . The weekend is open but could be something Saturday and soothing Sunday. I acknowledge that they often have events and are flexible days. I feel better about knowing that Wednesday and Friday will be mostly just for us . I feel better about our rhythm in general, knowing that I have some guidance for each day and will stop being swep t along by the tasks and to dos . Naming things really does make them feel more official, easier to stick to, and feel like an event rather than a vague intention that might or might not happen. I love this. I think I wrote about this in Happy and Home because there's Bake on Monday, Wash on Tuesday . It's just a classic approach and I love this idea of capturing what you want the essence of the day to be. And then it does. It feels like it's more of an event. It feels more , it feels more purposeful . I love the alliteration. I love this approach. Yeah, and I think you can get people on board when you name something like, Oh, well , we're going to the zoo because it's Family Friday. That's something we would do on Family Friday. And then we're like, Oh, well it is Family Friday. Okay? Yeah, I think that's great. And it also helps you make time for everything. It's like we want time to slow down and we want time to run around and this way you don't fall into a habit of just running around all the time because you haven't set aside the slow days. This way you make sure that you have a little bit of everything that you want in whatever portion you want. So I thought that was a great idea. Yes. And now we have a listener question from Lizzy. Yeah, she says, I would really appreciate some advice on an abstainer moderator stumbling block I have. My word for the year is bal asanced I have some things I'm actively trying to increase in my life whimsy, fun, movement, reading, and other things I am working on reducing, nagging, ultra processed food, doomscrolling. One of my things to reduce is sugar. I started the year by recording my sugary treat intake over a week and was mildly horrified. I knew I had a sweet tooth, but still , I decided to take a moderator approach as my goal was to reduce, not cut sugar completely . I tried various strategies, one treat a day, one treat day a week, et cetera, but I kept making excuses, oh I can have two treats today. I'll just have none tomorrow, et cetera. And I had to admit it wasn't really working. Then I tried abstaining. This was hard for the first few days. Don't ask my husband or kids about my less nagging grouching reduction attempt in this period, but I did it and the power of the streak soon got me. I'm an obliger and find a streak to be a powerful tool. I made it to twenty nine days . But then a chance remark from a friend on their favorite dessert got to me. I felt suddenly absurdly sad that if I continued to abstain I would, never again taste all my favorite sweet things. I wouldn't be able to eat birthday cake with my daughter, share a dessert after dinner out with my husband, or curl up in a comfy chair with a book, a cup of tea, and a favorite chocolate. I fell off the wagon big . I now feel dispirited at the thought of starting all over again. I wonder if with a moderator approach I won't regret so much and so hard as I can still appreciate the sweet foods I love, but I've already proved that I'm not good at moderating . But and I realize how pathetic this sounds, it genuinely makes me feel sad to think of a life with no sugary treats in it. I think Gretchen has mentioned before her sweet tooth and how abstaining from sugar is the only way she can achieve her balance. Do you have any words of wisdom for me? I do wonder if my oblige or nature is hindering me here. My inner expectation is just not cutting it. Well, this is something a lot of people struggle with. A lot of people struggle with this. And one of the preliminary things I would say is in general, moderation just doesn't work for me. It's something I would say is something a lot of people experience. I think people assume that moderation is easier. Like it's easier to have something sometime than almost never . But for a lot of people, it's actually easier to have it almost never. People like me . So that is what it is to be an abstainer. But Lizzy, here is the good news . There is a way to be an abstainer and yet have those special treats. I tend not to do that , but only because I kind of like the hobby of not doing it, but I'll taste something here and there. But for most people they do want to have a sweet treat sometime. And there is a way to do it as an abstainer that works really, really well. And it's all about having a planned exception. So with a planned exception, you are planning something in advance , then you do it at the time just as you planned and then you look back on it with pleasure , but that is it. It's an exception. You haven't broken your streak. You've kept your streak. Right. So your streak is still going. This is a planned exception. So could you have birthday cake with your daughter? Yes, you could. You could say, hey, my daughter's birthday is next month. I'm gonna have a big piece of her carrot cake birthday cake. That's her favorite flavor. That's my favorite flavor. I'm gonna have a piece. It's gonna be great. And you have that and you love that. Now, the next day, there's leftover birthday cake in the fridge. Do you eat it? No, you do not, right? Because this is, I'm having a piece of birthday cake to celebrate my daughter's birthday. Oh, I'm at my favorite restaurant and they have amazing carrot cake. It's exactly the kind of carrot cake we serve to my daughter. Do I get a piece ? No, I do not, because it is not the special birthday cake for my daughter's birthday. There's a planned exception. It covers a one time thing , and then you go right back and you haven't broken the streak. This is part of the way that it's set up. You have your streak and within your streak, you have your planned exceptions, but they have to be very limited. So it's not something like every Sunday or whenever somebody makes chocolate chip cookies or something like that. It has to be something that you really are planning and then you really enjoy it. So it's like it's our anniversary, it's New Year's Day, whatever , but it can't be something like it's the holiday season. Yes, right and go vastly awry . People go from Thanksgiving to like january second . That's not a planned exception. It has to be something that is truly special . And it's not something that you decide in the moment because if you decide in the moment, that's impulsivity. And if you're being impulsive, you're not keeping your word to yourself. You want to keep your word to yourself. With the planned exception , you're planning it. This is part of your plan . And it's part of your plan and it serves your plan because it's hard to say, I'm never gonna eat sugar again and maybe that'll mean that you just don't do it at all. This way, you have your cake and eat it too. You have your cake and you don't eat it too , right? And you could set this up anyway, well like our father had a grandchild exception. If there was a grandchild who was eating ice cream, baking cookies, giving brownies, he would do it. Yes. But then all the other time basically, he didn't. Yes. But how often was a grandchild standing there with a cupcake in her hand? Not that often. And so that grand exception worked for him. And I think this works really well with Obligers because it sounds like Lizzie's doing really well with the streaks . Yes. Streaks often work really well. So this is a way to have your streak, but also have those plans exception. This comes up a lot with moderators and abstainers . So anybody who wants to weigh in, please do because I think this is something that's really interesting for a lot of people. Yes. Okay, Gretchen, now we have a question for listeners . Yes. Now this relates to a different framework, a different set of distinctions for me, which is the four tenancies. And again, if you don't know your tendency, go to GretchenRubin. com and you can look at the quiz and find out if you're an upholder or a question or you're rebel and learn all about the four tendencies . This is a call about rebels. If you are a rebel or you've been dealing with a rebel, what works? Rebels, what works for you in terms of getting yourself to do something, getting yourself to do something you don't really feel like doing? How do you manage that? If you're dealing with a rebel, whether at home or at work or in life , how have you found ways to work with them successfully and effectively? How do you communicate with them so you don't ignite the spirit of resistance? How do you set things up in a way that makes sense to them? Rebel is an incredibly powerful tendency, but it's more different from the other three tendencies. And so I really want to focus in on the rebel experience and explore that. So I would love to hear what people have to say. Yes. 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