Better Than Before by Gretchen Rubin

Better Than Before by Gretchen Rubin is a book that I've had sitting on my Kindle for a long time now.  When I first saw that a book existed that might help me become better at forming habits, I jumped to buy it, and then, characteristically, did not manage my time well enough to read it right away.  Typical.

Anyway, I've read it now, and I can say that there are some fantastic tips in here to help people form new habits and get their lives on track.  The book is divided into several sections, each focusing on a different aspect of habit formation.  These sections include, "Self-Knowledge," "Pillars of Habits," "The Best Time to Begin," "Desire, Ease and Excuses," and "Unique, Just Like Everyone Else." Reading through each chapter will lead you through the process of forming habits based around your personality, sticking to them until they become automatic, avoiding the pitfalls of giving up, and treating yourself when things go right.

One part of this guide that I completely agree with is Rubin's assertion that people function in different ways, and your own personality type should be taken into account when planning to start a new habit.  I especially enjoyed her theory of the Four Tendencies, in which Rubin divides up the world into four main types of people: Upholders, who respond favorably to outer and inner expectations, Questioners, who question all expectations and meet only the ones they can logically justify, Obligers, who respond favorably to outer expectations, but tend to let inner expectations slide, and Rebels, who resist all expectations.

I, without a doubt, am a textbook Upholder under this model. I enjoy making and following rules, I frequently set personal and professional goals, I love making to-do lists and hate making mistakes or letting people down. I tend to struggle with sticking to some habits because I try to do too much and burn out. I expect a lot of myself and get disappointed when things don't turn out perfectly. I learned while reading that my tendency type means that I need to structure less ambitious habits sometimes, forgive myself when I get off track, and start things NOW, instead of putting off new habits in the name of "research," or "waiting for the perfect day to start."

I also learned why my husband and I often clash and become bad influences on each other when we try to form new habits together - he is a classic Questioner.  I stick to rules to a fault, while he won't buy into anything he doesn't see the point of merely for structure's sake, and has no problem changing a practice that he no longer sees the benefit of. We are different people, and as such, we have to try and form habits in ways that work for us as individuals.  I had never really thought of forming habits in this way before.

After explaining how the different tendencies affect behavior, Rubin goes on to give tips for sticking to habits, what to do when the urge to make excuses or quit a habit arises, and how to judge whether it's time to give up a habit.  Every point she makes is thoroughly researched and backed up with statistics or anecdotes. My head is swimming with everything I read in this guide, and I need to go back and take some notes to make sure I don't lose any important details. I related strongly to many of the assertions that Rubin makes throughout this book, and I feel like a more serious study of it would yield many benefits. There's some really good stuff in here, and it helps that I match almost all of Rubin's tendencies and personality traits.  We are basically the same person. It might not be possible to reach nirvana with to-do lists, copious amounts of research, and neatly organized file folders, but gosh darn it, we're going to try!

Much like with Rubin's other self-improvement book, The Happiness Project, I want to soak all of her points in and remodel little pieces of my life. Better Than Before is a wonderful resource to jump start the process of pulling yourself together and creating the time for things that really matter to you.  As Rubin says, perfection isn't the end goal here, the goal is to be better than you were before, and this book will definitely help you take the first steps.