“Do I need fifty finger-painted pictures by my toddler, or is one enoug...” — Gretchen Rubin Quote

Do I need fifty finger-painted pictures by my toddler, or is one enough to capture this time of life? Mementos work best when they're carefully chosen - and when they don't take up much room!

They say that people teach what they need to learn. By adopting the role of happiness teacher, if only for myself, I was trying to find the method to conquer my particular faults and limitations.

Many people keep photos in their homes, in their office, or in their wallet, and happy families tend to display large numbers of photos at home. In 'Happier at Home,' I write about my 'shrine to my family' made of photographs.

Being taken for granted is an unpleasant but sincere form of praise. Ironically, the more reliable you are, and the less you complain, the more likely you are to be taken for granted.

Yet, it ought to be obvious that good music generally occupies a higher plane that mere politics. Great writers can express moods through melody and capture experiences we share most powerfully - love, lust, longing; joy, rage, fear; triumph, yearning and confusion.

You are forced to have the best data capture, the best information, when you have goods in hundreds of factories around the world, and the question is: 'Where is everything?' And how do you bring it all together?

If you can write a catchy melody and a song that captures people around the world, what better thing to do? Other than 'Let Her Go,' I haven't managed to do that. And that's fine by me.

We had this idea, and I think a lot of people did going in, that you can make some short film and it's going to get industry attention and that's going to be your thing. And it was only later on at school that we realized that's very rare that a short film is going to capture the attention of anyone.