In partnership with
Longevity Isn’t Complicated
Welcome to Effective Habits, a weekly newsletter where I share evidence-based strategies and tools to help you live a happy, healthy, and productive life.
Today at a Glance:
22 Happiness Hacks I Wish I Knew at 22
The Key to Longevity Is Boring
The 4 Quarters Technique
“Let everything happen to you: Beauty and terror. Just keep going. No feeling is final.”
22 Happiness Hacks I Wish I Knew at 22
Sahil Bloom
🔦Lights, Camera, ...
Happiness is often framed as something to achieve quickly or optimize relentlessly, but research and lived experience suggest a different starting point: it’s less about speed and more about direction. Insights from happiness science emphasize that well-being comes from orienting your life toward what genuinely matters—values, relationships, purpose—rather than racing toward external milestones. Moving slowly in the right direction tends to be far more fulfilling than making rapid progress toward goals that don’t truly fit. With that perspective in mind, the ideas that follow aren’t shortcuts to constant joy, but practical principles meant to help people, especially early in adulthood, choose a truer path and stay aligned with it over time.
🎬Action!
Happiness is not a destination but a direction. Regularly check whether your choices align with your values and the people you want to share life with, rather than how quickly you’re advancing.
Choose happiness over the need to be exceptional. Notice when you’re trading meaningful time and relationships for status, recognition, or extra work, and consciously rebalance toward what actually brings fulfillment.
Document your parents’ stories while you still can. Have conversations with them about their childhoods, adventures, fears, hopes, and dreams because your time with them is finite.
Say exactly what you mean. No one can read your mind, so express your needs, feelings, and expectations directly to avoid unnecessary misunderstandings.
Express appreciation to your partner every day. Make it a daily habit to name one specific thing you value or admire about them, and say it out loud.
Treat conflicts as a shared problem to solve together. Frame disagreements as “we versus the issue” rather than “me versus you” to foster collaboration instead of defensiveness.
Build identity capital early through memorable experiences. In your 20s and 30s, pursue experiences you’ll be proud to talk about later, knowing they’ll shape who you are and support future opportunities.
Show up with presence, not solutions, when someone is struggling. When a loved one is in pain, prioritize simply being there and letting them know they’re not alone. Advice, perspectives, or offers to help are often minimally impactful.
Voice kind thoughts immediately instead of saving them. When you think something positive about someone, tell them right away rather than waiting for a special moment that may never come.
Stop trying to be interesting and focus on being interested. Shift your attention away from impressing others and toward genuine curiosity. Ask thoughtful questions, listen closely, and engage deeply. Interest in others is what ultimately makes you interesting.
The Key to Longevity Is Boring
Brad Stulberg
🔦Lights, Camera, ...
The modern obsession with longevity has turned health into a noisy maze of biohacks, supplements, gadgets, and rigid protocols, all promising control over aging while quietly draining time, money, and attention. Yet the evidence has been consistent for decades: long, healthy lives are built on a handful of unglamorous fundamentals—regular exercise, quality sleep, nutritious food, not smoking, limited alcohol, and strong relationships. Large studies show these habits add years to life and, more importantly, keep those years largely free of disability, while loneliness and social isolation meaningfully increase the risk of early death. This simplicity doesn’t sell well in an influencer economy that profits from complexity and fear, but it works. Like elite performance in sport or craft, health isn’t about exotic routines or quick fixes, it’s about executing the basics well, consistently, over time. The real risk today isn’t missing the perfect protocol, it’s becoming so fixated on extending life that we forget to actually live it. The best approach is boring, proven, and freeing: focus on what matters, do it steadily, and don’t waste precious energy on the rest.
🎬Action!
Commit to the fundamentals consistently and ignore the rest. Choose a simple, evidence-based baseline—move your body regularly, eat nutritious food, get good quality sleep, avoid smoking, drink alcohol sparingly, and invest time in meaningful relationships—and execute it steadily over years, not weeks, while ignoring trendy biohacks that add complexity with little to no benefit.
The 4 Quarters Technique
Sahil Bloom
🔦Lights, Camera, ...
Most days don’t fall apart all at once. They unravel gradually, usually after one small slip that convinces us the whole day is “ruined.” The Four Quarters Technique, popularized by Gretchen Rubin, offers a simple but powerful reframing: instead of treating the day as one fragile block, think of it as four distinct quarters—morning, midday, afternoon, and evening—each with its own fresh start. Miss a workout, waste an hour scrolling, or derail your plans early on? You haven’t failed the day; you’ve only lost one quarter. This mental reframe reduces all-or-nothing thinking, lowers guilt, and makes it easier to recover momentum instead of postponing progress until “tomorrow.” By pairing a bit of structure with built-in forgiveness, the Four Quarters Technique turns every day into multiple opportunities to reset, re-engage, and end stronger than you started.
🎬Action!
Divide your day into four quarters. Mentally split your waking hours into four roughly equal blocks—morning, midday, afternoon, and evening—so the day feels like a series of manageable segments rather than one all-or-nothing stretch.
Assign a clear focus to each quarter. Decide in advance what kind of activities belong in each segment (for example: deep work, movement, social time, or recovery) to give each quarter a purpose.
Treat each quarter as a reset point. If one quarter goes off the rails, deliberately let it go and recommit at the start of the next quarter instead of writing off the entire day.
Plan lightly, not rigidly. Use the quarters to create gentle structure, not a minute-by-minute schedule, leaving room for real life to happen without breaking the system.
TOOL TIP
One Sec: A screen time app that adds a mandatory pause, like a deep breath or a moment of reflection, before you can open distracting apps, helping to break mindless scrolling habits and increase awareness of your phone usage by creating friction to reduce automatic usage.
FUN FACT
In the deep sea, male anglerfish don’t just mate – they fuse. The tiny males bite onto a much larger female and gradually dissolve into her body, leaving behind little more than a living sack of sperm she can use whenever she wants to lay eggs.
If you’ve found value in what I share, buying me a coffee is a great way to say “thanks” and help me keep doing what I love. Every bit of support helps me spend more time creating useful, thoughtful content for you. Thanks for being here—it means a lot! 🙏
Become An AI Expert In Just 5 Minutes
If you’re a decision maker at your company, you need to be on the bleeding edge of, well, everything. But before you go signing up for seminars, conferences, lunch ‘n learns, and all that jazz, just know there’s a far better (and simpler) way: Subscribing to The Deep View.
This daily newsletter condenses everything you need to know about the latest and greatest AI developments into a 5-minute read. Squeeze it into your morning coffee break and before you know it, you’ll be an expert too.
Subscribe right here. It’s totally free, wildly informative, and trusted by 600,000+ readers at Google, Meta, Microsoft, and beyond.
If you enjoyed today's newsletter, please share it with your friends and family!
If this email was forwarded to you, consider subscribing to receive them in future!
What'd you think of today's edition?
Disclaimer: The information provided in this newsletter is for informational purposes only and is not intended as medical advice. Please consult a medical professional for advice, diagnosis, or treatment. We are not liable for any risks or issues that may arise from using this information.
