The Joy in Business summary

So how do you make the House of Glad your primary place of residence? Well, to play on the house metaphor some more, you’ve got to pay your RENT! That’s an acronym for Rest, Exercise, Nutrition and Thoughts. To live a happy life, you’ve got to maintain healthy habits in all four of these areas. In this blink, we’ll focus on rest. Then we’ll look at the other areas. 

Now, when we talk about rest, we’re not just talking about getting enough sleep. Rest is anything that helps you refresh yourself. Regardless of how much sleep you get, you could probably use some more refreshment throughout the day. Here are two quick ways to get it. 

Now we come to the letter E of the RENT you need to pay to live in the House of Glad: exercise. If that word sends shivers down your spine, don’t worry. This blink isn’t going to be about trying to get you to run a 5K on a daily basis. 

On the contrary, it’s about recognizing that setting lofty exercise objectives like these can be counterproductive. That’s because it takes a lot of planning and dedication to achieve them. For example, you’ve got to figure out a way to fit that 5K run into your busy day – perhaps by sleeping in your running clothes and doing it first thing in the morning.

Last but certainly not least, we come to the final letter of the RENT acronym: T for thoughts. This is arguably the most important component of the RENT we need to pay to live in the House of Glad. After all, if you don’t have healthy thoughts about rest, exercise and nutrition, you’re not going to be able to cover the first three parts of your RENT! They’re a prerequisite to getting everything else right. 

More broadly speaking, our thoughts shape our behaviors in general, so they’re crucial in all areas of our personal and professional lives. The more positive our thoughts are, the more positive our behaviors will be. Conversely, negative thoughts tend to lead to negative behaviors. 

Our next positive self-talk technique comes courtesy of a nineteenth-century French psychologist named Émile Coué. It’s called autosuggestion, also known as flooding. 

To do this, simply repeat the same positive statement over and over again – 20 times in a row, once in the morning and once at night. Try doing this every day for a month and see how it works out for you. Better yet, take it to the next level and also practice it during idle moments of the day, such as waiting in line or driving somewhere. 

To take up residence in the House of Glad, you’ll probably need to get yourself out of the House of Scared. Unfortunately, that’s where most of us tend to live. As we go through our days, we’re almost constantly troubled by our Worries, Anxieties and Fears – or WAFs, in short. 

So the question becomes, How do we say goodbye to our WAFs? Well, here’s yet another of the author’s acronyms to the rescue: PAR. That stands for Prevent, Acknowledge and Release. 

As we’ve seen, the language we use can have a powerful effect on us. And of course it can also have a major impact on other people in our lives. Just think about how much criticism can sting your ego or a compliment can lift your mood. Words can improve or injure our relationships – so let’s take a look at how we can use them to do more of the first and less of the second. 

Now, for many of us, giving critical feedback can be one of our main sticking points when communicating with colleagues, friends and family alike. It’s hard to deliver such feedback without hitting the sensitive spots of someone’s self-esteem too hard. Fortunately, there’s an easy-to-assemble tool that can soften the blow: the Velvet Hammer. 

We started these blinks by touring the four houses of emotion. Now we’re going to end them by surveying the four lands of personality. With this metaphor in hand, you’ll really be able to take your language game to the next level! 

To start off, imagine four countries. Each one represents a different personality type, which is defined by a different motivation. First, there’s the “Land of Social” people. Their motivation is to be accepted and noticed by the people around them. Then, there’s the “Land of Factual” people. They’re obsessed with accuracy. Next, there’s the “Land of Driven” people. Their focus is on winning. And finally, there’s the “Land of Helpful” people. They’re all about giving a hand.