Gretchen Rubin: Advice for Making Outdoor Time Better via Life in 5 Senses (Gretchen Rubin, happiness researcher and author)

What would you find if you spent your outdoor time focused on experiencing life through your five senses? I don’t mean just soaking in the great outdoors by seeing, hearing, smelling, touching and tasting, but by adding an intentional focus to explore what each of them adds.

That’s a question New York Times best-selling author Gretchen Rubin asks through her new book Life In Five Senses and is actively exploring through her own one-year outdoor challenge that she’s shared with listeners of her Happier With Gretchen Rubin podcast.

In this episode Gretchen sits down to chat with us about all things five senses, outdoor habits, what you find by doing the same thing every day -- whether that be going outside of visiting a museum -- and how you can use your five senses to make your life even happier. Listen now.

Connect with this episode:

Read Life in 5 Senses (affiliate link)

Visit Gretchen’s website

Follow Gretchen on Instagram

Follow Gretchen on Facebook

Join the Humans Outside Challenge

Follow Humans Outside on Instagram

Follow Humans Outside on Facebook

Some of the good stuff:

[3:05] Gretchen Rubin’s favorite outdoor space

[4:10] How Gretchen became someone who likes to go outside

[6:35] The problem of things taking effort

[8:47] Why Gretchen started her Life in 5 Senses project

[11:33] Does she still go to this place every day?

[11:38] How that practice is like a sit spot

[14:40] The freedom (and challenge) of doing something every day

[18:28] Gretchen’s favorite sense and how her experiment impacted it

[19:41] What do we lose when we ignore our senses?

[22:27] All about Gretchen’s daily outdoor project

[24:15] The difference between a chore and recess outside

[27:00] Why the freedom to choose your own rules is important (and hard)

[30:13] The inspiration for Gretchen’s project

[33:17] How her five sense are influencing her outdoor project

[36:19] Personal habits that make her outdoor time better

[40:21] Gretchen’s favorite outdoor moment