The Practices

This is Nothing Better as a rule of life: a few practices for each day, each week and each season, built around the five gifts.

The practices here are examples. Adopt them as they stand, then adapt: cross out what does not hold and write in what does. Keep it small. One practice per gift is enough to begin.

Three Rhythms

Most rules of life run on daily and weekly practices, with a periodic review. This one reviews each season.

Daily: Small practices that take a few minutes and no planning, the kind you can keep in a hard week.
Weekly: One regular practice per gift, on the same day each week. Most of the rule lives here.
Seasonal: Four times a year, at the turn of the season, a longer look back: what has moved, what has stalled, which force has been running you. Revise the rule then, not in the middle of a bad day.

Each Day: How You See

An unseen gift stays wrapped. So the rule begins with attention, and attention is a 2-minute practice, morning or evening, with coffee or without.

Four questions, one per lens.

MaterialWhat is in my hands today, and have I actually looked at it?
PhysicalWhat is my body telling me that I have been overriding?
RelationalWho is in front of me that I have been treating as scenery?
EmotionalWhat am I carrying that I have not named?

Friends in chairs around a backyard fire with mugs in their hands; one man, still in his work shirt, has loosened a red tie.

Feast with Friends

Meaning is shared at the table.

Daily: Eat one meal at the table, not at a desk, with your phone in another room.
Weekly: A regular meal with friends, the same night each week, or Saturday breakfast with the kids.
Seasonal: Host one bigger gathering: a birthday, a holiday, the first cookout of summer.

Yours

Two men carrying a wooden dresser up a flight of steps, a red strap around it.

Do Some Good

Burn your calories for good.

Daily: Finish one task all the way, then stop work at a set hour.
Weekly: Do something for someone who can't pay you back: give them a ride, help them move, fix something next door.
Seasonal: Take on one project for your house or your neighborhood.

Yours

A couple on a couch on a weeknight, his arm around her, the television off and a red phone face down on the table.

Enjoy Your Partner

Take joy in the person you chose and the life you are building together.

Daily: Ask your partner something real, like “What was the best part of your day?”, and listen to the whole answer. A hug or a hand on the shoulder, just because.
Weekly: An evening or a walk together with no phones and no planning talk.
Seasonal: Plan something together: a trip, a new tradition, a project around the house.

Yours

Four people at a table in the middle of a meal, with one more place set and a red plate waiting at it.

Share Your Stuff

Use what you have for others' good.

Daily: Use something good you've been saving: the good dishes, the good coffee.
Weekly: Give something: an hour, a skill, an introduction, a meal, money.
Seasonal: Go through the closets and the garage, and give away what hasn't been used in a year.

Yours

A man in a coat stepping through a puddle in the rain, smiling, his red umbrella closed in his hand.

Opt for Joy

In whatever you're facing, choose joy.

Daily: When the day offers a choice, pick the one with more joy in it: lunch outside, the long way home. Before bed, remember one good thing from the day.
Weekly: A walk without your phone, or a game with someone, just for fun.
Seasonal: Look back at the season. What crowded out joy? Choose one small thing to do differently.
Whatever you’re facing: If the calendar is full, spend one gap between things outside. If the load is heavy, notice one good thing inside the hardest task. If the days are chaotic, stop three times today and look around. If you have time and nothing seems to matter, pick one gift and do the smallest version of it.

Yours

Each Week: Five Words

Feast. Work. Love. Give. Rejoice.

Five gifts, five fingers. Once a week, on the same day, count them on one hand: Feast. Work. Love. Give. Rejoice. For each one, ask what you already have in hand. Then ask which one was missing this week, and make room for it next week.

Each Season: Why So Serious

Ten forces ruin play: seriousness, discontentment, resentment, time, religion, family, self-protection, languishing, atrophy, control. Some of them look like virtues. Most people are run by two or three of them at a time.

At the turn of each season, name yours. Not all ten: the two or three that have been passing for your best qualities. Then refuse them in small ways, one moment at a time, and reach for one of the gifts in their place: the meal instead of the late night at the desk, the walk instead of the worry.

When the Rule Breaks

It will. A diagnosis, a funeral, a quarter that takes over the calendar. Find the one gift still within reach, and keep that one until the others come back. This is not the rule failing. This is what it was written for.

Writing Your Own

Keep the whole rule on one page, short enough to keep in a hard week.

Keep the practices above for one season before changing any. At the turn of the season, reread What Is Nothing Better? first, so the practices stay tied to the gifts and don't turn into a to-do list or a productivity system. Then cross out what did not hold and write in what did.

When you revise, ask one question of each practice: did it bring any joy this season? Keep the ones that did.

Download The Practices (PDF, 3 pages)