Make the dull task fun: temptation bundling and turning discipline into a game
October 21, 2026 · 20 min read
Katy Milkman's temptation bundling and her advice to make structure fun, Mel Robbins' step of making a goal fun and easy, and Rob Dyrdek's gamifying of discipline with data all argue that enjoyment is something you can design into necessary work. Pairing a chore with something you like, or turning it into a game, keeps people going where willpower alone runs out.
The rules, numbers and steps worth keeping in front of you.
- Milkman, citing Fishbach and Woolley: people who pick the most enjoyable route to a goal persist longer than those who pick the most efficient one.
- Temptation bundling (Milkman): allow yourself a pleasure, like a gripping audiobook, only while doing the chore you avoid.
- Milkman's large randomized controlled trials found that teaching people to temptation bundle improves exercise.
- Milkman: smokers who deposited money they would forfeit on a failed nicotine test had a 30% higher quit rate.
- Milkman: inviting people to save $5 a day instead of $150 a month produced about five times more sign-ups.
- Milkman: set a tough goal with a few emergency passes so one slip doesn't trigger the what-the-hell effect; rigidity is the enemy of habit.
- Robbins: do about a week of consistent reps first, then ask how to make them fun and easy.
- Robbins: take decisions out with phone alarms, sticky notes, clothes laid out, Sunday-night planning and the first step left where you can't miss it.
- Robbins: in one exercise study, 91% of those who wrote down when and where they'd exercise did it, about double the other groups.
- Robbins: success is defined by the day you return after slipping.
- Dyrdek: score each day 0 to 10 on life, work and health and track your habits; he says discipline and quality of life move together.
- Dyrdek: if a task drains energy, master it, automate it or outsource it.
- Check significant exercise, diet or weight changes with a doctor or qualified professional.
This is the short form. The full insight has every expert's reasoning, their own words and the sources.