The High 5 Habit: Take Control of Your Life with One Simple Habit

Robbins opens with an anecdote describing how she began practicing the high-five habit in her own life. One morning, during a moment of overwhelming stress and self-criticism, she spontaneously gave herself a high-five in the bathroom mirror. This simple gesture unexpectedly lifted her spirits and marked the beginning of what would become a transformative daily practice.

Robbins contextualizes the power of high-fives by drawing on her experience running the 2001 New York City Marathon just two months after the September 11 attacks. Despite being undertrained and physically unprepared, she completed the race, and she credits this to the constant encouragement and high-fives she received from strangers lining the course. For Robbins, this experience demonstrates how external validation and celebration can fuel perseverance and achievement. She argues that high-fives represent far more than casual gestures—rather, they constitute a “transfer of energy and belief from one person to another” (5), and this awakens inner strength and reminds individuals of their capabilities.

The chapter’s central thesis emerges from this parallel: If external encouragement through high-fives can enable extraordinary achievements, then self-administered encouragement should produce similar results in daily life. Robbins challenges readers to examine their relationship with themselves, pointing out the stark disparity between how readily most people celebrate others versus how harshly they treat themselves.