Rosalyn Engelman was just 15 when she met her future husband, Irwin, she says. That was in 1953.

The two were set up by a mutual friend, and when Irwin, then 19, came to pick her up at her family’s home in the Bronx, “I certainly had not dated anyone like the tall, dark, handsome man in a navy-blue suit with a briefcase who came to my door,” she says.

“He looked like a movie star.” Irwin took her out for a movie and milkshake, and by the end of the night, they were falling in love, she says. After three years of dating, the two got married in November 1956.

In their nearly 70 years together, they had two daughters, stood side by side through life-threatening illnesses, traveled the world, and built their careers. Irwin worked as a CFO at companies like Xerox, and Engelman was a painter and mixed media artist whose work has been displayed all over the world, she says.

They now live at the Apsley, an assisted living facility in Manhattan.

For couples seeking tips on how to stay happily together for decades, here’s Engelman’s advice.

For Engelman, it really comes down to one piece of advice: “Try to understand the other person,” she says.

That can come into play in many ways.

If your spouse sometimes prioritizes their work, for example, put yourself in their shoes. “I never resented his time that he worked hard,” she says, “and I don’t think he resented the fact that I was covered in paint.”

Try to get interested in their hobbies as well. “He liked opera more, I learned to like opera,” she says. “I like classical music most, he learned to love classical music.”

Finally, understanding each other can also mean forgiving each other during mishaps, large or small. Engelman remembers the first time she tried to cook the two of them dinner. She decided on Brussels sprouts, hot dogs, and corn. And the dinner did not come out as she planned. The Brussels sprouts tasted like rubber, she says.

Irwin was not angry. Instead, “we just started laughing and went out for pizza,” she says. That’s the kind of mutual understanding that can keep a relationship strong.

Want to improve your communication, confidence and success at work? Take CNBC’s new online course, Master Your Body Language To Boost Your Influence.

As language and public speaking experts, usually we talk about the specific words and phrases you can use to influence others — ways to get people on board with your ideas, or to view you as a leader.

But there’s more to communication than just talking. Nonverbal cues can be just as powerful, and sometimes even more persuasive than what you say.

So how can you earn respect and influence people without being overbearing or pushy? Here are 10 subtle tricks that can tip the scale in your favor.

Studies have found that people tend to think more positively about people they’ve helped out in some way. Behavioral scientists call this the Benjamin Franklin effect, after Franklin wrote about borrowing a rare book from a political rival — who later became a supporter.

Even minor requests, like asking if someone has a phone number or if you can borrow a pen, can increase goodwill and openness toward you.

This is a variation on the Benjamin Franklin effect, and is often called the Ladder of Engagement or Foot in the Door Technique. You ask someone for a small favor and they comply. Then you ask for something larger, and they comply again because they’re already committed to helping you. 

Leaders often use this approach to build momentum and alignment without forcing compliance.

People like to think they’re making decisions, that they’re not being steamrolled. So it’s a good idea to give them the feeling that they’re in control by offering them choices instead of saying a blunt “here’s what I want you to do.”

By allowing someone to choose between acceptable alternatives, you reduce resistance and increase cooperation. The decision feels voluntary, not imposed.

Leaders don’t feel the need to fill every second with conversation. They pause and let the other person wait and wonder. This can be especially effective when you’re negotiating something.

The silence often prompts the other person to start talking and, often, give more information than they intended just to banish the silence. 

Strong leaders don’t feel the need to fill every moment with noise. Silence creates space, and often prompts the other person to keep talking.

This is especially effective in negotiations. People frequently reveal more information than they intended simply to escape the discomfort of silence.

Silence can also take the form of brief pauses before you respond. Waiting two or three seconds signals that you’ve listened carefully and are considering your answer, which builds trust and goodwill.

Research also shows that pausing every 20 seconds or so helps maintain attention and engagement.

Our brains can only hold a limited amount of information at once — roughly four key ideas. Long explanations dilute your message.

Aim to speak in concise bursts: one or two sentences at a time, ideally under 30 seconds. Clear, focused statements are easier to follow and more persuasive.

If someone challenges you, resist the urge to match their energy. Staying calm and refusing to escalate is often the fastest way to regain control of the conversation.

When you don’t engage in back-and-forth conflict, the other person’s argument often loses steam on its own — and you come across as confident rather than defensive.

Persuasive communication depends not only on what you say, but how you say it. Numerous studies show that people perceive speakers as more confident when they speak firmly, keep their pitch relatively low, and end sentences with a falling intonation.

Speed matters, too. Linguists have found that speaking too slowly can make you seem disengaged or dull, while speaking too quickly may make you appear nervous or untrustworthy. A moderate pace strikes the right balance.

You’ve probably heard that nodding when someone else is talking can make them think more favorably of you (because you’re showing that you’re listening and interested). But it’s also a great idea to nod when you’re doing the talking.

It sends a subconscious message to the person listening to you: Agree with me. What I’m saying is right. And there’s another interesting side benefit: Nodding when you’re speaking increases your own self-confidence in your message.

It’s a variation on the old “leave them wanting more” concept. When you close down the conversation before the other person, you leave in charge … and you make them wonder what else you didn’t say. 

Kathy and Ross Petras are the brother-and-sister co-authors of the New York Times bestseller You’re Saying It Wrong, along with other popular language books, and co-hosts of the award-winning NPR syndicated radio show and podcast ”You’re Saying It Wrong.” They’ve also been featured in media outlets including The New York Times, The Chicago Tribune, The Washington Post and Harvard Business Review. Follow them on Bluesky.

Want to give your kids the ultimate advantage? Sign up for CNBC’s new online course, How to Raise Financially Smart Kids. Learn how to build healthy financial habits today to set your children up for greater success in the future.

Stephanie Harrison spent so much of her life trying to get it “right,” chasing the right schools, the right job, the right apartment and the right achievements that would give her life a sense of meaning.

But in 2013, she was struggling. “I was unbearably lonely. I had daily panic attacks, developed a stress-induced autoimmune disease, and felt an overwhelming sense of hopelessness almost every day,” she writes in “New Happy: Getting Happiness Right in a World That’s Got It Wrong.”

At her lowest moment, she got curious about why happiness seemed to be eluding her — and realized she was following the wrong playbook. She started making changes in her life: moving cities, studying happiness, and cultivating new relationships, including one with the man she fell in love with, Alex. 

When Alex became ill, Harrison took on the role of full-time caregiver. “It was shocking to compare my 2013 self, who had everything going ‘right’ and yet felt lost, miserable, and isolated,” she writes, “to my 2018 self, who had everything going ‘wrong’ and yet felt far more peace, joy, and purpose.”

Harrison attributes this to throwing out what she calls “Old Happy” and embracing “New Happy,” the philosophy she lays out in her book.

CNBC Make It chose “New Happy” as our February book club pick because we know our readers, like Harrison, are searching for happiness as well as success.

Here are some key takeaways ahead of Wednesday’s discussion in our private LinkedIn group (you can join the group here, then drop your questions for Harrison in the comments of this post).

So many of us craft our lives around the idea that happiness comes from things like perfection, material gain, fame and acclaim, and achievement at all costs.

According to Harrison, there are three pillars that Old Happy culture relies on to thrive:

• Individualism: the idea that you don’t need other people and you have to go it alone
• Capitalism: the idea that you must be successful, and your value is based on your work  
• Domination: the idea that you need to compete and win, and that some people are better than others 

Old Happy is “like the mythical three-headed Hydra monster,” Harrison writes, “snapping at you to isolate yourself, work harder and harder, and prove your worth.” 

One of the biggest lies that Old Happy tells us, Harrison explains, is that the pursuit of extrinsic goals and external approval — popularity, conformity, financial success, aesthetic beauty — is the key to happiness. 

But at the end of the day, Harrison writes. “What makes us happy is acting in alignment with our true selves.”

New Happy is all about the cultivation of intrinsic goals that are aligned with your internal value system, such as taking care of yourself, learning to love yourself, and building community with others. 

Three of the most important questions you can ask yourself are: “Who am I?” “What should I do?” and “How am I related to others?”

Harrison recalls people often asking her if running her company, The New Happy, was too much alongside caregiving, but she actually felt the opposite. 

“It was my lifeline, refueling me, giving me meaning, and connecting me to others,” she writes. “The more I gave, the more I personally received in return. I am certain that I would not have survived those difficult years without it. I am so grateful that I didn’t wait until life was better. If I had, I would still be waiting, and I would have missed out on so much joy.”

When someone is in need, there are two chances for joy and happiness: one for the person who needs help, and one for the person who is helping them. 

“Human beings do not possess a finite amount of love, compassion, and support. If you ask someone for love, you are not draining them of their limited supply. People are not oil wells. Care is not a nonrenewable resource,” she explains. “Asking for help gives someone else a chance to be of service and, therefore, to experience happiness.”

Harrison says she used to describe her experience as “I am a young caregiver for a sick partner who had a mysterious degenerative disease that no doctor understood or could help with.” That perspective was a lonely and isolating one.

But one day, she says, “I started describing my pain in a new way: ’I am a person who has been affected by a devastating illness.” That expansion led to greater connection. There were so many people in her sphere who’d supported a friend or loved one through illness. 

“Finally I went even bigger: ’I am a person who has gone through pain,” Harrison recalls. “In opening up to ways in which our pain connects us, we are able to tap into another level of compassion for ourselves and others,” she writes. “Connection makes our pain bearable.”

One of the biggest ways to find happiness, Harrison says, is to figure out what your gifts are and share them widely. If you’re struggling to figure out what your talents are, Harrison recommends asking yourself a few key questions.

• “What did my seven-year-old self love?” Whether it was a subject in school, or a book or film, regardless of how impractical it might seem, write it down. 
• “Who leads a life that excites me?” Borrow their schedule and see how it might feel to be the person who you look at and think “Wow, I can’t believe they get to wake up every morning and do that.
• “What is something I love and feels like it comes easy to me that other people might dislike or struggle with?”

Then reach out to five to 10 people who know you — family, friends, colleagues, or neighbors. Ask them “What do you think my unique talents are?” or “When have you seen me most alive?” 

Old Happy thrives on the lie that just one hero is coming to save us and change the world. New Happy is built on everyone coming together to share their valuable and transformative gifts. 

“Making our world better is not a soloist task. It is an orchestral one,” Harrison writes. “Our orchestra is incomplete without you,” she writes. “We need you to play the part that only you can play.” 

So how can you do that? Harrison recommends looking to the inspiring stories of others, and seeing how they lead by example, fight for what they believe is right, reject the way that things have always been done, build hope and community, embrace their biggest challenges, and work to achieve their dreams through small, incremental actions.

Then join them.

Ready to dive in? Start reading, request to join our LinkedIn group, and come chat with us and Harrison on Wednesday, March 4, at 12 p.m. ET, at our next CNBC Make It Book Club discussion. 

Any questions for the author? Drop them in the comments of this LinkedIn post (you’ll need to join our private group first, which you can do here). Or email them to us in advance at askmakeit@cnbc.com, using the subject line “Question for Stephanie Harrison.”

Have suggestions for future picks? Send them to us at askmakeit@cnbc.com, using the subject line “Make It book club suggestion.”

Leslie Edelman has run Tiny Doll House, a miniature figurine shop in New York’s Upper East Side neighborhood, for 35 years. Eighteen months ago, new clientele started routinely coming to the store, he says.

In addition to Edelman’s regulars — parents, grandparents and collectors — groups of 20-somethings now flock to the store on Saturday afternoons. They giggle among themselves, text furiously and buy tiny Labubu keychains, Pez dispensers and mock Eames chairs. Some tell Edelman, “I’ve seen you on TikTok,” he says.

“There’s a hell of a lot of picture-taking,” says Edelman, a 75-year-old lifelong New Yorker.

Business owners like Edelman say they’ve noticed a shift in consumer behavior: Gen Zers increasingly seeking out and spending money on old-school hobbies and habits in an effort to get more offline. For small businesses that sell tactile, nostalgic products and services — like rotary phones, needlepoint kits or embroidery services — average shopper age is down and revenue is up, from extant and new customers alike, some owners say.

DON’T MISS: How to read people and master your body language to be more influential at work

Craft-based activities and retro-style in-person experiences have steadily gained in popularity since the Covid-19 pandemic, says Marni Shapiro, a co-founder and managing partner of research and consulting firm The Retail Tracker. Specifically, physical products related to offline hobbies have hit a new sales peak this winter as the phrase “going analog” achieved social media virality, she says.

Nearly three quarters of adults participated in a crafting project in 2025, up from 62% in 2019, according to Mintel research. The art and craft materials industry was valued at $23.56 billion in 2025, led by supply companies like Crayola and Faber-Castell, according to a Fortune Business Insights report.

“If we are going more and more digital and using more AI, the counter-trend is going to be very tactile,” Shapiro says. “Nostalgia, to me, is the single biggest [retail] trend out there. It’s not dying. It’s getting stronger.”

Louise Carmen, a Paris-based company, sells accessorized leather journals at two storefronts and online for up to €198.55 — or approximately $232.84 — before customizations. The brand reached a new American audience over the course of 2023, says founder Nathalie Valmary, after her daughter started filming bird’s-eye view TikTok videos of employees’ hands as they personalized leather notebooks with engravings, colorful cords and charms.

The videos racked up views, some surpassing 1 million, and roughly 60% of Louise Carmen’s online sales now ship to the U.S., says Valmary. Some Americans have even posted online about booking trans-Atlantic flights to buy the notebooks in Paris.

Political and economic uncertainty — like a turbulent job market, declining home ownership and the rising cost of living in the U.S. — tends to send people clamoring back toward the products, styles and experiences of their, or their parents’, childhoods, says Shapiro. Plus, the more time you spend scrolling on your phone, the more likely you are to engage with media about that uncertainty, so hobbies that keep idle hands busy are in increasingly high demand.

Journaling helps Valmary collect and reflect on her thoughts and be creative, she says. She suspects younger generations benefit even more from the practice. Gen Zers’ lives and experiences have been “exposed on social media, [posted] from them or their friends or their families, since they were very young,” she says. When handwriting in journals, “they don’t have to perform, they can just be honest.”

Part of “going analog” involves aesthetics, too: Nostalgic-looking products can be a fashion statement, says Camp Snap president Trevor George. His Redondo Beach, California-based company sells screen-free digital cameras that automatically apply film-mimicking filter effects to photos, ranging from $70 to $200 apiece. Since launching in late 2023, the brand has sold over 1 million cameras, George says.

The company’s sales were up by 350% at the end of last year compared to the same period in 2024, he says, and celebrities like Taylor Swift and Idris Elba have been spotted with Camp Snap products. “The smartphones a bit tired,” he says. “To be out with your friends or in a community and pull out this what looks like an old-school camera, but really has digital features, it’s kind of like a personal statement.”

Gen Z consumers are now between the ages of 14 and 29, meaning many are at an age where they want to explore their identity and have a little money to do so, says Peter Fader, a marketing professor who focuses on consumer behavior at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

In one sense, the generation’s affinity for analog products — or modernized versions of them — represents many Gen Zers’ oft-cited desire to resist the mainstream, Fader says. In other sense, they’re doing exactly the same thing as generations before them: “Going analog” isn’t all that different than millennials’ obsession with polaroid cameras and record players in the 2010s, says Fader.

Plenty of Gen Zers still post about their analog experiences online, which Fader says is evidence of modern technology’s convenience and deep roots in many people’s lives. But even going analog for a little while may help people discover new and rewarding hobbies that make their lives better, he says.

“This analog thing, I’m not going to say it’s a passing fad, because there will continue to be a fad with each generation … [but] I would not be betting big on a giant analog rebirth,” says Fader.

The popularity of any kind of nostalgia is bound to ebb and flow, Shapiro says. Edelman suspects his shop has survived for decades because people want physical items that can elicit strong memories, he says.

“People can create the living room they’ll never have,” Edelman says. He still remembers the first doll house he built for his niece decades ago, a pink Victorian-style mansion with white trim and tiny dark brown shingles. “I feel like there’s a warmth and a comfort in looking at these things, holding them.”

Conversions from euros to USD were done using the OANDA conversion rate of 1 euro to $1.18 USD on March 3, 2026.

Want to improve your communication, confidence and success at work? Take CNBC’s new online course, Master Your Body Language To Boost Your Influence.

People don’t like being caught off guard. Even the most accomplished professionals frequently ask me: “What do I do when I’m put on the spot?” They worry they’ll ramble, hedge, or get defensive.

As a workplace psychology expert and executive coach, I’ve spent the last 15 years showing leaders at companies like Google and Amazon how to communicate better. And I know that few things are more nerve-racking than speaking off the cuff.

Suddenly all eyes are on you and you have to think on your feet. Freeze up and you risk leaving the impression that you’re disorganized or unprepared. But stay composed, and you show that you can think clearly under pressure, which is a crucial element of executive presence.

Use these strategies to handle unexpected questions with poise and you’ll never be blindsided again. 

Your instinct might be to deflect (“I’m probably not the best person to comment”) or water down your response with qualifiers (“Well, I don’t really know about other departments, but I think maybe from what I’ve heard…”). Neither option instills confidence.

Instead, clearly define the boundaries of what you do know from the vantage point of your role, your past experience, or your access to information. This sounds far more authoritative and lets you contribute meaningfully without overstating your knowledge. 

You might say: 

• “From a graphic design perspective, I can say…”
• “Based on the three product implementations I’ve been part of…”
• “I have direct visibility into our conversations with client [X], so I can speak to…” 

When you’re caught off guard, asking a question in return can be a powerful move. It not only gives you a moment to gather your thoughts, but it can also provide you with concrete information to frame your response. 

Delivering your question with a curious tone ensures you’re seen as someone who listens carefully and thinks before they speak. 

You might say: 

• “Can you say more about what you’re specifically concerned about?”
• “Which part of this would be the most helpful to unpack?”
• “What’s making this top of mind right now?” 

The best communicators understand that most questions are really requests for one of three things: reassurance (“Is this under control?”), guidance (“What should I think about this?”), or action (“What do I need to do?”). 

When the head of operations asks about projections, for instance, they’re not looking for every assumption in your financial model. They want to know if they need to prepare their boss for bad news.

Try to gauge the underlying need and address it in your response. 

You might say: 

• “We’re on track to hit our targets for this month. I’ll reach out if anything changes.”
• “The way I see it, we have two options: [X] and [Y]. I recommend [X].”  
• “We go live on Monday, so your team can start planning around that.” 

Sometimes you don’t have the answer on the spot, and that’s okay. The key is to show how the delay benefits them, not that it reflects a gap in your knowledge or is evidence that you’re scrambling. 

You might say: 

• “Let me pull the data so I’m not working from memory. You deserve accurate numbers.”
• “I want to make sure I’m giving you a complete answer. Give me until Friday.” 
• “A quick reaction won’t do this justice. We can give you a much better strategy if we have a day to think it through.” 

Thinking on your feet is becoming more critical than ever. After all, anyone can sound somewhat articulate via email by using AI. Fair or not, people will increasingly judge your capabilities by how you respond in unscripted moments.

Melody Wilding, LMSW is an executive coach, human behavior professor, and author of ”Managing Up: How to Get What You Need from the People in Charge.” Get her free training, 5 Steps to Speak Like a Senior Leader, here. 

Want to be a successful, confident communicator? Take CNBC’s online course Become an Effective Communicator: Master Public Speaking. We’ll teach you how to speak clearly and confidently, calm your nerves, what to say and not say, and body language techniques to make a great first impression. Get started today.