Tag: Happiness

How to be happily unproductive

I’ve noticed that I don’t do all that much with my free time. I do mindless things like browse the internet and watch videos. I always link free time with relaxation so I disassociate myself from anything I perceive as work.

I’ve also noticed that this trend leads to more frustration that it’s meant to. I feel better when I’m making progress with work. However, it seems odd to exclaim I enjoy working instead of relaxing but that’s exactly what happens. Doing nothing constructive can be extremely boring and even tiring but I almost feel obligated to continue doing nothing with my free time because I don’t want it to become like work.

Being in the flow

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi has produced some great research on what makes people happy. He noticed that a surprising number of people are actually happier at work than during their free time despite saying they enjoyed their free time more.  In light of this, the solution for some is to either fill up their free time with more work or do nothing about it. Neither are ideal. One just leads to burnout and a build up of resentment towards it. The other doesn’t help change your position in any way.

Csikszentmihalyi says that being in a state of flow is what makes people happy. There are a few factors present when someone is in the flow.

  1. They’re completely focused on one activity
  2. They feel in control of what they’re doing
  3. It’s intrinsically rewarding
  4. They essentially lose their sense of time

All these factors point to a situation where you’re so focused on an activity you enjoy that you don’t have time to be frustrated with yourself. You feel relaxed because you’re living in the present and very mindful of what you’re doing.

Best of all: you’re happy. 

How to be in the flow

While you’ve probably experienced this feeling before, you might not know why it happens.

This chart shows what it takes for someone to be in the state of flow.

The difficulty level of the activity should match our perceived skill set. This means  it shouldn’t be so difficult that you feel like throwing a chair through your window. Nor should it be so easy that you could fall asleep at a moments notice.

People usually feel happier while actually doing something (even if it’s at work or while studying) because of a constructive environment. You’re more likely to be completely focused on a project you want to work on, than sifting through pictures of birds with arms.

Why free time can make us unhappy 

The reason why people can feel frustrated or unhappy with their free time is mainly because they don’t do anything with it.  If you spend all day refreshing YouTube, then you’l probably feel extremely unfulfilled. Boredom will rise at an alarming rate, time will disappear and ‘damn, where did the time go?’ will be exclaimed.

Being happily unproductive 

If you don’t feel like you enjoy your free time or have even found it draining (like I have!), here’s a list of a few things you could start doing:

Learn a new skill – There’s so much out there that can help you learn things for free or a small price. Online courses offered by websites such as Coursera, edX, Codecademy and Duolingo are fun and engaging. You don’t need to put pressure on yourself to complete them by a certain date.

Read a book – If you have a list of books that you’ve been meaning to get started with, actually do it. If not, there are over 800 new books published each day in the US. You’ll find something to read! Losing yourself in a good book is a perfect example of what it feels like to be in the flow.

Create something – At least try. It’s easy to dismiss this option because you’re ‘not a creative person’ but creativity is something that can be developed as well as anything else. Write, draw, make music or even build something! It doesn’t need to be a best seller but spend a small time creating something and you’ll probably find it fun and try again.

Have a hobby – That can be anything from maintaining a blog or learning something new to marking origami turtles. If you have no idea what you could do, try a variety of things and you’ll find something you’ll want to pursue more. (Try origami, it’s a lot of fun)

Do some gaming – This isn’t an excuse to game unconditionally for hours and hours on end but the reason why we can play games for so long is because of flow!

Enjoy your free time 

After reading this, you might have realised that you don’t actually care for much of what you do in your free time. Switching through TV channels in an attempt to find something interesting is boring. Instead, do something interesting.

You don’t want it to be be mentally draining or become like work but doing next to nothing might not help you feel that relaxed either.

If you want to find out more about flow and where I got my information from, I’d recommend watching Csikszentmihalyi’s TED talk on the topic and reading his book called ‘Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience’.

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Another thing you can do, if you found this post helpful, is share it. You can follow the blog too. It’ll put you in the zone if you do. (It won’t. Sorry)

1. The ‘800 books a day’ statistic was simply found by dividing the number of books published a year in the US by 365.

2. The image came from news.cnet.com

3. Birds with arms is exactly what it sounds like.

4. I can’t say Csikszentmihalyi’s name. I just stare at it. Should I feel bad? Csikszentmihalyi if you ever read this post, hi and sorry I can’t say your name.

The Value of a Smile

I recently came across a poem that I’d like to share.

The Value of a Smile 

It costs nothing, but creates much.

It enriches those who receive, without impoverishing those who give.

It happens in a flash and the memory of it sometimes lasts forever.

None are so rich they can get along without it, and none so poor but are richer for its benefits.

It creates happiness in the home, fosters good will in a business, and is the countersign of friends.

It is rest to the weary, daylight to the discouraged, sunshine to the sad, and Nature’s best antidote for trouble.

Yet it cannot be bought, begged, borrowed, or stolen, for it is something that is no earthly good to anybody till it is given away.

And if in the last-minute rush of the business-day, some of our colleagues should be too tired to give a smile, may we ask you to leave one of yours?

For nobody needs a smile so much as those who have none left to give!

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When I remember people that I like to be around, I tend to remember them when they’re happy. Although we have a great tendency to attach ourselves to negative events, genuine smiles are wonderful memories.

It can be difficult to smile when you feel that everything is against you but greeting a person with a warm smile might improve their day.

I can’t remember the last time I was ever annoyed by someone smiling at me. I only remember smiling back. That can’t be a bad thing, can it?

The Importance of a Good Attitude

The attitude of ‘this could be better’ plays a part in many areas of our lives. We are always trying to find ways to improve ourselves, whether it is our writing, fitness or just general well-being. This is motivation can stem from being disappointed with how we currently are or the need to achieve something else we want.

We then find different ways to improve ourselves by reading about how to instill good habits, become happier, wake up earlier and so on. Our efforts might not go the way we plan first time round or even the second. But we promise ourselves that we won’t make the same mistakes. However, our disappointment and frustration only continues to grow. If you exercised regularly a year ago, you already would have lost the weight, right? This disappointment will only fuel your current effort and make you even more determined than before.

Not really.

It’s important to understand just how powerful your attitude can be when approaching any form of self-improvement. A lot of self-improvement journeys start from moments of sadness and disappointment but we seldom look back and give ourselves credit for the good things we have done.

At what point does it change from wanting to improve things to simply focusing on the negative?

Forgive yourself.

Always saying ‘this could have been better’ can be more harmful than beneficial.

This isn’t the same as simply trying to forget about any goals you failed to achieve in the past. It requires honesty and willingness to let go of self-imposed burdens. Deciding to forgive myself for not reading much more when I was younger or not being more proactive with my education was tough. It meant that I had to admit that using disappointment and frustration as a basis for my attitude was only leading me towards more frustration. It meant I needed to stop dwelling on what I hadn’t achieved but on what I am going to do.

But ultimately, it meant that I freed myself from cycles of self-criticism of a past that I couldn’t change. My attitude towards self-improvement, and more importantly myself, started shifting from focusing simply on what I hadn’t achieved, to the progress I have made and the progress I will continue to make.

Why is this so useful?

  • It doesn’t prevent you from looking for areas of improvement.
  • You’ll dwell on past misfortunes much less which means you put more energy towards future goals.
  •  You enjoy the progress you make instead of worrying about the things you haven’t yet done.

Allowing yourself to appreciate your current progress and putting aside the anger you had for your previous actions will result in a more positive approach to your work.

Your attitude towards yourself and work also affects how likely you are to complete goals. Here are a few things you should remember when trying to complete something:

1. Perfection is impossible

Whether we admit it or not, we always want our best work to be the first piece of work we produce. It leads to constant worrying about whether our work will be good enough and we may even doubt our ability to get it done at all.

We seem to forget that work is actually worked on. Not produced and framed straight away. If I could write the perfect book without having to edit it, I would have written it yesterday. But I can’t do that and neither can any of the famous authors you read.

They begin and later improve on it.

2. Improvement is slow

A large reason why people give up on goals (especially New Year’s resolutions) is because they expect to see visible change instantly. When we don’t see the change we expect straight away we become demotivated and give up.

However, we shouldn’t expect fireworks to straight away. Musicians practice regularly, writers write regularly and runners run regularly. See the pattern? If you ask a person about how they lost weight, they won’t say it happened in a day. If you ask an author how many times they edited their work before they experienced some success, they won’t say only once.

Realising this helped me understand why consistency is the key to getting things done.

3.  You’re better than you give yourself credit for

Doubt is normal but it shouldn’t stop us from trying to work towards goals we want. Having a realistic outlook on things is good but that should not equate to always telling yourself that you’re worse than you actually are. This eventually leads us to the point where we believe that there’s no use is starting something. Usually because we don’t think we are intelligent enough, as hard working as we used to be or have the necessary self-discipline.

We essentially say to ourselves that we can’t run the race before we even get out of bed. Try letting yourself believe that you’re capable of completing what you want and see what happens. After all, you’ve probably downplayed your ability for much longer than you’ve praised your work.

Looking at the how influential my attitude towards myself and my work is has increased how much I enjoy it. Self-criticism should never result in self-loathing or continuous disappointment. It should only serve to improve the work that you’re doing.

Try changing your attitude towards yourself and your work. There’s little value always being negative about your progress or character.

Understanding selfishness

I think I’ve held a misunderstanding of what it means to be selfish. I’m trying to come to a better conclusion about why we would label one person as selfish and another person as normal or altruistic.

Selfishness is a bad thing. That’s what I’ve been told all my life. We should always strive to be a little more selfless in our everyday lives because that’s what good people do. They care about other people more than they do themselves. It’s an admirable trait that everyone should aim to have.

This definition, I fear, can be taken too literally. As I think I have been doing for the past couple of years. My mindset to how I should treat myself and others was heavily skewed against me. I thought that I should only wish well for other people because that is good. I should not always desire to have things just for myself if I could share them with other people like my siblings and friends.

“My things are our things.” That kind of mindset. (Unsurprisingly, that happened with food a lot. No one really wanted to share socks.)

Now I think I’m mistaken. Wishing good things to happen to yourself is not selfish. It’s not bad in anyway. In fact, it’s healthy. While we should attempt to stray away from being self defeatist, purposefully ignoring our wishes is unhelpful too. It doesn’t allow us to be positive in times that we want to or feel we need to. Having a desire for yourself is not bad. And we shouldn’t always feel guilty about wanting to act on it.

For example, I use a walking stick and use the train somewhat frequently. Now, sometimes there won’t be seats and I’ll have to stand. Usually I’m fine with that and don’t make a fuss about it. People are tired and want to sit down. We’re all in the same boat train. The problem, however, is that I used to think, when someone would offer me there seat, that taking it would be selfish. Sometimes I decline, other times I accept. But I shouldn’t feel guilty for accepting a good deed, should I? Nor should I feel guilty for not giving up a seat if I feel like I need it. Although, I still give up my seat for other people.

Some people might try to tell me that everyone is naturally selfish so I have absolutely no reason to worry about it. The way I understand it currently is: no matter what we do, we always try to do it for our own benefit. We’re all egoists at heart. The oft-cited example is giving to charity. While I may say that I just want to help other people, I really do it because it makes me feel good.

To me, that view is unfair. While it may be true that we enjoy the benefits of every action we do, in everyday life our intentions tend to be genuine and that is how we should measure selfishness. The last time you gave to charity or helped your sibling with homework, I doubt you asked the question ‘why will this help me?’

Thinking of yourself and wishing yourself well is not a negative thing. Being selfish requires negative intent and complete disregard of other people. There’s no need to feel guilty about enjoying your own slice of cake.

Hatred is a Harmful Emotion

When you were younger, your parents may have told you “Never say you hate someone! It’s a strong word!” After that you apologise, run upstairs and express your dislike for this person in your room.

As you grow older, that may translate to hating people that have been mean to you, various celebrities who don’t ‘deserve their fame’ and politicians you hear about on the news.  It may seem absurd to think that people actually hate these people but you’d be just as surprised as me. The same goes for disliking people for small, pointless things.

Hatred is an unnecessary source of frustration, anger and even disappointment. It’s something that we would be better off without and on a path to being happier and more content with ourselves. When we hate someone, we are taking time out of our day to worsen our own well being by expressing the intense dislike that we have of that person.

By expressing your hatred of someone you’re giving them permission to occupy your thoughts and make you focus on a negative part of your life.

Are they worth it?

Getting rid of hatred is something that’s helped me direct my attention towards becoming more positive. Instead of saying how much I dislike one person for a certain action, I’d just forget about them. If someone asks me about what I think about them, my answer tends to be neutral and short.

They don’t deserve to occupy my thoughts and prevent me from enjoying the positive parts of my life.

The same is applicable to the dislike we have of popular celebrities. The chances are that they did nothing to you and you simply dislike their fans. No one is forcing you to watch their shows or listen to their music. Or focus on their fans for that matter.

How to stop focusing on negative emotions

Ask yourself two questions:

  1. Why do I hate/dislike this person?
  2. Is it worth my time and energy?

Most of the time, you don’t need to hate them and if you do hate them,  they probably aren’t worth the attention you currently give them. Solution? Stop wasting your time and focus on other things. You’ll feel much calmer overall.

Holding onto anger, hatred and resentment for other people hurts yourself more than the other person.

However, if you find yourself getting angry at One Direction on TV – go for a walk.

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I know that I ended this post saying that holding onto anger is bad but I don’t think screaming into pillows and squeezing stress balls isn’t the best way to handle it either. I’ll focus on that in another post!

I’d be interested in hearing your opinions about this. Getting rid of these negative feelings towards others is a small thing that’s helped me. Do you find yourself disliking or even hating other people?