life-enhancing Archives - Sarah Wiesendanger

Enhancing Your Life-Energy

What proportion of your life do you spend engaged in activities that are life-enhancing? You know the ones. The kind that, when you’ve finished, you’re fizzing with energy and joy, ready to laugh and love, walking on air.

Is half your day spent doing things like that? The whole of your day, none of a typical day?

You might think it unrealistic to expect that too great a proportion of your life can be spent doing what you really love. You might think life is just too full of chores and duties, that to focus on what you want to do all the time would simply be selfish? But is it really?

In creating a more life-enhancing daily pattern, many of my clients find it helpful to go back to the basics. They find it helpful to spend time working out a clear life philosophy and value system that is meaningful to them, that gives them a sense of greater purpose and self-respect; a life philosophy and value system which does not depend on looking to others for approval or appreciation, but that really chimes with their own true nature…

…And then my clients check their daily activities against these values and beliefs. Do they fit or not? In what way can those that don’t be replaced with ones that do?

When we live according to our own values, in a way that gives us a sense of greater purpose, we usually find that even the unpleasant tasks are life-enhancing. We know why we are doing them and, in the greater scheme of things, we are pleased we are doing them because they are an expression of our true nature. They fulfil the larger meaning of our lives, and there is nothing more truly joyful than that.

Optimistic Thinking versus Fantasy

Successful people dream up a vision. From this, they can create a goal towards which they aspire. But, in order to turn the vision into reality, the dreaming – or fantasising – must stop. A more dynamic mindset is required.

Fantasies of success tend to lead to inactivity, and so low performance.

Positive expectation, on the other hand, is linked to high aspiration and optimistic thinking. These lead to productive cognition, problem-solving, high performance, and prosocial behaviour. It is a strong motivator. In fact, in a thirty-year longtidunal study (Peterson, MEP, et al), optimistic thinking was shown to be good for you health, slowing the progress of both acute and chronic disease. Conversely, fantasy has a negative outcome on health.

Our brains are designed to fulfil expectations. It’s partly how we corroborate our personal world view. It stands to reason, then, that if we expect a particular outcome and think optimistically about this, our mindset will be configured to achieve that expectation.

Fantasising, however, precludes realisation, wrapped up, as it is, in a tissue of unreality; from the outset, there is the belief that it can’t really come true. And so, guess what, that expectation is fulfilled.

When we employ optimistic thinking, we are less likely to give up when luck doesn’t seem to be on our side; in other words, we create our destiny. If opportunity doesn’t come knocking, we build a door…