Every day as an output
Miscellaneous / / December 19, 2019
We are particularly happy on Saturdays at 7:26 pm. Seriously, this is proven by studies. Of course, I exaggerate a little, calling so exact time, but researchers have shown that people tend to be happier on the weekend.
A team of researchers from the University of Rochester found that, no matter how much money you get, how many hours a week of work, regardless of the priorities in life, during the weekend we are happier than in Weekdays.
Even the unemployed are happier on the weekend, according to research at Stanford University. It seems, "Weekend happiness" - a feeling that is common to all, no matter what happens in life.
To understand why the weekend to bring happiness, I decided to put the experiment on himself. His idea was to identify their sources of joy and stress. So I wanted to understand why the weekend feel differently than in everyday life.
To find the dependence of my emotional state from what I do, I recorded the following information within 10 days:
- what I eat and drink;
- how many hours I sleep;
- major events: parties, dinners with friends, and so on;
- 1-2 sentences about their feelings on the last day;
- the rating of the day on a scale of 1 to 10, where 10 - a great day.
Originally, I had planned a longer experiment, but after 10 days, began to emerge clear patterns.
The first thing that surprised me while watching my rating of days, is that any day I do not put the estimate higher than 8 out of 10.
In fact, my daily average rating - 6.6 out of 10. Slightly above average. What I saw made me think about how I live: many good things that happen to me, I take it for granted. I was lucky to be born in a strong loving family, which inspired me to study. I paid her education loan and married the girl of your dreams. The last decade I make my living doing favorite work. This is the life I wanted, to which aspired. So why is his every day, I do not appreciate by 10 points?
There was some reason, which reduced my level of satisfaction passing day. And looking at the numbers, I realized that it is in the weekdays.
The average score was 6.4 weekdays from 10 Average rating output (Saturday and Sunday) - 7.5 10.
To get to the reason, I made two lists: what makes me happy, and sources of stress.
What makes me happy:
- lower operational issues;
- less bad mood generated by other people;
- enough sleep;
- the opportunity to spend sufficient time on creative tasks, in my case - writing texts;
- the opportunity to work on an important task;
- meeting with friends, family;
- well-focused work in the morning;
- sports, charging;
- healthy food.
Sources of stress:
- insufficient amount of work done per day;
- a distraction from the main task;
- disputes;
- the need to do things that I believe are equally important: moving furniture, cleaning the bathroom and the like;
- heavy, unhealthy food;
- lack of physical activity.
Naturally, the more a day happened that brings happiness, the higher its ranking. Two days in which there were 4 or 5 factors happy, I put the estimate of 8 out of 10. The more happy things going on during the day, the better it is. What about the stress factors?
Examining the pieces of good and bad days, I noticed that the cause of all the days with low ratings It became a source of stress - constant pressure of thinking that needs to be done "enough" work for day.
The average rating of the day, when I thought I did enough work - 7.6 10.
The average rating of the day, when it seemed to me that I did not do enough -
5.6 10.
When I felt that I had too many problems in time to deal with them for a day, I took the job unimportant and forced the diversion of exasperation. Just annoyed disputes, junk food that I had there, to save time, training gaps.
To test the conjecture that it is an insufficient amount of work done per day is a major source of stress, pulling for a rest, I have done here is a schedule. As it pointed out as positive factors influence the rating of the day.
It is clear that the main source of stress for me is that I'm not worked during the day. In addition to this internal sources of stress, there is also external stimuli, especially during the week.
Passive stress - stress that is transmitted from one person to another. We have learned to recognize when someone stress, because it was necessary for survival. Empathy helps us to understand when someone is in need of others for food, water or shelter. But if you see someone Angered, you begin to increase the levels of cortisol - a stress hormone. neurons of the brain mirrors the human condition, which is next to you, whether you like it or not.
Passive stress affect you worse than your own, since you can not control it. For example, you learn how to manage their emotions, but if your side someone is under stress, you experience it, too. And the more people around the disgruntled, the worse you will.
Stress is distributed on the network effect. The term "network effect" is often used in business: the more people who use the product, the faster it spreads, there is exponential growth.
Feel the network effects of stress can be in traffic. It seems you are calm, but feel how angry the people around you. And now all the signals to each other, screaming from the windows of a car - and you suddenly start cursing too.
It is because of the passive stress we feel bad during the week. And while many companies are now introduced a flexible schedule, the majority adheres to the standard 40-hour weeks of office.
Even if you have a free schedule, you often have to adhere to standards to maintain relationships with customers, friends, family. Therefore, during the week you get more emails, messages, phone calls, more appointments. You are overwhelmed and often can not control their time and business. Moreover, many people do not love their work, and, as a result of research conducted by Gallup, of about 70%. So, the stress will be much stronger.
Researchers from the University of Rochester have come to a similar conclusion when they registered mood swings in 74 people aged 18 to 62 years old who worked full-time. It was found that the study participants a much better feel on the weekend, and there are two main reasons:
I knew that getting happier when spending time with family and friends, but I did not expect how strong this relationship, until he began his experiment.
This explains why even the unemployed or people with a free schedule feel better on weekends than during the week: our good mood and our stress depend on the schedules of those around us.
After I conducted the experiment began to understand better what it depends on my mood. I realized that people around a strong influence on me. Of course, I was not able to change the world work schedule to reduce stress, but I found a way to reduce the influence of external sources on my mood.
I realized that I could not feel happy all the time. And that's fine. Sadness, stress, and anger also make life experiences. But I want to improve the overall feel of each day we live. Short-term stress does not kill, but the constant - can. The road is long, and if you all the time over the dark clouds, it's hard. Do you experience feelings that have worked well for the day. And eventually you run out of power.
After the experiment, I began to look for ways to set yourself up for a long journey. I knew that if I could do it, then I will feel better and better every day, I will do my job. Since the experiment two years have passed, and I found a few ways to get rid of daily stress sources.
The biggest source of stress for me was the feeling that I need to do too much work. But in reality it was not a huge amount of work, and in the wrong organization. stress source was this seemingly innocent thing, as the to-do list. He was bulky. I poured into it all the goals, ideas, tasks, they were realistic or not. Who is funny to remember that sometimes in the task list for the day, I had 161 para.
Before the column "Writing texts" I made a column with the morning daily tasks and column "unsorted" where I am neglecting all incoming case to put them in priority later.
If you see the problem is not urgent, I look at the list of "unsorted" only after finish all the works planned for the day.
Every evening after work, I try to make a list of the next day - it's not for long, I need only to fill in the column.
When I had an infinitely long list, I have not seen the progress, problems could hang in there for months, nerviruya me. Now my list is cleared in the evening and at the end of the day I feel that it is not spent in vain.
Using the shortlist apart from the priorities you focus on important current affairs with a positive attitude, you do not have the feeling of constant stress, which reduces the quality of the work.
The entire previous year, I watched the performance of its deadlines and realized that I was able to withstand only a quarter of them. Like most people, I tend to overestimate their abilities and plan a lot more than I have time. When I'm not in the prescribed period, I feel stress. I decided in each case seek simply to act. For example, when I write the lyrics, I do not set goals to write a certain number of words or finish the article, I set a goal to write every day, whether a single paragraph or article. As I write, I win. Only when I am close to the end of the article, I write to-do list "to finish the article."
Setting unrealistic deadlines - a recipe for burnout and inability to maintain a high pace of work. If you recycle and squeeze yourself to drop today, but will not work tomorrow, what is the result? Less progress and more stress.
Whoever wrote 200 words a day for 10 days as a result of performing the same amount of work as the one who wrote 2000 words every 10 days.
Of course, if you are logged into a state of flux, write all you want, do not limit yourself. But if your attention begins to dissipate (you want to look at a favorite site or in phone), it is a signal that we need a break.
Cases always take longer than you plan. And if you manage to complete the task sooner than you had planned, you will feel as if you appear too much free time. When was the last time you felt this good feeling?
The fact that you are working long hours does not mean you're doing more work or perform it better. One hour of focused work without distractions equals three hours of work for which you are distracted by messages, letters, phone calls. Multitasking - a myth. You may feel that you have altered a lot of cases, but in reality you have worked enough and probably not very high quality.
When I first tried to work to focus, I felt rude: put on the headphones and did not react to people who have tried to communicate with me. I felt uncomfortable and because of this still could not fully concentrate on his work.
And I realized that I need to warn others that you are now going to work with concentration and can not be distracted. Not all are practicing this method, so I just explain it to your co-workers or loved ones not to feel uncomfortable.
Here, for example, such a message I send to his wife:
Before that happened, that his wife had called me just at the wrong time, when I tried to concentrate, and I talked to her in exasperation. Then in the evenings because of this case of conflict. Although the warning and will take some time, it is still better than to snap at people or ignore them when they try to speak with you at the time of concentrated work.
Whatever happens, take the time to communicate with loved ones, instead of trying to squeeze out of himself a few more hours. You will be happier.
Usually it takes me 7.5-8.5 hours of sleep to rest well. I noticed that because workloads have I done, and less sleep on weekdays. Every week, once or twice I could not sleep because my mind kept working to solve the problem. But I stayed in bed and all the forces trying to sleep.
He lay staring at the ceiling, nervous. I understand that sleep is very important, and the longer he could not sleep, the more upset because of this. Now, instead of lying in bed when I can not sleep, I get up and start working on that spinning in my head. No matter 2am or 4am. Half an hour of work on the task of disturbing me soothe much better than endless vorochanie in bed trying to fall asleep.
Our bodies need a sport, but not necessarily every day to arrange a full workout, to get the desired charge of health.
Byutner Dan (Dan Buettner) from National Geographic studied places in the world where people live longer, and it turned out that the locals are constantly moving: walk, stand, sit, work in the garden.
When you have long stays in the same position, your blood stagnates. Movement makes it run faster. Walk around the office until dinner warms in the microwave a couple of times go up and down the stairs, play with your colleagues in the table football, if you have one. Blood will run faster, will refresh your brain, and you'll feel better. Take breaks, change the position in which sit, make a complex of office exercise, take a walk.
As I have concluded that a healthy diet brings me good mood during my experiment. What is surprising, proper nutrition affects the level of my happiness is 10 times stronger than a good sleep and charge.
But when hungry, easily seduced by quick snack and harmful. Now I try to keep a number of useful products that are easy to eat:
- Dried young soybeans;
- non-fat greek yogurt;
- carrot;
- tuna in cans that are just open;
- thinly sliced turkey.
This list I created for myself by trial and error, picking up those products that support my energy level, and thanks to which I feel good.
affirmations - formula of self-hypnosis to help you catch the positive mood.
I am a lucky man, but occasionally forget about it. As recently wrote Duval, Jeremy (Jeremy Duvall), one of the authors of our blog: "The fact that we cease to be grateful for what happens to us the good things - this hedonistic adaptation. Our mind adapts to things happening around us, and the good and bad. When there is something good, our happiness level increases immediately, but soon we discover that we feel the same way as before the jump. "
Not to forget the good that happens so often that I cease to notice it, I spend 5 minutes a day to write down answers to the following questions:
At the beginning of the day:
- I'm grateful for...
- What will make this wonderful day?
- Daily affirmation. I... (a creative person, a happy person ...)
At the end of the day:
- Three amazing things that happened today.
- How could I have done better today?
I learned this technique due to the podcast of the famous writer of the productivity of Tim Ferriss (Tim Ferriss). Writing the answers to these questions, you remind yourself, for what should be thankful, and that is valuable to you. Constantly reminding yourself of the good things you create a shield against negative events. You are setting yourself that whatever happened today, good or bad, you already have many things for which you are grateful.
At first I thought that you can not write the answers, and pronounce them himself. But no, it is the writing makes you remember it all day. And you will spend less time on it than on the cleaning of the teeth.
We're living in the future all the time, trying to make life better. And it is necessary to make progress, but sometimes you have to look around. What is the point of living in stress, five days a week, and then trying to recover for the two?
To live a happy life, you ought to understand what brings you joy, and that - sorry. Try to carry out the same experiment, as I did, and then to reduce the sources of stress and add the sources of happiness in your every day. If you fail the first time, try more. I still do not have an ideal formula of a happy life, but I clearly understand what makes her happy and filled.