Originally posted Oct 5, 2017 on www.energised.life

There’s lots about Positive Psychology that really interests me (funnily enough seeing as I’ve chosen to take a Master’s degree in it!) but one of the elements that really made me think and allowed me to turn a corner was understanding how I use different activities in my life to feel ‘happier’.

Happiness is an interesting concept and there’s lots of boring research around it and how we measure it, but I won’t bore you with that this time round. For the purpose of this blog post I’m looking at the difference between ‘Hedonic’ and ‘Eudaimonic’ views of happiness.

Now, not being an academic and like many of you, I always think these weird title’s are a bit ‘wanky’ and promote even more confusion – I sometimes think it’s a bit deliberate – but hey, that’s just me.

I’m going to describe what I think these both mean and how they can have an impact on your life….

Hedonic Happiness.

I suspect we’re all conjuring up images of running around naked on a beach surrounded by other naked beauties all looking for a bit of the sweet stuff – or is that just my warped mind? I always thought ‘Hedonism’ was that of ‘The pursuit of absolute pleasure’ but tended to link it to sex. No idea why. ahem… moving on.

So, being serious for a moment, from here on in, we’ll call Hedonic Happiness ‘Pleasure’ – things we do for pleasure. Whether that be buying those new shoes or riding a rollercoaster, they are fun but the feeling doesn’t last all that long.

Eudaimonic Happiness.

Said ‘You-day-monic’ (I think) Yeh. I know. Well, Eudaimonic happiness has a deeper feeling of enjoyment. Rather that short lasting pleasure, the feelings created last longer, mean more to you and promote a ‘contented state’. So from now on, we’ll call this ‘Enjoyment’.

Erm, so what?

Hopefully, just from that short intro, you’re already starting to see where your life fits in. But it’s important to know how this can impact you.

(My apologies for the dreadful drawing, my husband is an illustrator – but he’s busy, so you have to put up with my handiwork using my daughters crayons!)

I’m sure everyone has seen a similar analogy, of a large jug with small sieve holes at the bottom. This is your ‘Happiness’ jug, you want to fill it as much as possible. But all activities that are simply there for pleasure are thrown in the top, travel through the jug and fall out of the bottom – some may take longer than others, but eventually the feeling of pleasure disappears.

Parts of your life that you genuinely enjoy go in the top and are toooooooo big to fall through the holes, so stick around. They may shrink or grow the more or less you do them (so eventually if you stop doing them, they’ll shrink to the point of falling out of the bottom too) but they stick around for longer.

Now, imagine if you only filled this Happiness jug up with pleasurable things – it may feel great, but you keep having to top these up, in order to retain that pleasure state. As things fall through faster, you have to top them up more.

So, as an example, shopping – the pleasure of buying something new peaks at purchase and diminishes after the first couple of uses – so you have to buy something else to re-create that feeling again.*

Capeesh?

So how do we know what classes as ‘enjoyment’ for us?

Firstly, when you get a chance, write down a list of all the activities you’ve done over the past couple of weeks. What has taken up your time?

Good question… So according to some very important and useful academic research from the New Economics Foundation, there are 5 actions we can build into our daily lives to raise our well-being:

Connection – with the people around you to build support and enrich your life. Whether this be with friends, family, colleagues or neighbours.

Activity – Exercising makes you feel good. Doesn’t have to include spending seven hours a day in the gym getting sweaty. A brisk walk or playing in the garden with the kids will do.

Taking Notice – Being curious, catching sight of the beautiful, savouring the moment and being aware of the world around you. (Not just that stunning mountain scenery)

Continuing to learn – Trying something new, or delving further into an already established interest. Learning something new is fun and helps you to be more confident.

Giving Back – doing something nice for someone else. Being thankful, smiling, volunteering. Doesn’t have to be grand gestures either.

Now, if you take these 5 actions, then look at the list of activities that you have listed earlier – for each activity, reflect on which of the 5 actions, if any it falls into.

The way I look at this is, if your activity falls into two or more boxes, it can be classed as something you truly enjoy, rather than something you do for pleasure – so offers a longer lasting feeling of positive emotion.

For me, one of my favourite activities is cycling.

When I ride, I go with friends (Connection), I’m learning each time I ride – whether it be how to tackle corners at speed or a new route (Continuing to learn), It’s obviously exercise (Activity), I am lucky to cycle through some beautiful routes – (Taking notice) and on occasion I’m able to offer my cycling (non) wisdom to another rider (Giving). So for me, cycling offers me real, genuine enjoyment that I look forward to and keep the feeling of for a longer period of time.

What does this mean to me?

I found by taking notice of the activities I was choosing to do each week, I found I started to choose activities based on the longer term enjoyment value rather than the short lived pleasure. So, for example, rather than take my daughter shopping with me for new shoes for me – I took her to the park and did my shoe shopping during my lunch break.

I feel I use my time more wisely and have been able to see when I need more fulfilling activities and also when I just need a top up.

I want to say – there’s nothing bad in seeking pleasure of course, but if you do this exercise and find that pretty much all your activities are on the pleasure side – then you may find that you’re flitting between happy and unhappy pretty quickly and feel the need to fill that gap more often. But sometimes, we all know we need that quick fix.

Oh, and I clearly realise our life can’t be full of pleasure or enjoyment, I still have to do the washing and ironing or clean up after my daughter has been sick – but the personal balance is important and finding those significant activities that tick all your well-being boxes are the key.

There’s soooooooooooooo much more I want to say on this subject, but it will have to wait for another blog post….

Here’s some references for you to find out more:

New Economics Foundation
Positive Psychology Masterclass
On happiness and human potentials: a review of research on hedonic and eudaimonic well-being
What is Eudaimonia? The Concept of Eudaimonic Well-Being and Happiness

I’d like to remind you that my blog posts are totally my take on this research and academic standpoint – it may not completely tally with what they say but I’m trying to make it accessible to all 🙂

*As a footnote, this happiness just will also be filled with elements such as friends, family, health and so much more. Here we’re just focussing on what you fill your days with 🙂