Relax More To Achieve More?
The Study | The Findings | What should you do? | Takeaway
The hustle culture and “grindset” are at large. People advocate working relentlessly to tick off goals, but is that really the best way to lead your life?
We all have something we want to achieve. Like getting a six-pack, buying a faster car, or becoming financially free. Whatever it may be, people say you must work on your goals, and then keep on working.
However, a study finds that if you value other things too, there may be a better approach.
The Study
The aim of the study, and also our interest, is the relation between well-being and fulfilling the things you value.
To figure this out, they had 184 participants take part in a daily questionnaire over 9 days.
The study, called Value Fulfillment and Well-being: Clarifying Directions Over Time, takes a look at 5 out of 10 value types found by the social psychologist Shalom H. Schwartz.
The 5 value types evaluated are:
Achievement - being ambitious and successful
Self-direction - being creative and choosing your own path
Stimulation - living a varied life
Hedonism - relaxing/pleasure/leisure
Conformity - fitting in with the people around you
The researchers, through the daily questionnaire, asked the participants questions on well-being (like life satisfaction and stress) and also what they spent their time doing.
So, for example, a person may have spent their whole day working and noted a life satisfaction score of 7 for the day.
Now, let’s take a look at their finding and see what we can apply to our own lives.
The Findings
The study found that fulfilling different value types had different effects on well-being, but the other way around was true too.
A person’s level of well-being affects how well they fulfill their values.
Researchers found that fulfilling your values of being ambitious and living a creative and varied life will lead to an increase in positive well-being (like life satisfaction).
In decreasing negative well-being (stress, anxiety, and depression), only relaxing and leisure activities had a significant effect.
Interestingly, the people who had more positive well-being (felt better about life) were able to achieve more and live a more varied life.
People who reported higher negative well-being (people who were more stressed and depressed), felt as though they didn’t fulfill their achievement goals.
What should you do?
So, am I saying you should take your foot off the pedal and go to the pub? Nope, the opposite actually.
Working on achieving your goals increases your life satisfaction, and an increase in your life satisfaction enables you to continue working on your goals.
It’s an upward spiral.
But it doesn’t just have to be achievement-focused. Being more creative or adventurous also increases positive well-being, which in turn, allows you to be more ambitious/successful.
If you do, however, feel stressed or depressed, should you be docile and lazy? Again, no.
Relaxing and leisure may decrease negative well-being which in turn may mean you can work on fulfilling your goals. But relaxing and leisure don’t have to be unproductive or harmful.
Go for a walk, read a book, or meditate. There are better ways to relax than bingeing TV shows or going for a pint.
Takeaway
How you feel does impact your ability to fulfill the things you value (like being successful, creative, or adventurous).
But fulfilling the things you value also affects how you feel.
If you’re reading this, you most probably value achievement. However, the degree to which each of us values achievement will vary.
If you’re someone who values achieving over everything else, then maybe the hustle culture is for you.
If you have ambitions but also have other values too, you should fulfill them. And in doing so, it may bring greater success.
Source
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jopy.12869
