58. So, how on earth do you actually live a good life?

I’m a chronic overthinker.

I overthink… hang on let me think about that… yep, everything. All the time. 

And one of the things that I ruminate on excessively is how I spend my time.

Some variation of the following thought pretty much enters my head on a daily basis: “Is what I’m doing now a good use of time, or a terrible use of time?”

That tension is often between some iteration of: 

1. What I want to do now (i.e. lie on the sofa and not much else) and

2. What I wish I had done when I look back/reflect on my life (i.e. a little less sofa, and a bit more doing stuff)

And goodness me I find that first option enticing. 

I wouldn’t say that I necessarily am these days (as it’s been a conscious effort to try and change it), but my default setting is to be a right lazy fucker. 

All day video games, endless TikTok scrolling, and bottomless YouTube rabbit holes are tempting beyond belief. Mainly because it’s absolutely delightful to indulge in these things. 

And maybe living a good life is as simple as that. Just do stuff that we want to do. 

My issue is that my specific psyche, or wiring, or whatever we want to call it, means that an extended overindulgence in these sort of activities makes me feel miserable. 

When overindulging in said activities, it doesn’t take particularly long for another thought to appear: “what are you doing with your life, boy!?”. Which is then swiftly followed by some sort of overly critical self-talk (something that generally never seems to need a second invite to join proceedings).

To be fair, knowing this does push me to try and get my arse in gear and do whatever it was that I was probably procrastinating on because it seemed like too much effort. 

I’m sure we’ve all got those things. For me it’s stuff like exercising, writing, reading and the podcast thing.

Broadly, I do really enjoy doing them, but they can also be a serious slog. And it’s far easier to not do them.  

Because of this, I do find myself at times wondering if they are actually worth the effort. 

I guess when it comes to how we spend our time and the whole “what should I actually be doing with my life?” question, there are two broad Schools of Thought.  

Now, there’s a load of nuance to the below, and an intersection between the two, but at either end of the spectrum we have: 

• School of Thought 1: Do stuff now that we want to do

• School of Thought 2: Do stuff now that we will look back on and be glad that we did

Naturally, there are things that fall into both camps. Though there are also things that fall pretty much exclusively into one or the other. 

School of Thought 1 is where Psychologist Daniel Gilbert recommends we focus our attention. Let’s say we were to spend the rest of our lives lying on a beach chinning salty Margs, then we potentially may not have found much in the way of meaning, though each moment was enjoyable. And for Gilbert, a life well lived is essentially an accumulation of things that make us happy in the moment. Fair.

On the flip side, School of Thought 2 is where Psychologist Daniel Kahneman recommends we focus our attention. A life well lived should more be assessed in retrospect, and one that we look back on with pride and that we’re glad we lived. As such, it leans more towards the pursuit of challenge, achievement and meaning. Also fair.

Of course, there’s a scale between the two extremes. And I’m sure we all sit somewhere differently on said scale depending on our natural (or learned) disposition. 

It’s also probably dependent on the area of our life that we’re looking at.

Someone may skew towards School 1 when it comes to say, their finances - but take a more School 2 approach with another area of their life, like their physical fitness for example.

Both approaches have their positives, and also have their negatives.  

It feels like School 1 may likely be more fun in the moment, but perhaps has a higher potential for regret further down the line. 

In contrast, School 2 is likely less fun in the moment, but perhaps results in a life that we may look back on with more sense of accomplishment. 

One probably leans more towards pleasure, whereas the other leans more towards meaning. 

Which I suppose brings us back to the key tension from the start of this post. 

A key tension that I think a lot of decisions boil down to: Does our motivation & desire to do the thing outweigh our motivation and desire to not do it.

And on top of this, choosing the relevant downsides that come with those decisions: There’s the ballache of actually doing the thing, but there’s also the possible regret & self-criticism that may come with having not done it.

It’s a weird one. I quite often get plagued by this sense that I’m not making the most of days, and life more broadly.

Maybe that’s normal, as we can’t do everything.

And even the things we can do, there’s the opportunity cost that comes with it, and the relevant downsides of that decision. So perhaps there’s always going to be a degree of regret, or a feeling that we’re missing out on something, with whatever it is we decide to do.

And maybe it's a case of trying to make peace with that.

Who knows.

But no doubt it’s something that I’m going to ruminate over for a little while longer…