Many of us have bucket lists. Nothing wrong with that in and of itself. It’s fun to think about what we would most love to do and perhaps have a plan for “someday” when we will actually do this thing. Bucket lists are especially helpful when they’re achievable and when they allow one to prioritize what is truly important in this life and go for it.
The problem comes in when the bucket list takes priority over the day-to-day—when it feeds a “when this happens, then I’ll be happy” mentality. We can wait, and wait, and wait for that day to come. Sometimes it never does. And, even when it does, what do we do the other 99 percent of the time? Where are we putting our focus?
This is where “buckets of well-being” come in. I came up with this term for myself and my patients during the pandemic. During those early stages especially, during lockdowns and social distancing, fear and uncertainty, I found that happiness was not always so prevalent—and, yet, well-being could still be found, in micro-doses of intentional actions.
Even though I was feeling a lot of fear and anxiety on a pretty regular basis, I found deep well-being by finding ways to contribute, finding ways to connect (despite the physical isolation), and being in nature. All these things could be present alongside whatever I was feeling and became a deep “well” from which I could draw nourishment to help support me. My husband found solace during that time in learning new things. For example, he went from having hardly cooked in his life to becoming pizza maker and chef extraordinaire. This gave him some purpose and pleasure during those days of being stuck in lockdown.
Neuroscientist and researcher Richard Davidson says that well-being is a skill that we can grow and strengthen. He identifies four components of well-being we can strengthen:
Importantly, I have found that it’s important to not think we have to force ourselves to be happy all the time. When we stop striving for happiness and focus on well-being instead, it leaves room for us to experience whatever human emotions we’re feeling (we could be feeling sad, down, or anxious) and nonetheless know there are things we can do to take care of ourselves and our feelings.
Instead of trying to get rid of an unpleasant mood, we add on an activity that naturally brings about heartfelt emotions. We bring something new in to help support us.
Instead of pushing away our unpleasant emotions, we invite something else in (see ideas below) to sit side-by-side with whatever difficult emotions we might be experiencing.
I have found that focusing on small ways to fill our buckets of well-being can promote some, if not all the skills that Davidson talks about:
Sitting with hundreds of people through the years in my profession, I have come to see that we all have “buckets of well-being.” They may look different for different people, but we all have them. These are the things that nourish our souls, the things that are available to us right here, no matter what we are feeling, no matter what our life circumstances.
Here are some examples:
Unlike our bucket list, the nice thing about our buckets of well-being is that they are always there for us to draw from, as we go through our daily lives. During times when I’m feeling down, I find that putting just one drop in one bucket on one day can really make a difference in supporting me.
Don’t worry about your bucket list. It will still be waiting for you. But if you put a few drops in your buckets of well-being on a regular basis, you may find that you don’t have to wait to complete your bucket list to find joy, meaning, satisfaction, and well-being right here, in the very fabric of your daily life.
In part adapted from You Don't Have to Change to Change Everything: Six Ways to Shift Your Vantage Point, Stop Striving for Happy, and Find True Well-Being, with permission from Health Communications Inc.
Forget Your Bucket List—Try Buckets of Well-Being Instead
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28.03.2024
Many of us have bucket lists. Nothing wrong with that in and of itself. It’s fun to think about what we would most love to do and perhaps have a plan for “someday” when we will actually do this thing. Bucket lists are especially helpful when they’re achievable and when they allow one to prioritize what is truly important in this life and go for it.
The problem comes in when the bucket list takes priority over the day-to-day—when it feeds a “when this happens, then I’ll be happy” mentality. We can wait, and wait, and wait for that day to come. Sometimes it never does. And, even when it does, what do we do the other 99 percent of the time? Where are we putting our focus?
This is where “buckets of well-being” come in. I came up with this term for myself and my patients during the pandemic. During those early stages especially, during lockdowns and social distancing, fear and uncertainty, I found that happiness was not always so prevalent—and, yet,........
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