Excellence University Journal

STEAM Tip: Enjoyment

by Dr. Brian Higley

December 22nd, 2009

Sometimes people give up on working toward goals because they do not enjoy engaging in activities that lead to goal-achievement enough.  If there are any goals that you are struggling to complete on time or at high levels of quality, you may wish to increase your enjoyment levels for the activities necessary for the achievement of those goals.  There are many ways to increase enjoyment for activities; different things work for different people at different times in their lives.  Here are some methods that have helped people to enjoy the process of goal-pursuit more robustly.

Some of these methods may be used to make activities truly enjoyable, while others may help to simply help to take away the intense lack of enjoyment associated with certain activities.  Either way, we are more likely to engage in activities if we are able to either make them something that we truly look forward to or at least do not dread.

• Cut large activities into smaller ones.  Sometimes enjoyment can be increased by decreasing the duration of certain activities.  For example, if you are finding that reading or writing in 1-2 hour time spans is draining your energy, you can decide to write/read in 15 minute segments of time throughout the day.  If 1-2 longer work sessions per day are not for you, you may be surprised by how much more enjoyable 4-8 shorter work sessions are (I often write articles like this one in small 15 minute spans of time in between other activities [i.e., 1-2 paragraphs or so per session] because I personally prefer to write in shorter time spans).
• Listen to enjoyable music while pursuing goals.  Sometimes listening to (non-distracting) music that we enjoy can make activities more enjoyable.  For example, many people may find that the 15-minute reading/writing sessions mentioned above can become even more enjoyable when some relaxing background music is added.  In fact (if you are like me), it may be that you will find that such music may actually cause you to want to double the duration of such sessions every once in awhile just because you are enjoying the music so much!
• Pursue goals in more enjoyable environments.   Many people find that certain locations help them to enjoy certain activities more thoroughly.  For example, you may wish to engage in reading/writing sessions in your favorite park or in your favorite room.  Add some of your favorite relaxing music to the mix, and you may find from time to time that the 15-minute session that you planned is not long enough because you are enjoying working in your favorite location while also listening to your favorite music too much to leave so soon.  
  
• Ask enjoyable others to pursue goals with you.  For those of us who enjoy working in the presence of others, inviting enjoyable others to work with us can be a powerful method of enhancing enjoyment.  For example, you may wish to invite some of your favorite people to join you for your reading/writing sessions from time-to-time.  As with the other methods mentioned above, you may sometimes find that you are enjoying your time in the presence of enjoyable others so much that you will want to increase time spent on your activity.  An important caveat to this method: As with the other methods listed here, it is important that your enjoyment method does not also serve to distract you from your focus.  It is important that you select enjoyable others who are unlikely to distract you from your mission (e.g., reading or writing).  One final note: As with all other methods listed here, it is important that you select only those methods that are right for you; if you do not like working in the presence of other people, then inviting others to work with you does not qualify as a method of enhancing enjoyment.  It’s best to skip any method listed here that does not actually produce increased enjoyment.
• Change things up from time to time.  Sometimes we can drain our enjoyment for certain activities because we are becoming bored by overly-repetitive routines.  You can change things up in a variety of ways, including duration (e.g., 15-minute, 30-minute, and 60-minute reading/writing sessions), location (e.g., in the park, in your favorite room at home, at your favorite coffee shop), type of music/audio (e.g., calming nature sounds, calming music, no audio), and people (person A, person B, person C, all three people).  You may find that changing the duration, location, audio, and people involved can help you to look forward to engaging in certain activities regularly (or at least decrease the probability that you will be constantly dreading doing so).

If increasing enjoyment sounds good to you, you may wish to keep this article in mind while setting your goals.  For example, the goal “Complete an important project” could be modified for enjoyment like this: “Work on this important project for 15-60 minutes per a day (depending on how much I am enjoying the work session) in the park with my good friend John.  If John is unavailable, listen to my favorite music while working.  If I do not feel like going to the park, then work in my favorite room at home.”  The more enjoyable components you add to goal-pursuit, the more likely it is you will experience regular persistence with activities associated with high-quality achievement (and increased life satisfaction in general – a very nice additional perk!).

FINAL NOTE: If you were linked to this article by a video or email, please return to that link and proceed with any other instructions that you deem helpful.  If you are using the Mission Fulfillment System to identify and track goal achievement, please keep this article in mind when you develop and/or modify your goals on the system.  For more articles related to improving STEAM, see our Self-Mastery, Interpersonal Expertise, and Mission Connection tips.

Article Filed under: 3. Enjoyment Tips