Psychological Research Shows Us How To ‘YOLO’ The Right Way

20 Sep Psychological Research Shows Us How To ‘YOLO’ The Right Way

It’s an undeniable truth that “you only live once”.

But “YOLO” has become a cliche for living it up or even for hedonism.

None of this is necessarily bad or wrong, but real happiness is something more than the pithy social media slogans.

So if you want to live your best life, you might find this Forbes article by Mark Travers worth a few minutes of your time …

The belief that we should live life to its fullest is by no means a flawed concept, but we must not ignore its downsides. When we engage in thrill-seeking behavior for short-term pleasure, we run the risk of building up stress in our future. For instance, if we max out our credit cards to support our current way of life, we are setting ourselves up for a very un-YOLO future.

Here are two science-backed tips to help you YOLO the right way.

#1. Get a grip on yourself

Self-control is one of the most important contributors to happiness. How do you muster your self-control resources? A recent study published in Frontiers in Psychology has an answer.

The authors suggest there are four primary ways we can exert self-control in a tempting situation. They use fighting off the urge to smoke as an example. We can:

1. Select the situation. This involves steering clear of environments where you know other people will be smoking and you feel you might be tempted to indulge as well.
2. Shift your attention. This strategy involves shifting your attention away from the unwanted desire (i.e., cigarettes) to something more pleasant and wholesome (e.g., an upcoming vacation).
3. Reappraise the urge. This is where you reconsider the impulse in light of its negative effects (smelling bad, bad breath, scratchy throat, etc.) instead of its appealing qualities (e.g., calming one’s nerves).
4. Inhibit the urge. Here, you simply suppress the desire through your willpower.

While each strategy can be effective in its own right, the researchers found that reappraising the urge and shifting one’s attention were the most powerful ways to exert self-control in uncomfortable situations…

… keep reading the full & original article HERE