(2021-11-29) This Is The Most Surprising Way To Make Your Life Awesome

This Is The Most Surprising Way To Make Your Life Awesome. ...small reduction in trait neuroticism (a propensity for negative moods, stress, and worry)

new research is showing we have more power over our disposition than was previously thought. With effort, you can change aspects of who you are – especially your levels of extroversion and neuroticism.

When psychologists measure personality they use the “Big five” traits.

Now how do you change your traits? Well, there’s one incredibly easy way: do nothing. With age, extroversion, openness and neuroticism drop while conscientiousness and agreeableness usually increase.

A better approach is to alter your context. Mom said don’t hang out with a bad crowd and mom was right

Unfortunately, we don’t always have control over those things.

So we’re going to focus on behavioral change.

we’re going to focus on the changes most people desire: more extroversion, openness, conscientiousness, agreeableness — and less neuroticism.

Extroversion

many of us do wish we were more social at times. And research consistently shows extroverts are happier

To be more extroverted… act like an extrovert. Spend more time with friends. Talk to strangers.

It might sound overwhelming

When you feel overstimulated or anxious, just say: “I am excited.”

Openness

openness to experience

We can train ourselves to be more curious and to see old things in new ways.

It’s all about taking on a more experimental, explorative mindset.

A great start is exposing yourself to more cultural activities and to keep learning

And there’s another way to increase openness that’s pretty surprising: exercise. Studies show physically active people didn’t have the same declines in openness as they aged.

not exercising can actually make your personality worse:
These findings provide evidence that a physically inactive lifestyle is associated with long-term detrimental personality trajectories.

Conscientiousness

We get our act together when we feel like something in our life really matters

If you want to become more conscientious, find a job or role that is deeply meaningful to you.

In your current job or roles, think about how what you do benefits other people. This increases meaning in life – and can help you get your act together

But how can we be more conscientious every day, outside of roles like work or family? Turns out having more self-control is less about increasing willpower and more about removing temptations that distract you.

Agreeableness

Increasing agreeableness is fundamentally about improving your empathy skills.

Research shows identifying and understanding different facets of your character boosts empathy. To better understand others, it really helps to better understand yourself.

A good next step is to spend more time with other people. Specifically, people very different from yourself

Neuroticism

Lower is almost always better, higher is almost always worse. Being very neurotic rarely confers any superpowers – it just increases suffering.

Gratitude exercises can help.

Before you go to bed, write down a few things you are thankful for that happened that day.

Gratitude is so magical because you don’t need to accomplish anything, acquire anything, or really do anything. It’s just a shift in perspective

how else can we reduce neuroticism? Therapy and meditation can certainly help but let’s focus on something fun and easy that almost everybody loves: travel. Specifically, international travel.

Sum Up

Don’t worry about “being yourself.” Heck, you don’t even really know who that is. Instead, strive to be your best self.

Be the platonic form of you. Be the 3-D IMAX version of you. It’s the path to feeling authentic, and to great relationships.