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Consider using your time off as an opportunity to learn something wonderful, Arthur Brooks wrote in 2023. ⁠https://lnkd.in/euXhSpw5 ⁠ To get the most contentment from your vacation, it is worthwhile to understand that “an abundance of basic positive emotions such as joy, surprise, and anticipation is what you seek.” But Brooks notes that “you shouldn’t neglect another positive emotion of special importance: interest—the feeling of curiosity or fascination that captures your attention.” The well-being effect from learning is not as straightforward as it is for other activities, such as eating a doughnut. Investing in an activity to raise competency can lower your moment-to-moment happiness but can boost well-being measured over a longer time frame of hours and days. In that respect, learning is like exercise: sometimes painful in the moment, but rewarding overall. A key to maximizing satisfaction through learning is intrinsic motivation, or what the psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi called “autotelic learning”: learning for its own sake. ⁠ ⁠ You can choose a range of ways to achieve satisfaction from learning about an interest, whether cheap and casual or expensive and formal, Brooks continues at the link in our bio. Perhaps you want to learn how to cook Punjabi cuisine, or follow one of the many “massive open online classes” (MOOCs, for short). For a more intensive (and expensive) option, you could hire a teacher to give you a head start on playing the guitar or speaking Mandarin. At the most rigorous level, you might go all in and spend your vacation on a guided silent retreat in one spiritual tradition or another. ⁠ ⁠ Feeling compelled to relax and have fun is a common and counterproductive mistake. Telling yourself “I will be refreshed and not think about work!” is bound to lead in the wrong direction. Instead, Brooks urges, “turn your leisure into learning. You might just have your best holiday ever.”⁠ Read more: https://lnkd.in/euXhSpw5 ⁠ 🎨: Jan Buchczik

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Kimetha Dunn

AI UXR | Enterprise User Researcher at Microsoft | AI Researcher | Speaker | UX/UI Instructor | Podcast Host

3mo

Good point!

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#LifeLongLearner

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