4 Steps to Move from Floundering to Flourishing
4 Steps to Rise From Floundering to Flourishing
Eudomonia.
It’s a funny word. And right now, it’s one of my favorite words.
In terms of etymology, eudaimonia comes from the Greek word eû (good) and daimōn (spirit). Or good spirit. In everyday usage, it generally translates to happiness, welfare, or flourishing.
Put simply, eudaimonia is the act of living well, of flourishing. Something we all hope to achieve.
Yet, so many of us, so often fail to achieve that aim. Too often, we flounder instead of flourish.
I believe Flourishing is universally available to each of us and the path to achieve is is found in the Big 3.
So how do we do that?
It begins by understanding the gap. Nearly all of us exist and operate on a daily basis with a big ass gap between who we are being and who we want to be.
I would also offer that gap is not so much a character flaw as it is a design flaw. It’s not so much that we are not capable, as it is we simply have not yet learned how to bridge it.
To understand that gap, we have to understand another idea sourced from the Greeks, a concept or idea captured by the word Areté.
Once we begin to understand it, we can begin to close the gap daily between where we are now and where our highest potential may exist.
It all starts with Areté. As we know, the word directly translates as “virtue” or “excellence” but has a deeper meaning — something along the lines of “expressing our highest potential.” When? Moment to moment to moment. When we express what we’re capable of in any given moment there’s no room for regret or all the other negative stuff. We feel great. We flourish. — Brian Johnson
Brian Johnson, who I quoted above, runs an organization called Heroic (see heroic.us). He teaches that we have three fundamental aspects of living, or what he calls The Big 3, where we can most directly express our highest potential: Energy, Work, and Relationships, or you may prefer, Energy, Service, and Love.
These three areas encapsulate and condenses the more expansive idea of PERMA as identified by author and researcher Martin Seligman is is expansive book on this subject called Flourish.
Lean into these three areas.
Most of us fundamentally understand Work and Relationships. It’s pretty easy to discern whether or not we did good work or connected with another through positive relationships. Most of us can easily assess our success or failures. We know when we have had a good day or a bad day.
But it’s that third concept of energy that needs to be explored.
When you do good work, whether it be your job or career or simply cleaning the garage, you know when you have been successful and you know when you have mailed it in.
Likewise, you just know in your relationships. Did you lift someone up today or did you show up like an asshole? Were you present and connected, or were you merely taking up space while absorbed in the game on tv or scrolling through your phone?
Our work and our relationships can be both our most rewarding and most taxing aspects of life. Many times, they can be both in the same day.
Rarely, however, are they ambiguous. You just know whether you were useful and loving. And, you know when you are not.
The ups and downs that accompany them can leave us feeling anxious, abused, and unappreciated just as much as they can cause us to feel respected, adored, and celebrated.
It can be easy to let the undulations of those areas be the sole determinant of how we feel about ourselves. How we respect ourselves. They can easily be the determining factor as to whether we feel like we are flourishing or floundering.
But it doesn’t have to be. Not if you prioritize the third aspect of living, the lesser known but most impactful of the Big 3.
Each of us must learn to harvest our own energy. Each of us must learn to eat first.
Learning to Eat First. Creating Our Own Energy
Those bad days. Those ups and downs and all that ambiguity can largely be eliminated when take control of the third area — an area too often ignored.
The key to all well-being is found in the energy bucket, this third dimension.
Before you can serve, before you can love, you have to fill your own cup. You have to give yourself permission to take ownership of your energy.
Unfortunately, many of us fail to do that at all, we fail to be consistent, or we fail to create and live a life that exists anywhere near our potential.
When we ignore the foundational requirement of creating energy, you almost guarantee failure in the work and relationship areas of living.
How can you really expect to thrive when you feel like a gigantic piece of shit? Is it even possible?
If you want to actualize your potential and truly serve, you need to become radically selfish at creating, harnessing, and leveraging your own energy.
If you ever hope to realize eudaimonia, to flourish, you must learn to protect and serve yourself first.
This is admittedly easier said than done.
Making ourselves a priority can feel like an impossible lift. Our kids demand our attention in the morning. Emails have filled our inbox before we’ve even brushed our teeth. The commute’s a bitch. The internet is slow. Our wives nitpick. Interruptions abound. Life is a constant din of never-ending background noise.
And it creates this gravitational pull into mediocrity. We get frustrated, sometimes angry, and we invariably go through the day with a simmering level of “fuck off” coursing through our veins.
We’re lucky if we eat at all, let alone eat first.
Can you relate?
Your inability to make yourself a priority is why you are floundering.
And the ability to change is both simple and well within your power.
The Four Creators of Positive Energy
Creating positive energy and emotion isn’t rocket science. It doesn’t take massive amounts of time, nor does it require you to turn your life upside down or sacrifice those who matter most to you.
Before every flight, the airlines remind us that we have to put our own oxygen mask on first. This is the same idea.
It’s simple, but not easy (most of the good shit in life is the same way.
It takes some intention and attention, and it’s time you start both now. Not tomorrow, but today.
The four activities of daily living that will most positively impact your energy are:
· Sleep,
· Eat,
· Move, and
· Peace.
None of these are difficult. None probably require much explanation. And for today, I’m simply going to make a single suggestion that you begin now.
To move closer to flourishing today, begin with this.
Eat: Intentionally reduce your sugar and reduce the amount of processed crap you consume. You know it’s not good for you. Stop putting that shit inside of you. This applies to fake sugar too. Look at the back of the package and if it says “added sugar,” move onto something else. Or better yet, just eat real food and drink some water.
Move: Walk more. It’s the simplest activity, and arguably the most beneficial, available. Open your fitness app on your iPhone and look at your daily steps. Set a goal to increase it by a thousand. How? Walk to the mailbox. Park farther away. Walk around the block. Start there before you worry about gyms, fitness programs, etc. Just move.
Sleep: Most of us exist at an unacceptable level of exhaustion. We cannot show up in work and love when we are tired. The most universal suggestion I see for improving sleep is turn off your phones/computers/tvs an hour before you sleep. That blue-light jacks with your head. Break the addiction.
Peace: Find silence. Meditate. Read. Turn off notifications. Sit outside. I don’t care how you do it, just make some time every day to be where your feet are. Of the four creators, this is the one most available to you.
Most everything that has to do with expressing our potential is firmly in our control.
We just have to own it.
So much of our ups and downs are rooted in this idea of energy. When we feel good about who we are, it shows up in a hundred ways every day.
Stop pissing away that gift.
Harness it, and be a little selfish.
Eat. Move. Sleep. Find some peace.
It’s not that hard. When you flourish, everyone around you will experience it.
You are an influencer of flourishing.
I am an influencer of flourishing.
We are all influencers of flourishing.
And that can be a heavy responsibility or a beautiful gift.
Your choice.
Will you flourish with that responsibility? Or flounder with it.