Label your emotions (e.g., ‘I’m afraid’ or ‘I’m languishing’) to gain power over them and make conscious choices about how to respond. This shifts how you process the experience and enables you to take action.
Practice self-compassion when experiencing difficult emotional states like languishing by recognizing that ’there’s nothing wrong with me; there’s something wrong in my circumstances.’ This helps normalize the experience and builds confidence for future challenges.
Identify your personal ‘Mario Kart’ – an activity or project that provides flow, involves people you care about, and offers a sense of mastery, mindfulness, and mattering. This personalized approach helps combat languishing effectively.
Choose flow activities that are ‘good flow’ (build you up) rather than ‘junk flow’ (leave you feeling gross or drained, like binge-watching certain shows). This ensures the activity genuinely contributes to your well-being.
To combat languishing (stagnation), seek activities that provide a sense of mastery, where you feel competent, have gotten better at something, or accomplished a task. This creates a feeling of forward movement and momentum.
Focus on achieving ‘small wins’ rather than only grand triumphs to experience mastery. These little jolts of accomplishment provide a sense of capability and progress, which is crucial for escaping languishing.
Seek out ‘just manageable difficulties’ – challenges that are within your current capabilities but still require effort. These build confidence in overcoming obstacles and reinforce that you won’t necessarily be stopped by them.
Practice mindfulness by focusing all your attention on a single task or activity, avoiding multitasking. This deep concentration is essential for achieving mastery and flow, as humans are serial processors.
Block out dedicated time in your schedule to concentrate on a single activity, whether it’s ‘deep work’ or ‘deep fun.’ This prevents ’time confetti’ (slicing time into tiny, unproductive chunks) and allows for true engagement and flow.
Cultivate a sense of ‘mattering’ by finding ways to contribute and make a difference to others, even in small ways. This provides meaning and purpose, which can combat the aimlessness of languishing.
Perform ‘five-minute favors’ or small acts of kindness, such as sharing knowledge, giving feedback, or making introductions. These small efforts have a big positive impact on your mood and reinforce a sense of mattering.
Proactively plan opportunities to help others, especially when spontaneous interactions are limited. This ensures you consistently experience the psychological boost and sense of mattering that comes from contributing.
If you are languishing, find someone else who is also languishing and offer them suggestions on how to overcome it. You will likely find that the advice you give to others is the advice you need to take for yourself.
If you recognize you’re languishing, reflect on past instances where you felt similarly and recall the choices or behaviors that helped you overcome it. This leverages your own resilience and past wisdom to find solutions.
Give yourself permission to honestly express feelings of languishing (e.g., ‘I’m kind of eh’) rather than succumbing to ’toxic positivity’ and feeling pressured to always be upbeat. This promotes authenticity and self-acceptance.
When languishing, proactively engage in physical activity like yoga or other movements that you know will help improve your state. This is a direct action to combat the feeling of being stuck.
To avoid wasting time on TV, only turn it on if you already know what you want to watch. This prevents getting sucked into mindless viewing and helps manage your time effectively.
Avoid mindlessly scrolling on social media unless there’s absolutely nothing else you could be doing (e.g., waiting for a plane). This helps prevent getting sucked into unproductive time.
Do not pick up your phone in bed to ensure you get adequate rest. This prevents late-night distractions that disrupt sleep patterns and energy levels.