how to have a perfect day
What does your perfect day look like? Don’t pick a vacation day or a weekend—just a normal weekday. It’s a question I really like asking, especially when people are deciding between job offers. I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately.
My daughter recently turned one. (Woo!) For the child-free among you, this means my “typical day” has changed about a dozen times in the past year. The second I think I know what’s going on, she decides to switch it up. I haven’t had a chance to optimize my day because I don’t know what it’s going to be.
That’s one version of the story. The other version is that I hadn’t considered this as something I could apply to myself. It feels weird to direct these questions back at myself. And, I suppose, I haven’t thought about it until now, because I’m busy chasing a toddler around. (Aaand I’m back to the same excuse.)
Turns out, this particular question was/is fascinating to mull over. Fantasizing about the perfect day is intoxicating, but it’s also kind of hard. What makes a day perfect? How do you quantify it? I can easily go through my schedule today and cherry pick the things I want to do and the things I don’t want to do, but generating the ideal day from a lifetime of data isn’t as simple.
Still, I gave it my best shot. Here are the questions that helped me:
What are the things I have to do? If there are things on here that I kind of hate, how do I do less of it or get rid of it?
What are the things I get to do that feel like a treat? What makes me happy in the moment?
Who is important to me? How do I spend more time with them?
What environments give me comfort?
Aside from wanting waffles for breakfast—a true fantasy on a weekday—I also think about having a tidy office and home, getting some time to write, pushing my daughter on a swing and hearing her shriek with joy, and having long conversations with my partner about whatever we’re reading at the moment.
Once I know what some of the components of a perfect day are, then it’s all about what I can tweak to up my chances of getting one. It’s a great little game that actually leads to better career/life goals, assuming your goal is related to maximizing happiness. Who knew trying to optimize my mornings for waffle production could be a career goal—one I will probably never achieve.
I’m serious, too. I know this exercise sounds kind of silly, but having a bunch of good days with people you love is lot more likely to make you happy than achieving that one big career goal. It’s called arrival fallacy. A recent NYTimes article (linked below) described it like this:
“Arrival fallacy is this illusion that once we make it, once we attain our goal or reach our destination, we will reach lasting happiness,” said Tal Ben-Shahar, the Harvard-trained positive psychology expert who is credited with coining the term.
He cited a 1998 study in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology in which professors who had either received or been denied tenure in the preceding five years were asked to rate their happiness. Tenure is the golden snitch of academia: It grants job security, prestige and, usually, a bump in pay, so you’d expect the tenured professors to be significantly more satisfied with their jobs. However, both groups reported similar levels of happiness.
This study also asked assistant professors, who had yet to be considered for tenure, how happy they thought achieving that goal would make them. These professors consistently overestimated the amount of joy that was headed their way.
In other words, career goals related to achieving that one elusive thing that will surely make you happy… probably won’t. That big promotion, that corner office, that big publication, that huge funding round—they’re all great, but they can’t be the only thing you’re working toward. You have to think smaller. Instead of dreaming about what kind of life you want, bring it all the way back to what kind of day you want. How can you have a good day? And another one? And another one?
So, with all that in mind, what little things could you do to make these perfect days more common?
interesting reads
cool jobs
Pixar has a research residency program for recent PhD grads in computer graphics, simulation, or machine learning. Apply here.
Cortico, a nonprofit with roots in the Media Lab, aims to create a healthier public dialogue and has a technical fellowship starting this summer. Apply here.