What is Engaged Living?

Unlike other topics on the website, you might not have heard of “engaged living” before. Just like the other topics, however, engaged living is a big part of human flourishing. If you are feeling stuck in any way, engaged living is for you. If you are wondering how to increase your sense of vitality in life, engaged living is for you. If you are wanting to escape a cycle of negativity, engaged living is for you. It is, in essence, a skill that catches us in our nosedives and lifts us into healthy action.

When Martin Seligman called for a “new era of positive psychology,” he highlighted what the science of well-being has to say about living “the full life.” For reference, the full life is on a higher plane than the pleasant life or the good life. One of the central pillars of this full life is engagement! But what exactly is engagement and how does it help us live a full life? Put simply, when we take action and “move toward” the people and things that matter most to us, we are living an engaged life. In practice, this might mean choosing to exercise instead of choosing to eat junk food because you value your physical health. Or, it may mean choosing to spend time with your loved ones when you feel depressed instead of spending time alone because you value your connection with those people. As we actively move in the direction of our values, we increase the likelihood of enjoying positive emotions, and more importantly, a life of meaning. You may have experienced, however, that it is not always easy to move toward our values.

In this video, Russ Harris explains how to move toward our values instead of away from them, setting the stage for our discussion of engaged living:

As Harris mentions, we first need to establish our values. These values can range from people to behaviors to attributes to hobbies. Take a moment to reflect on your life’s most worthwhile pursuits. You may value a spouse, sibling, parent, or friend. You might also value playing music, creating art, cooking, playing sports, or reading. Whatever your values are, make sure to write them down as you begin this process of becoming more engaged with them. [See also the Values Clarification exercise HERE]. Consider placing this list of values in a place where you will see it often, like on the fridge or on the bathroom mirror. Remembering your values can inspire and motivate you to take action toward them. 

Once you have a vision of your values, you can start strengthening your ability to act in ways that bring you closer to them. We call these ‘toward moves.’ This module is full of resources to help you increase your capacity to make toward moves. As you progress through the module, you will come to understand that vulnerability, courage, and self-efficacy are three core skills that will strengthen your ability to take committed action. Committed action can be understood as consistently making toward moves and is ultimately the best way to live an engaged life. Because you are human, there will be times when you will be tempted to act in ways that pull you away from your values instead. We call these ‘away moves.’ You may even find that choosing away moves is easier than choosing toward moves. Away moves are easy because they require little to no effort, and they’re usually very reinforcing in the short term. However, they can cause us to get stuck in a downward spiral of avoidance and discouragement. In contrast, toward moves lead us to the rewarding experiences of living as the best version of ourselves. 

If you aren’t convinced yet that practicing engaged living can change your life, consider some of the benefits emphasized in the research. In a massive study of nearly 13,000 participants, engaged living was the number one characteristic that was able to explain the difference between people’s levels of life satisfaction (Vella-Brodrick et al., 2009). Whether each person was more likely to have positive experiences or negative experiences could be traced back to their levels of engaged living. Isn’t that motivating? Other researchers found similar results as they discovered that people are more likely to feel gratitude, hope, self-esteem, and happiness when they are engaged in their lives (Froh et al., 2010). In fact, they also found the opposite to be true: people are more likely to be depressed when they are not practicing engaged living. A truly inspiring bit of information is that engaged living not only increases life satisfaction, but life satisfaction also increases engaged living (Frisch et al., 2005; Lewis et al., 2011; Shocet et al., 2006). This means that as we engage in valued behaviors, our life satisfaction increases and makes it more likely that we will keep engaging in those behaviors! Decide to practice engaged living so this positive cycle can pick you up and launch you into a brighter future.