Fill Your Life with Things You Love

We get so focused on the next achievement that we forget the small things that bring joy right now. Without them, apathy shows up sooner or later.

How do you become a happier person?

I once heard a very simple but incredibly powerful piece of advice: “Fill your life with the things you love.” The author went on to explain that we are so often focused on our next achievement that we forget to do the small things that bring us joy here and now.

And very often that is a matter of our own decision, not of free time, money or some special circumstances.

You would think enough books have already been written about enjoying the journey towards a goal rather than only the destination. So many videos have been made on the subject.

But when I heard that advice and thought for the first time about how many things genuinely bring me joy, I realised the list would be extremely short.

At that point my life held dozens of things that brought benefit, meaning, new opportunities and a sense of belonging to something important — but very few things that gave me plain, ordinary joy.

So I decided to fix it. I started rereading novels by my favourite authors: Remarque, Dreiser, London, Zweig. I started meeting thoughtful people from time to time and talking about what interests me. I started gathering a group of friends now and then to go to a good bathhouse together.

The list could go on, but its main feature is that it is about “I want” rather than “I have to.”

At that point my life was full of things that were useful, right and necessary. Alongside them I simply added a small percentage of things that were about pure pleasure.

Maybe you, like me, love taking a ball out to the basketball court. Or you could call a close friend and just talk about life for thirty minutes. Or go for a walk in the park with a cup of your favourite coffee. I do not know what is on your list of favourite things.

But it seems to me that it matters that such a list exists in our lives, and that we act on something from it from time to time.

So that, even in the middle of a hurricane, we can switch off from our work, our obligations, our goals and the word “must” for twenty minutes.

It is important to be able to take small pauses, to reward yourself for your efforts and to take pleasure in life, however hard and tragic it may be in that particular period.

At the very thought of doing something purely for your own pleasure, you may run into judgement — both from inside yourself and from other people. The arguments will sound fair: “This is not the time or the place. Look at what is happening around us!”

But an inner spring cannot stay under tension forever. Sooner or later it releases.

That is why I think it is worth adding a drop of joy and warmth into your life from time to time, so that you do not wake up one day realising that your life gives you no joy at all.

The body needs dopamine, and it will look for it regardless. If you do not get it in a natural way, what starts instead is overeating, various other harmful addictions, and a sense of apathy close to depression.

After relationships and finances, the third most common request I get in consultations is the loss of a taste for life. That is when nothing brings joy any more.

So it is better not to let yourself reach that state, and to allow yourself at least twenty minutes a week to do something pleasant and joyful for yourself.

And what things bring you joy? What gives you your “taste for life”?