Implementing "Carpe Diem"

Philosophy Professor Catherine Wilson talks about pleasure being fundamental in our ability to live a good life, and how a fine balance has to be maintained between current pleasure(indulgence) and future pleasure, which is life planning.

If we work ourselves endlessly, trying to hoard wealth, life will be over in a blink of an eye.

Apart from a more justified and gender-neutral definition of hedonism, the definition of luxury and pleasure itself is changing. What was once enjoyable seems like a waste of time now, while economic instability and low wages do not allow for a hedonistic lifestyle to be a reality for many of us.

Pleasure seeking needs to be viewed as a positive, life-giving pursuit in these times where everyone is striving hard to make ends meet.

• Belief in a just world can serve as motivation for making long-term efforts.
• Belief in a just world can serve as a coping mechanism for everyday struggles.
• Belief in a just world can help people cope with existential issues, by providing them with a sense of purpose.
• Belief in a just world can help people feel in control, because they believe their future will be determined by their actions.

• Various background factors, such as religion and ethnicity, can affect the likelihood that people will display just-world beliefs, and the degree to which they will display them.
• Various situational factors can also affect the degree to which people believe in a just world. For example, being in a good mood reduces people’s tendency to blame innocent victims, while being in a bad mood increases this tendency.

• For small decisions like if you should go and do the dishes, respond to an email or work out, give myself 30 seconds or less to make a decision.
• For somewhat larger decisions that would  take you days or weeks to think through in general, use a deadline for 30 minutes or for the end of the workday.

• Get a good start, that will set the tone for your day. (read or work-out and then start with the most important task of the day).
• Single-task and take regular breaks. This will help you to keep a sharp focus during your day and to get what’s most important done while also allowing you to rest.
• Minimize your daily input, especially from social media consumption. It will clutter your mind as the day progresses.

Which of your projects, errands and general to-do items do you still have left from the previous year that you may be able to complete in less than 2 hours? Do them now to enable you to give yourself a fresh start.

Dreaming is great, but if you want to accomplish some improvements, you need to make your dream more realistic.

Break your dream down into milestones: if you want to work from home, what steps do you need to take? Break those steps down further into actionable steps and start working towards making your dream a reality.

• Metallica (the band) has trilled audiences around the world with their song Carpe Diem Baby.
• Carpe diem is a message found in Hollywood films such as Dead Poets Society.
• Carpe diem relates tp one of the most successful brand campaigns (Just Do It);
• Carpe diem is alsso related to the social media hashtag #yolo (you only live once).
• This expression from a dead language returns more than 25m online search results.

Carpe diem means different things to different people.

For some of us it may relate to taking a once in a lifetime opportunity, while for others it is about indulging in wild hedonism or living calmly in the present moment.

Generally, ennui makes you feel almost always bored (in general or in specific parts of your life - your job or your hobbies); you feel this boredom on a deep, existential level, in a way that is hard to change.

You may also lack enthusiasm or excitement and show no interest in how the future will look like.

A person can suffer from ennui but not depression. Similarly, this also means that it’s possible for someone to suffer from depression but not ennui.

Depression is well defined from a clinical perspective, and is therefore a commonly used medical term, whereas ennui isn’t, and shouldn’t be viewed as such.

Focus on doing something you love.

When you’ve found what you’re passionate about, you get the motivation to keep you moving.

If people think their job will lead to success, they might spend too much time on it and neglect other areas of their life.

Keep a balance between work, rest, health and life. 

It is a process of quiet reflection that requires mindful attentiveness, letting go of distracting thoughts and opinions to be fully in the moment with the text. 

It slows down the reader and the reading—that alone changes the experience. It moves the reader into a calm awareness, allowing for a more profound experience and understanding.

Writing benefits from the capacities that mindfulness cultivates: being in the moment, even when remembering the past or imagining the future; not judging others and oneself while still exercising discriminating wisdom; holding multiple perspectives; being open to the new; and practicing kindness, compassion, and patience. 

• negative-negative (e.g., feeling embarrassed about feeling sad)
• negative-positive (e.g., feeling guilty about feeling happy)
• positive-positive (e.g., feeling hopeful about feeling relieved)
• positive-negative (e.g., feeling pleased about feeling angry). 

... are the most common type. This indicates that many people get upset, nervous, or angry about their own negative emotions, in particular.