Making It Stick / Lasting Change in a Life Worth Living

We’ve all seen the clickbait headlines: “One weird trick to fix your problem.” “One easy tip that will change your life.”

It’s easy for us Moderns to think that all we need are tips and tricks. We’re all about how-tos—Technologies of the self. And, as with any technology, we prefer our self-making tech fast, cheap, and easy. If only taking on a new way of life were as simple as upgrading our tech.

The ancients generally agree that it takes something more to make a change in our lives stick. We need effective strategies—sure. But we need something deeper—practices—that help us “try on” a way of life, train our bodies and our minds in it, and, ultimately, fall in love with it.

Lecturer at Yale College and Life Worth Living Director, Matt Croasmun considers how to make a life worth living stick, in this chapter-by-chapter video curriculum series based on his bestselling book (with Ryan McAnnally-Linz and Miroslav Volf), Life Worth Living: A Guide to What Matters Most.

Transcript

We’ve all seen the clickbait headlines: "One weird trick to fix your problem." "One easy tip that will change your life."

It’s easy for us Moderns to think that all we need are tips and tricks. We’re all about how-tos—Technologies of the self. And, as with any technology, we prefer our self-making tech fast, cheap, and easy.  If only taking on a new way of life were as simple as upgrading our tech.

The ancients generally agree that it takes something more to make a change in our lives stick. We need effective strategies—sure. But we need something deeper—*practices—*that help us “try on” a way of life, train our bodies and our minds in it, and, ultimately, fall in love with it.

That means that these practices are specific to a particular vision of what matters most. If you think performing your particular role within a community is most important, ritual practices that prescribe just the right way of fulfilling your particular responsibilities will be central. If you’re convinced that our entire experience of the world is fundamentally false, then a meditative practice that trains your attention in entirely different ways will be of utmost importance. If your highest good is God and God’s presence, practices that tune your attention to the divine presence in every moment will be your guide.

Whichever practices we take up, we’re likely to find that the practices themselves stick and do their deepest work on us if we take them up in community.

Now, pursuing the good life in community doesn’t guarantee we’ll get it right. We can get it just about as wrong together as alone. But we’re unlikely to make much progress at all on our own.

So, as you consider the practices you want to adopt, also consider: who can you lean on to help you make it stick? With whom can you cultivate lives worthy of our shared humanity?