The Most Important Question To Ask Yourself Every Day

If there is one thing I could teach the world, it would be the skill of hope.

Feeling hopeful is a muscle we can strengthen over time. And when we are hopeful, it has profound personal benefits. A new longitudinal study, adding to a vast library of research, found that hopeful people had:

• Better physical health

• Better social support

• Greater resilience to challenges

• Fewer chronic health problems

• Less depression

• Less anxiety

• A longer life

Hope leads to a better, longer life. Sign me up!

Demystifying hope

The scientific study of hope has identified that it has three components:

• The what (A goal)

• The why (The motivation to work towards that goal)

• The how (The plan for how you will achieve that goal)

But there are also different kinds of hope. (At least, I think there are!)

The first is the hope that alights upon us.

This is the hope you are most familiar with: that feeling that swells up when we're embarking on a new adventure. Hope organically arises in this moment without any effort from us. The moment has the three components (a future vision, the motivation, and the steps to take.)

The second is the hope that is a verb.

This is the decision to practice hope in hard moments, big and small, and build it as a skill.

The pandemic has threatened the first kind of hope. Most of our long-term external goals look very precarious. We don't know how things will turn out out there. Our milestones are on hold. Our adventures have ceased.

This is the moment to turn to the second type of hope.

How to practice hope

Here is one strategy that is incredibly powerful for practicing hope. Every morning, ask yourself this magic question:

What is one small thing I can do today to live up to the person I want to be?

Asking, answering, and acting upon this question will transform your life. This question is magic because it helps you to easily embody three core secrets to happiness.

First, it focuses us on our intrinsic rather than our extrinsic goals. Extensive research has found that intrinsic goals (like personal growth, relationships, and giving) lead to lasting happiness. In the middle of this pandemic, the status of many of our extrinsic goals is out of our control. But our intrinsic goals are always within our control. You might want to be more kind, more patient, more deliberate. Who do you want to be?

Then, it asks us to take that big goal, and find a way to act upon it in a small way. Our self is the accumulation of millions of small acts. Many of these acts are not deliberate but the result of habits. Over time, we can embody our ideal self by using this question to keep us on course. It's hard to act on something vague like ‘be kind’. It's easier to identify one kind act for today (take in your neighbor's garbage bins, call grandma, text your friend.)

And finally, acting on your answer builds your sense of control. Dr. Martin Seligman discovered that our default response to challenges is helplessness. But practicing hope as a skill builds up a sense of control that protects us from feeling helpless. Achieving this small goal will create a positive upward spiral.

This question will build your hope, make you more resilient, and help you be your best self, one small act at a time.