Living Fully is the Most Important Decision

Living fully isn't a state, but a process to understand that you're more than what you've done or achieved. It's what you bring along, to appreciate your magical essence, and understand that you're a very precious asset.

Reviewed and approved by the psychologist Valeria Sabater.

Written by Valeria Sabater

Last update: 28 July, 2022

Living fully is possible thanks to the appreciation of what you have, everything you’ve experienced, and what you are. Now, the art of fulfillment also enables you to be entrepreneurial, explorer of better paths by feeling empowered by any given experience, self-love, and personal security. Few psychological states are as enriching as they are powerful.

The poet T. S Eliot once said that the fullness the human heart longs for is always available. However, people seldom notice it. Furthermore, you also don’t know how to reach that dimension. This is because, in many cases, you fail to understand a key aspect: you can only fill yourself if you make space for it.

It’s about letting go of the anxiety of not having certain things. To realize you’re richer than you think. Quench the fear of losing certain dimensions, people, or objects only to discover that, sometimes, you’re better off without many of them. Fullness is, after all, an awakening and, above all, an awareness of who you are in order to have greater balance in your life.

It’s common to hear that this dimension comes at a certain stage in your life cycle, which is the product of maturity. In recent years, people pay attention to the 50s and 60s, when the human being, supposedly, had a higher degree of psychological well-being. Well, nothing is absolute when it comes to age.

Sooner or later, each person reaches a peak of personal development and fulfillment in their time and day. Others, however, never reach that peak. Continue reading to look at the data.

Living fully, in balance, and satisfied

Living fully isn’t a state. It isn’t about reaching the peak of Abraham Maslow’s pyramid of needs. The places where self-realization resides and thinking that everything ends there, that you’ve conquered happiness. In reality, living fully is an actual process: being part of the movement of life feeling strong and empowered for what may come.

Therefore, you’re not facing a dimension of personal development that’s easy to achieve or conquer. Furthermore, there’s a constant interest in understanding how people face these events in such complex times from the social sciences. Social psychology wants to understand, more than ever, what your internal resources for achieving well-being are.

Thus, Princeton University psychologist Daniel Kahneman often says that much of this research has a curious problem: people can’t give an exact definition of happiness. However, in a study that he personally conducted and published in the magazine Sciencie as “Would you be happier if you were richer?”, he showed something rather interesting that, apparently, most people are clear about.

In this study, Dr. Kahneman revealed that, on average, people know that money doesn’t bring happiness. In fact, they also know that happiness isn’t the same as personal fulfillment. In reality, something that most people aspire to is precisely this last dimension: to feel full, fulfilled, in balance with themselves and their own life.

What are the keys to living fully?

Living fully is the opposite of living in a vacuum. You experience this last state when your discouragement, anguish, fear, and feeling of loneliness grow. It’s clear that, somehow, you’ll always be dealing with these psychological realities. However, those who work on their fulfillment daily are better able to handle these situations.

Here’s how to reach and develop this dimension.

You’re not what you do but what you carry within

Rarely do people ask themselves: “What do I bring into my being?” Often, people define themselves by what they do or what they’ve gone through (I’m a nurse, I’m a mechanic, etc). Now, in order to live fully, you must become aware of what you carry within your personality; what defines you.

For example, “I’m passionate, hopeful, optimistic, and determined. I have my compassion as a nurse, my love for my family, my satisfaction for what I am, and have achieved, etc.”

Feel present in the here and now with all its possibilities

Living fully isn’t a state of mind, but rather a process, and, above all, an attitude. It’s to be clear on what you carry within and use it to make the most of the present, the here and now.

Connect with your reality to enjoy your passionate side. Likewise, if you’re affectionate, then take care of your own; connect with your loved ones in the present moment. Take advantage of every second to continue experiencing things and feeling alive. Especially if you’re the curious type and enjoy learning by doing.

It’s all as you see it, to achieve a harmony between what you are and what’s around you. Living fully is about not missing what you don’t have or dreading any excess you might possess. It’s about feeling empowered to accept what you can’t change, to have the courage to transform what you can change, and to continue progressing without losing your personal balance.