Anticipation and planning can help you enjoy life more

Alle Pierce knows how to plan a vacation. A few months earlier, she “goes on a Google orgy,” putting together a spreadsheet of all the things she wants to do and see. She examines the menus of the restaurants she plans to visit. She uses a photo of the destination as her phone screen lock and downloads a countdown app.

“What’s most exciting about a trip is the anticipation around it,” said Pierce, founder of a luxury travel company called Gals Abroad Getaways, which plans trips for women’s groups. Experts say she’s probably right. Several studies suggest that having something to look forward to in advance improves mood and reduces stress.

“Imagining good things ahead makes us feel better in the present moment,” said Simon A. Rego, chief psychologist at Montefiore Medical Center and Albert Einstein College of Medicine, who has written extensively on the effect of anticipation on mood. “It can increase motivation, optimism and patience and decrease irritability.”

Of course, we can’t just book a plane ticket every time we need a little excitement. But there are ways to harness and incorporate the power of expectation into everyday life.

Get excited about lots of little things

Thinking ahead of a handful of delicious little experiences can be as pleasant as waiting for a big event, said Carrie L. Wyland, a social psychologist at Tulane University in New Orleans.

“At the end of each day, write down one thing that cheers you up for tomorrow,” she said. “Maybe it’s a new book, candy, or a package you’ve been waiting for.”

The accumulation of these mini-emotions means you’ll still reap the benefits of waiting for something, even if it’s not a huge reward, said Christian E. Waugh, a professor of psychology at Wake Forest University who studies expectations.

“Also, with things getting closer, there’s a greater sense that they’re going to happen for sure,” he said. “You have more control over a small meeting tonight than a vacation in six months.”

Connect with your future self

Have you ever walked by a house for sale and immediately imagined yourself serving a nice cheese platter on the terrace, perhaps dressed in some kind of fabulous caftan?

When Torrie Lloyd-Masters, co-founder of the interior design business A Home At Last, prepares a house for sale, “we’re going to show people what life would be like if they lived here,” she said. “We’re essentially saying, ‘This could be your future.'”

It works because it’s appealing to imagine yourself as the kind of person who always has a bouquet of tulips on the kitchen table. Research has shown that feeling like you’re on your way to your “future self” can have a positive effect on your well-being by pulling you out of short-term thinking. Thinking ahead can help you prioritize your health and perhaps even act more ethically.

While it’s fun to daydream about your future self, the concrete steps you need to take to get there can be intimidating. Maybe your future self wants to be fluent in French, but the present self can barely order a croissant.

Start by clarifying the things you value most in life, then set goals around them, said Dr. Trench. If your priority is getting fit and healthy as you age, maybe your goal is to run 5K. But don’t wait to feel motivated before you take the first step.

Instead, when you do something toward your goal, “focus on how motivated you feel afterward, not before,” he said. As you start to see progress, it will get easier: you will look forward to doing the things that will bring you closer to your future self.

A slight bribe can do wonders

Anyone who has taken a child for a flu shot and then for ice cream knows the power of building anticipation for something you don’t want to do by combining it with something you do want to do.

In a 2013 study on “temptation bundling” [agregar tentações, em tradução livre – quando se associa uma tarefa que a pessoa não quer fazer com algo prazeroso durante ou ao final dela], participants were given an iPod loaded with audiobooks that they could only listen to in the gym if they exercised 51% more than those who didn’t receive the iPod. It was so encouraging that when the study ended, 61% of participants said they would pay to have access to the audiobooks only at the gym.

To build anticipation for the group vacation she leads, Pierce sends clients a month in advance detailed lists of the appropriate clothing to bring. “I’m just as excited about the clothes I’m going to wear on the trip as I am about the trip itself,” she said.

But the promise of a new shirt works just as well for things you’re not into. In the spirit of dressing for the feeling you want to have, not the feeling you have, Pierce recommends using fashion subscription services like Rent the Runway to try out a new look in an affordable way.

“Let’s say you have a work presentation that makes you nervous,” she said. “If you also have a new outfit that you’re dying to wear, you’ll have a more positive expectation.”

Focus on experiences

Several studies have also suggested that we get more happiness from anticipating experiential rather than material acquisitions. Raising anticipation is an important gimmick for Lydia Fenet, a charity auctioneer who has raised more than $500 million in her career.

If the prize is a dinner with a celebrity, for example, she will paint a picture of all the ways the dinner can go. Maybe you and the celebrity will become friends. Perhaps they will become your child’s godparents. Maybe you’ll spend the next few decades doing fancy celebrity stuff together, like taking great-lit selfies on private jets.

“And when I’m about to hit the hammer and sell the lot, I turn to the audience and say, ‘So they’re going to have dinner with their new best friend George Clooney at Gramercy Tavern, and you’ll be sitting at home eating pizza'” , said Fenet.

Dinner with Clooney aside, you can still maximize anticipation before an experience like a date. Choose an activity that is meaningful to you or a place you want to show the other person, said Erika Kaplan, vice president of affiliates for the Three Day Rule couples service. “So you’re looking forward to two things,” she explained. “The date itself, but also introducing the other person to your world and seeing how they react.”

Anxiety and anticipation can coexist

The flip side of positive expectation is anticipatory anxiety — and what’s more fascinating, Waugh said, is that they often happen together. “Anxiety and arousal are sister emotions,” he said. “Think about when you’re going to get married or have your first child. It’s a mixture of both.”

But it’s only harmful “when you only focus on the anxiety part and neglect the arousal part,” he added. The key is to recognize the happy and positive aspect of what you are doing along with the nervous feelings. Studies suggest that “when you re-evaluate anxious things as exciting, it actually makes you feel better about them,” Waugh said.

Do something

If parties are something you expect, don’t wait for a holiday to celebrate — just make one up, said Megan White, an event planner in Savannah, Georgia. Throw a birthday party for the dog or make a pancake breakfast for all the kids on your street.

“Think of ways to make occasions special even when there aren’t any,” she said. (Need inspiration? Bow Tie Day, Lasagna Day, and Cat Hug Day are coming this summer, and International Talk Like a Pirate Day is in September.)

Whether it’s a party, a gift, or a to-do list, anticipation can be a powerful tool for manipulating our emotions.

When TV writer Anna Beth Chao writes an episode for Netflix’s “You,” she always tries “to end with something so you’re like, ‘Oh my God, I need to see what happens next,'” she said.

When she gets stuck, she just tells herself a story about the characters and sees where it goes. It’s a tactic she repurposes in her personal life to wait for something she dreads, like the four-day road trip she just took from Los Angeles to her home in New Orleans.

“Basically, I tell myself a little story about what might happen,” she said. “If you frame it as ‘Well, what if it’s an adventure?’ it’s easier to get excited.”

Translated by Luiz Roberto M. Gonçalves