22. Importance

Nothing is innately important; we ascribe value or importance to objects, people, activities, events, ideas, desires, etc. So, the area focuses on that process of assigning importance. We first examine how we ascribe importance, and then suggest some tips on how to reduce and increase importance.

 

What is important for me and why?

We should not take for granted that we know what is important to us and why. This can be easily distorted by pressures from other people, old habits, or a too narrow focus. For example, having a new garment or gadget may become important because your friends have them. News may become important because of a scrolling habit. Or, your daughter hitting the right keys on the piano may become more important at that moment than having a loving relationship with her. Examining what is really important to you, and why, can be a powerful tool to lead the life you want. The following questions may help you with that:

• Choose an object, person, event, activity or principle and ask yourself: “Why is this important for me?” Let’s say it is football. Why is this the case? Is it an old habit? Is it because it was important to your dad when you were growing up? Or is it because football is a refuge from the everyday grind?
• “What matters most in this case?” For example, time with friends may be more important than football as such. To find out, imagine going to a match on your own. Still important?

Remembering to ask yourself these questions in the heat of the moment can save you from unnecessary conflicts and making mistakes that you may regret later. Try it next time when you get annoyed with your partner or somebody else close to you. It will help you be more in charge of your responses. Once you are clearer about what really matters, you can set your priorities.

Setting priorities

This exercise can show you if you really prioritise your priorities:

The pyramid of priorities: for the purpose of this exercise you can draw your own ‘pyramids’ (the number of segments in each of the three levels can vary – those below are just an illustration).

• Place each item that matters to you (e.g. family, friends, health, job, religion, hobbies, etc.) on one level of the left pyramid: the most important one(s) on the top, medium important one(s) in the middle, and the less important one(s) at the bottom.
• In the upside-down pyramid write on top what takes most of your time, energy and attention, in the middle what takes less, and so on.
• Do the same things appear in the respective levels of both pyramids? If you find that you spend a lot of time on things that are not very important to you, you may want to make some changes (careful though: for example, your job may not be very important as such, but it may be essentail for support your family).

 

 

 

Regulating importance

Our state of mind depends not only on what is important to us but also on the extent to which it is important. The good news is that you can not only assign importance (or not), but you can increase or reduce it. Here is how.

Increasing importance

An attitude that nothing matters is sometimes adopted as a defence mechanism (against failure and disappointment) or to leave a ‘cool’ impression (of someone who is ‘above it all’). However, this easily turns into indifference or cynicism, and becomes a habit from which it is difficult to break out. It is accompanied by feeling bored, alienated, and demotivated most of the time. The following can help avoid or get out of that trap:

• Pay attention to the present moment. This may even save your life – most accidents happen because people don’t pay enough attention. Furthermore, you can easily have a more fulfilling life by simply not ignoring what is around you – after all, you only really live in the present.
• Don’t take anything for granted: when we take something for granted, we forget how valuable it actually is. If you suspect that you may be doing it, imagine for a moment that that thing or person has disappeared. How would you feel?
• Allow yourself to feel connected, not only to some people, but also to life in general, your town or country, photos or any objects that bring good memories, your profession, hobbies, and other activities, and yes, why not – the whole universe!
• Invest: the more you invest in something, the more important it becomes. So, invest whatever you can; it could be your time, thoughts, emotions, effort, money, etc.
• Allow yourself to get emotional about those things you want to increase their importance. Even negative emotions increase importance, although positive ones are better.
• Consider the value something that you want to care more about may have (e.g. your exams) – not only in the present but in the future, and not only for you, but for others, too.

Reducing importance

Some people ascribe too much importance across the board, which is stressful and exhausting, and makes the person vulnerable. If this applies to you, you need to put things in perspective:

• Zoom out: the more you focus on something, the more it becomes important, so take a broader perspective (you know that one, ‘in the grand scheme of things…’). When you put things in context, you spontaneously create distance, and what preoccupies you becomes smaller.
• Expand the time scale: ask yourself something like this, “Will this really matter tomorrow/next year/my deathbed?”
• Lighten up: don’t sweat the small stuff, as they say. Use humour if you notice that you are taking things too seriously.

A more common issue is giving too much importance to something specific. If unchecked, this can lead to an imbalance of importance: obsessing about the target, while neglecting other things in life. A typical example of that is forgetting everybody and everything else when starting a new romantic relationship. The following can help you be more in control in this respect:

• Imagination can amplify importance disproportionately, so ask yourself if getting worked up about something would make any difference. If not, try literally to stop imagining things.
• Devest time, thoughts, or emotions. For example, spend less time on social media or think about and invest emotionally less into somebody, and they will become less important.
• Something may be important for you because it makes you feel important. If this is the case, remember that self-importance is insatiable – the more you feed it, the more demanding it gets.
• Consider the importance of desires themselves. For example, the importance of having a new pair of shoes can be reduced if you reduce the importance of wanting.

 

The Goldilocks Principle

How do we put all these together? As a rule of thumb, it is best to keep importance within a certain range, as in the Goldilocks tale: not giving anything either too little or too much importance.