You can’t buy happiness… or can you?

One of the issues I hear most as a therapist is “there isn't enough time.” Not enough time for therapy, for self care, to spend time with your kids, to connect with your partner, to do everything required by your career even to eat or sleep the way you’d like to.  We all can relate.  In a busy busy busy modern life we never have enough time.  For many of us, the past few years have changed this as well.  Healthy work-life balance, not a strength of American life even before the pandemic, has become even more challenging with so many of us working from home.  Our kitchen tables or bedrooms are also our desks and our work may have crept slowly further and further into personal time.  

So, how do we fix this? 

Setting better boundaries and taking a critical look at our commitments can really help.  Even so, most of us still end up spending a lot of time doing menial chores and tasks that need to be done, but we don’t particularly enjoy.  According to this study, people who spend money on services that buy them more time report higher levels of happiness and life satisfaction than those who spend their money on possessions or experiences.  This is true across cultures and income brackets.  So, actually, you can buy happiness if you know where to spend your money.  Buying your way out of tasks that don’t bring you joy such as cleaning, grocery shopping, mowing the lawn, laundry or walking the dog?  All money in the happiness bank!  

So, why don’t more people do it?

We may feel guilty about paying someone else to do something we are perfectly capable of doing for ourselves, but the research is clear.  Spending money on possessions or even experiences doesn't come close to the boost in day to day life satisfaction that investing in a time saving service provides.  So go ahead, put aside your guilt and pay someone to run your errands.  Because really, what is more precious than more time?!