A middle-aged man takes a sick day off from work even though he is not sick. His job is going well enough. He just needs a break. At home his partner is at work and the kids are at school. He is alone, but he cannot seem to relax. He watches something on Netflix but wanders away uninterested. He is feeling restless, a little moody, and wondering where his life is going. He thinks briefly about starting up a hobby or dusting off his violin from the garage, but can't bring himself to rally for any of these options. Tomorrow, when he returns to work, things will feel more-or-less okay again. Not great, just okay.
Although psychologists have been studying languishing for some twenty years (see Keyes, 2002, NIH, The Mental Health Continuum: From Languishing to Flourishing in Life), it is only quite recently that the condition has become generally recognized. Like anxiety and depressive disorder, languishing at its most fundamental level is a mask that screens a person from the reality of his or her situation and inhibits effective action. In his 2014 book Fear: Essential Wisdom for Getting Through the Storm, Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh explains the distorted thinking at work:
“What should we do in these circumstances? We think we have to remove that feeling or emotion to be free again, so the beautiful sunrise can penetrate us. We consider our fear, anger, and worries as enemies. We think that without them we would be free, and that these feelings get in the way so we cannot receive the nourishment we need. It is in moments like this that we stick to our mindful breathing and gently recognize our afflictions, whether anger, frustration, or fear.”
If you are unfamiliar with mindfulness practices, this may seem like a simplistic solution to a difficult problem. Let’s take a closer look at the nature of languishing and perhaps we may come to understand the power of mindful interventions.
When an individual is handling everyday challenges well, making progress in life, and sustaining a generally positive mood, we say that she or he is flourishing. When this individual fails to accomplish even the most minor everyday tasks, his or her mood is low and he or she cannot seem to get a handle on life, we call this languishing. Although both men and women experience this mental state at times, certain men appear particularly susceptible.
Psychologists are beginning to identify languishing and its relationship to mental resilience. Think of flourishing as the opposite of depression. While languishing is not quite like depression, and not even a diagnosed mental health disorder, it is nevertheless real and may be easily overlooked. We can say that languishing falls somewhere between depression and flourishing. It is the sense of just getting by, and very possibly a lack of joy in your life.
Languishing is characterized by certain common traits:
- Lack of motivation
- Foggy thinking, feeling unfocused
- Low enthusiasm about life
- Feelings of emptiness
- Dullness and ennui
- Not highly engaged or passionate about work or school
Depending on their severity and level of distress, these same traits may be signs of depression or anxiety. But psychologists are beginning to recognize that some men encounter moments in life in a state of languishing, and yet they are suffering from neither depression nor anxiety. Who are these individuals and what's going on with them?
Three groups of men appear particularly susceptible: young men in the post-secondary school or college years, middle-age men at mid-career, and older men approximately five-to-ten years following retirement. Certain life circumstances are related to each of these age groupings. Each group is challenged by a sense of “what’s next,” lost as it were amid a dizzying array of possibilities, or conversely, perceiving a lack of attractive options. Some of these men are experiencing languishing.
Research is beginning to focus on mental resilience as the crucial link among these groups. Mental resilience refers to a person's ability to adapt to change and uncertainty. People who are mentally resilient are flexible and calm in the face of challenges, they tend to be proactive about opportunities, and they possess positive coping strategies ready to go when needed.
It is interesting that both languishing and mental resilience were deeply impacted by the Covid pandemic in 2020, although as we have seen research into each began much earlier. With the closings of schools and businesses during the first year of Covid, many people fell into a state of languishing. And some individuals became depressed or seriously anxious. Researchers now are beginning to link the onset of these serious mental health disorders with variations in mental resilience.
Those who are more resilient are less likely to become depressed or anxious even confronted by such strained circumstances as the Covid lock-downs. Fortunately we all have the ability to boost our resilience. Corey Keyes in his recently published book Languishing: How to Feel Alive Again in a World That Wears Us Down (2024) outlines a range of tactics and experiences that may enhance resilience:
- Meditation: beginning a daily practice
- Flow: work or hobbies that bring about a state of flow
- Exercise: regular activity that makes you sweat
- Exploring creativity: from writing to the arts, anything that enlists your creativity
- Connection: boosting one’s social connections beyond the family
- Learning new skills: the act and practice of learning
- Small daily achievements: to counteract the brain's negativity bias
- Savoring experiences: deepening the connections to your experiences
- Changing your environment: for even just a short time each day
- Doing good for others: join a project that will help others in your community
In Zen terms, these are all “nourishments” for your state of mind and each counteracts languishing in a slightly different way. Your mood is never directly confronted. Rather, each technique helps you to recognize the languishing state of mind, and by extending recognition, you may open your heart to the languishing mood and gently shift attention to more positive outlooks.
The first step is performing a deliberate self-assessment. If you are experiencing any kind of depressed, anxious or languishing mood, select a new resilience-enhancing practice from the list featured here.
Move forward and don’t look back.
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