Stressing about your bucket list? Maybe it's time to start a 'chuck-it list'

How do you define happiness and success? Are you pursuing goals because they make you feel fulfilled, or do you feel pressure to finish what you started?

While bucket lists can be a fun way to track long-awaited experiences, it may be mentally healthier to drop some goals into a "chuck-it list", said University of Minnesota philosophy professor Valerie Tiberius.

Tiberius discovered chuck-it lists from her father, who playfully uses a more explicit turn-of-phrase. In his older stage of life, he's realized some bucket-list items won't get crossed off and feels relieved to let them go.

"I think partly the process of being in middle age and aging makes you think about these questions," said Tiberius, who specializes in philosophy of well-being. "'What are the right goals?' 'How should I think about my life as I age, the list of goals that I've had and whether they need to be modified?'"

Tiberius believes happiness comes from achieving things you actively want to accomplish, an idea she explores in her newest book, "What Do You Want Out of Life? A Philosophical Guide to Figuring Out What Matters."

Whether it be a tropical getaway, a thrill-seeking activity, a job title or a personal milestone, chasing a bucket list item should bring you joy. If the thought of completing a goal evokes feelings of obligation, stress or anxiety, it may be time to re-evaluate if that aspiration fits into your life, she said.

The first step in transitioning items to a chuck-it list is identifying goals that compete with one another. Often this means one objective is taking up personal resources — like time, money or energy — that make it difficult to reach other goals.

"I sort of think human nature is goal-seeking nature," she said. "We're also creatures that, because we have such complex brains, we have lots of goals that often conflict with each other."

To resolve the internal battle that comes from this conflict, Tiberius said people should consider what drives them toward their goals: their values. Recognizing values such as family, relationships, leisure or career success can help an individual prioritize their aspirations and chuck items of lesser importance.

However, Tiberius said this process isn't always that simple.

"Often, the conflict is between things that you can't just chuck one," she said. "You have to keep them both, but you can find ways of making compromises so that they fit better together."

A common example is work-life balance. According to Tiberius, the key to managing multiple high-priority goals is to be flexible in the attention you devote to them as your life changes.

For example, Tiberius said her career used to be No. 1 in her life, even though she also deeply values family. Now that she's established in her field and her parents are aging, she's shifted her focus to them.

"I'm not going to tell my dad not to visit because I need to write," she said. "Twenty years ago when I was up for tenure and I had to publish, I would have said, 'Sorry, Dad, I've got to work on these papers.' But now I'm like, 'Who knows how much time I have left with him?' And so, publishing can wait."

Tiberius acknowledged that releasing goals is often an emotional process, but said it's important that people experiencing this aren't too hard on themselves. This kind of change might be necessary. Plus, there could be alternative ways to find pleasure in previous goals.

"My neighbor's take on it, which I really like, was that if it was some valuable activity that you did, like for her playing piano, you can still be happy that that music exists," she said. "And the same could be true for certain athletic endeavors. You can watch people run and think it's great what a human being can do."

The act of moving items from a bucket list to a chuck-it list can feel liberating, she said. Tiberius said reflecting on her priorities and how she's investing in them reminds her what matters most.

"I find that a helpful thing to do when I'm feeling like things are out of sorts and things aren't going well or I'm stressed," she said. "To just kind of remind myself: 'Like right now, I have a plan to see my dad. I have a plan to see my mom. Those were my priorities. That's good.' And it makes me feel grounded to think about those things."

Jessy Rehmann is a University of Minnesota student reporter on assignment for the Star Tribune. Reach her at Jessy.Rehmann@startribune.com.