Sometimes, we go through seasons in our lives when we are just going through the motions on autopilot, without realizing that our lives have slowly drifted off course. We end up feeling so empty and unhappy to the point that we start believing that maybe this is just how life is supposed to feel now.
We think about making a change but somehow the mere thought of doing something just immediately sucks out the very little motivation left in us.
This is exactly what I have been feeling for the past year. Before the year started, I had all these plans and goals. I made a checklist of everything I wanted to do to improve my life, finances, and health.
But then everything took a turn when one of my plans didn’t work out. You know the feeling when you keep trying and trying to make it work but regardless of what you do or how hard you try, you still end up failing?
That’s what happened to me. I felt so disappointed and I kept telling myself that I’ll just put these goals and plans on hold for just a few weeks then weeks turned into months. I didn’t realize that all the effort and hard work that I did at the beginning of the year had just faded into the background.
I kept thinking that maybe I just needed more time and that maybe I just needed to rest but I knew deep down that sooner or later I had to face the reality that what I was doing was not resting, I was just simply stuck.
I knew that this wasn’t where I wanted to be but it was just so difficult to push myself to do something and make a change. I thought that maybe I just had to wait for that motivation and drive to come back.
But I was wrong to think that. One of the things that I’ve learned is that sometimes our motivation and our drive don’t really come back. We can’t keep waiting for the day when we wake up finally feeling that drive and determination again because honestly it might never come.
I’ve learned that sometimes the best thing that we can do is to just start moving. Getting our life back on track doesn’t have to be this one huge overwhelming change that we have to make right away. It can be these small little changes that we make every single day.
In this blog post, I will be sharing with you simple daily changes I’ve made to help get my life back on track. These changes are small and manageable making it less overwhelming and so much easier for us to stick with them.
I’m hoping that these small changes can also help you get back on track.
How to get your life back on track
1. Revisit your goals
One of the mistakes that I have made was thinking that I still needed to follow through with some of my goals from last year even though I knew deep down that they were no longer aligned with the life that I wanted.
If you feel the same way too, please know that there is absolutely nothing wrong with letting go of your goals and changing your priorities. Doing this doesn’t mean that you are a failure or a quitter. We are always changing, alongside that, our goals, aspirations, and dreams also change and evolve.
If we continue to push ourselves to keep going after those goals that we really no longer want, we are not only wasting our efforts but we are also keeping ourselves in a path that we don’t want to be on.
Getting our life back on track is about making changes today that can help us live the life that we really want in the future. For us to be able to do that, we have to be honest with ourselves. Take some time to sit down and revisit your goals, reflect, and ask yourself if this is truly what you still want or are you just doing this because it is expected of you.
2. Lower the bar on one task today
One of the reasons that getting our life back on track is so difficult is that often we have this notion that every step that we make towards our goals needs to be perfect. I was guilty of this too. I had this all-or-nothing mindset that I kept projecting onto every task or decision that I made.
I kept believing that for me to make my goals a reality, I had to do every task perfectly. It was either that or I should just not do it in the first place. I thought that this type of mindset was helping me succeed but in reality, it was only keeping me stuck. I was so terrified of failing that I would rather choose to do nothing than to try and fail.
If you feel the same way, please know that constantly aiming for perfection is not helping your growth. It’s not helping you improve your life, achieve your dreams, and become happier.
It’s only keeping you stuck, stressed, and unhappy. It’s okay to make mistakes. Human as we are, we are all bound to fail and to stumble. What matters is we stand up and keep trying.
Moving forward, please give yourself permission to lower the bar on the tasks that you need to do. Instead of constantly avoiding them because you are so afraid that you wouldn’t be able to do them perfectly tackle them now with the mindset that done is better than perfect.
Remind yourself that doing something even if it’s not perfect is so much better than constantly worrying about not being able to do it perfectly. The important thing is that you do something and you move forward. That’s one of the things that will truly help you get your life back on track.
3. List your top 3 priorities
One important step that helped me get my life back on track is identifying my priorities. I realized that some things that I considered important to me last year were no longer that important to me now. Now that my circumstances have changed and I’ve gone through some low points in life.
I know that often we continue to give so much of ourselves to things, relationships, passions, and goals that we have always considered important to us. I did this too. It took some time for me to realize that those things that I thought were still important to me, did not give me the same sense of meaning and fulfillment that they once gave me.
Instead of actually making me excited about life, they were only draining my energy. That’s why it’s so important to take some time to reflect on the things that are important to you in this stage of your life. What might have been important to you last year, may not be what matters to you today.
And that’s perfectly okay. Give yourself some time to sit down and ask yourself: What are the three things that matter to me now?
Be honest about your answer. Make sure that you are choosing the priorities that truly matter to you and not the priorities that are expected of you.
Once you have chosen your top 3 priorities. Use this list as your reminder of which decisions and tasks deserve your attention. Doing this will help you give a sense of direction and clarity on what steps to take next.
4. Write down everything that’s currently stressing you out.
This step is certainly one of my favorites. When I was still thinking about how to get my life back on track, I was plagued with so many negative thoughts, what-ifs, and worries.
It became so bad to the point that it paralyzed me. I was overwhelmed and stressed and that made doing something even more difficult. This is where this step has become such a lifesaver.
When we are deep in our train of negative thoughts, it can be so difficult to see things clearly and rationally. We end up thinking about the worst possible scenarios and it just makes everything even more difficult to handle. Writing them down helps us break free from the negative thoughts.
I don’t know how but in some way, writing down everything that is causing me stress, all my worries and what-ifs, somehow helps me reclaim a sense of control and lessens the chaos in my mind. It makes those problems less overwhelming and manageable.
It’s like the moment that I write them down, I realize that some of these problems that have been causing me so much stress are not really something that I need to solve right now. It gives me a chance to see things from a different perspective and it makes me realize that some of the things that I was so worried about are actually things that were out of my control.
The next time that you feel overwhelmed, try this, get a piece of paper and just write down everything that you are worried about. You don’t have to worry about perfect grammar. It doesn’t need to have a structure. Just write down your thoughts.
Once you’ve written everything down. Go through them one by one and ask yourself: Is there something that I can do now to help solve this problem or is this problem out of my control?
I know that doing this does not really make our problems disappear but it does give us a chance to breathe and to think clearly, without having so many thoughts running through our heads.
5. Spend 15 minutes on the task that you have been avoiding
One of the most difficult things in getting our lives back on track is to actually push ourselves to tackle the task that we have been avoiding for so long.
One trick that has helped me with this problem is telling myself that I don’t have to complete the task immediately. I just need to spend 15 minutes on it. That’s it.
By giving myself permission to spend only a limited time on it, I’m making the task less intimidating and more manageable. I know how difficult it can be to start something that you have put on hold for a long time. That’s why the key here is not to push yourself to complete it right away or do a whole lot of things in one go.
You have to make each task feel less overwhelming for you to actually have the strength to do it. I’ve learned that giving myself permission to start something without the pressure of completing it immediately or doing it perfectly, makes it so much easier for me to actually do it.
And honestly, when I actually start doing the task with the permission of just doing it for only 15 minutes, it just makes it less scary which helps me turn that 15 minutes into 30 minutes or sometimes just finishing the task.
And even if you don’t finish the task, please know that the amount of time that you spend on it still matters because instead of avoiding it like you usually do, this time you finally started it.
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6. Journal for at least 5 minutes about how you’re feeling
When we are just going through the motions of our lives on autopilot we tend to easily forget to check in with ourselves. We keep on going through our days like everything is just perfectly fine but deep down, we know that we feel so empty and disconnected, and we don’t know why.
This is where this activity comes in. I’ve learned that getting our lives back on track is not only about taking the necessary steps towards our goals. It’s also about reconnecting with who we are and who we are becoming.
For us to truly know what we want and which direction to take, we have to allow ourselves to pause and check in with what we are currently feeling.
Pick a spot that’s cozy and comfy. A spot where there are no distractions. I know that some of us love to write things in the notes app on our phones. I actually love to do this too but for this activity, I learned that it’s best to stick with the basics, just a pen and paper.
That way, we can avoid any distractions. Like messages or notifications just popping up. Once you have your pen and paper, just write what you are currently feeling. If you need a guide to help you get started. I found that these questions helped me, maybe they can help you too.
What am’I truly feeling right now?
What has been stressing me out so much lately?
What do I want to achieve before the year ends?
What are my worries?
What’s stopping me from moving forward?
Remind yourself that the key here is just to be honest with yourself. You don’t have to worry about sentence structure or choosing the perfect words. You are doing this just for you. There’s no judgment here.
7. Name that one relationship that currently costs you more energy than it gives
This step was definitely a hard one for me. You see, I have always been terrified of change. I like things just the way they are. Often, it doesn’t really matter how unhappy or miserable I already am, I’ll still choose to stay in the familiar and comfortable rather than step into something new.
I’ve held on to so many toxic relationships in the past because I was so afraid to let go of that sense of familiarity and comfort. But the hard truth is, the longer that we keep holding on to people who are only costing ourselves our peace of mind and happiness, the longer we are also keeping ourselves stuck in a place that doesn’t support our growth and happiness.
Now, I’m not saying that you need to cut off that person immediately. The first step is just to identify those people. Those relationships that you have that now feel unhealthy and one-sided.
These were some of the questions that helped me with this step.
Who leaves me feeling drained and mentally exhausted after every conversation?
Who makes me question my worth every time I’m with them?
I know that these questions can be uncomfortable but please know that you can’t build a better and happier life, if you are still holding on to the relationships that are costing you your peace, mental health, and happiness.
Please remember that you are allowed to outgrow people. You are allowed to choose your peace of mind and prioritize it. You are allowed to set healthy boundaries.
8. Sit with a feeling you’ve been pushing down for a long time
I have always been guilty of bottling up my emotions and running away from what I was truly feeling. This has always been my coping mechanism. Every time, I go through the lowest points of my life, even grieving the loss of a loved one, I have always found it so difficult to sit with the uncomfortable feeling and to let myself feel.
So, instead of facing those emotions, I bottle them up thinking that if I just bottle them up long enough then maybe they will eventually go away. But of course, that’s not really the case.
Bottling up our emotions doesn’t make them go away. We can only push them down for so long before they all come out all at once, making it more difficult for us to face them.
For us to be able to get our lives back on track, we must also give ourselves a safe space to heal and we can only truly do that if we finally allow ourselves to feel those emotions that we have been pushing down for so long.
I know that you may think that you don’t need to sit with those feelings to heal and move forward, I thought that too, for a long time.
But the truth is, no matter how much we try to convince ourselves that we have already healed from the things that broke us without actually feeling them and sitting with them, those emotions don’t go away. They linger.
We can keep pretending that we are fine but we have to remind ourselves that healing is not about pretending that some things didn’t hurt and break us. It’s about giving ourselves the chance to acknowledge that those things did.
I’ve learned that the moment that we stop running away from the things that broke us and give ourselves the space to sit with it, even if it’s hard and uncomfortable, is also the moment that we start to heal, little by little.
During this step, please be gentle with yourself. Allow yourself to feel everything without any judgement or guilt. Please know that just because you have sat with those uncomfortable emotions doesn’t mean that you have to rush yourself to heal right away or to be okay immediately.
Healing takes time, and it’s certainly not linear. There will be days when you feel like you are making so much progress, but there will also be moments when you feel like you’ve taken three steps back. During those moments, remind yourself that what you are going through is normal and no, you did not fail.
9. Make tomorrow easier tonight
I know a lot of people are already doing this and if you are not one of those people, this may be the perfect time to do so. I realized that one of the easiest ways to feel like we are taking control of our lives, even just a little, is by making our mornings easier.
My mornings were always rushed. It was chaotic and I was usually overwhelmed with all the tasks that I still needed to do. You see, I don’t really like waking up early. I know some people wake up 30 minutes to an 1 hour earlier every day just to get everything done without feeling rushed or overwhelmed.
I tried that but that really was not for me. So, this step of preparing everything I needed before going to bed has been a great way of making my mornings less overwhelming and stressful.
I know that this is just a really simple step but I’ve learned that when we already feel so overwhelmed and unmotivated with everything, giving ourselves a sense of control over something so simple can give us that boost of confidence that we need to start believing that maybe we can tackle harder and bigger things too.
So, try this tonight. Prepare the clothes you need tomorrow. Clean the kitchen. Wash those dishes. Put your keys in the right place. Have all the breakfast ingredients ready. Ask yourself, what’s one thing that I can do tonight to make my life tomorrow easier?
10. Remind yourself that it’s okay to feel what you’re feeling now
When I finally admitted to myself that I don’t know what I’m doing with my life anymore, the first reaction that I had was thinking that I was a failure and that I was never good at anything because I let this happen to me.
If you feel the same way too, please allow me to tell you that you are not a failure. Give yourself grace and compassion. Know that everyone in this world, goes through seasons in their lives where they feel lost and stuck, regardless of how put together they may seem on the outside.
Just because you are feeling lost, confused, and unmotivated doesn’t mean that you are not good enough. I know that it can be tempting to blame yourself for feeling this way. I did that too for a long time.
But I realized that constantly punishing ourselves for not being where we thought we should be by now, is not really going to help us get our lives back on track. Being our own worst critic will only diminish our confidence and it will only make things even more overwhelming.
It’s time to stop punishing yourself and remind yourself that it’s not too late to start over. It’s not too late to try again. It’s not too late to still build that life that you wanted.
Please know that you are capable. You are enough and that you are worthy. You have this invaluable strength within you that will help you go through adversities.
Final Thoughts
I hope that some of the steps have resonated with you and help you get your life back on track. Before I end this post, I just want to acknowledge the strength you have to admit to yourself that you are lost and that you are not where you want to be right now.
I know how difficult it can be to admit that. Give yourself the credit that you deserve. It was not easy admitting that and it was even harder to start looking for ways to change things and yet here you are, you have already done the first step.
That alone is proof that you can do hard things. Keep going. Through this journey, please never forget to be kind to yourself. Especially on days when you feel like you are not making any progress. Remind yourself that this is not a race. Take your time.
Just take it one day at a time. The important thing is you keep trying. You got this. Please know that I’m always rooting for you.
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