Do you know what you want to achieve in life?
There are a handful of people that know exactly what they want in life, but most people have only idealistic ideas about that.
“Idealistic ideas” means to aspire and dream to accomplish what you feel that you should work for or what you might get in a perfect world.
The world is not perfect, and your dreams and goals need to be something that you desire and not something that you should achieve because this is what society expects from you.
What could happen to you to get to a point where you feel you don’t want anything?
- First, you might believe that you are ungrateful for what you already have/ accomplished;
- Second, you feel pressured to work for goals that are not coming out of your passion, needs, desires, and aspirations but from what someone else wants from you;
- Third, you might lack the confidence to dream, aspire and wish out of the fear that you can’t achieve them.
- Fourth, you’ve been disappointed too many times in the past wanting things that never came to fruition.
- Fifth, you might have low self-esteem and think that you don’t deserve to get more of what you already have.
Related: The 10 Confidence Habits That Helped Me Increase Self-Esteem
What can you do to get out of not wanting (truly) anything?
1. Understand that being grateful for what you already have means not wanting even more.
Wanting more and more is not greed, it is a necessity. It is the way you stay alive.
It is not about owning more and more stuff; it is about holding more and more dreams and goals. Because having dreams and goals to accomplish and aspire to gives an added purpose to your life.
Having no dreams and goals pushes you into apathy and apathy is the last step towards losing the desire to live.
2. Set your own goals and pursue them.
People that love you want the best for you, and sometimes, their desire to help is misguided and misguiding.
Growing up, almost everything I want to accomplish was received with the “[that] is not for you” from my parents. The tone wasn’t saying the I couldn’t get that something, but that something never seemed good enough for me. My goals and dreams never seemed worthy enough of the effort needed.
When other people feel the need to dream for you, that could come from three reasons:
- Either they expect you to accomplish something that they’ve dreamed and couldn’t achieve
- Either, they feel that you have no dreams of your own,
- Either, they believe, strongly that you are much more capable than you think.
Improve your interpersonal skills so that you can start dreaming for yourself without alienating the people that love you.
3. Stop limiting yourself.
Your dreams and aspirations should know no boundaries. Allow your imagination to fly because imagining what you want gives you a great insight of how to get there.
Motivation and confidence, in my view, are overrated. Instead of being tools to achieve what you want, if you wait to have them before even daring to start dreaming, you might feel stuck.
It is a shame to have all those talents, abilities and knowledge that you have and not give yourself the chances to use them.
Stop conditioning your dreams and aspirations by how motivated or confident you might feel. Start putting a foot in front of the other and walk!
The road is yours, the dream is yours. And when you don’t feel confident or motivated for your goal, crave the experience of getting there no matter how far you believe you can get.
4. Dream big and dream small.
Set for yourself big goals and small goals so that you are in balance. Make sure that your dreams and goals depend only on you to achieve them.
Read also: Top 5 Habits of Successful People
5. Improve your self-esteem, acknowledge that you are a valuable person.
You are as worthy and as deserving to dream as the next person is.
If you still don’t feel that you want something more, something better, start by asking yourself:
- What is missing right now from your life?
- What would be the simplest, easiest goal you can achieve today?
- What was the biggest dream in your childhood that you never get to achieve? No matter how childish could sound now, do it.
Related: Defining What You Don’t Want in Life and The Path to The Ideal Lifestyle
Remember, you have the right to dream and dreaming provides an added purpose to your life.
In case you need some inspiration to get started, here are the 23 keys to success that will get you where you want to be in life:
The 23 Keys to Success in Life
What about you? Have you defined what you want in life? What’s the next step to getting there?
About The Author
This is a guest post by Carmen Jacob, co-founder of SelfImprovement.org. She is the creator of several personal growth programs, courses, and books, which focus on using what you already have to improve your life and the life of those around you.