If you’re often thinking ‘I want to change my life.’, here’s something you might be forgetting. You’re changing. All the time.
If you realize that and are doing something about it, great.
If you don’t even think about it, then you’re changing for the worse.
We live in a world where nothing is certain. In any given moment there are tens of outer factors, circumstances, other people and natural outcomes involved. And you can’t control most of the things around you.
What you can control, though, is the direction you choose, the change you experience, and whether tomorrow you’ll be a better version of yourself, or not.
I Want to Change My Life: Where Do I Start?
It all starts with the realization that you want something more out of life, that you’re capable of much more, that you can live better and actually deserve it.
This means that you aren’t satisfied with your current situation any more. You don’t like your life enough, and are tired of having average results and being this version of yourself.
Don’t be depressed. That’s a great thing. Because you just found your reason.
Even if the only thing you did was to feel bad about not having achieved much, not living by the standards you want, or having too many things you don’t like in your life, you’re on the right path.
It all starts with not being satisfied.
Because once you feel this way, you start imagining what it could be if you changed your current situation.
You begin to create different versions of your life and who you are. You start visualizing being a better person, having good habits, more willpower and determination, setting higher goals and achieving them, being focused, becoming a role model. And eventually replacing the lifestyle you lead with a luxurious and much better one.
Or just leaving your daily routine with all the worries and problems, and moving to another country and starting to work for yourself, for example.
And this vision makes you feel stronger and motivated, makes things look possible, and even a small amount of hope rises.
You may forget about it an hour later, but the discontent with your life won’t be gone. It will appear again tomorrow, and the day after that. And you’ll develop this imaginary scenario more and more.
And it will lead to…
Taking The Decision to Change Your Life
Decisions are powerful.
I believe that making it clear that you want something and deciding to take action in order to get it is an inevitable step to changing your life for the better.
Be specific
Where do I start if I want to change my life? With a plan!
A plan will help you achieve the stuff you want. It will guide you through the journey, will consist of clear steps to take every day and you will know exactly what you need to do even when you feel discouraged.
So write down the thing you want. Consider your values, strengths, desires, dreams, current results, best practices that have worked out so far, how others have succeeded, etc.
Here’s a great explanation of what goal setting means by Ludwig from StartGainingMomentum:
“Your strategic objective is a to-the-point document where you describe specifically what you are doing to accomplish your goals over the next year.
Your strategic objective is the system that ensures you know what you will do, how you will do it and when you will do it…
Goal-setting should be:
• Adjusted to your own level of understanding (relevance)
• Paced to your current level of motivation (difficulty)
• Repeated and visualized consistently to become self-fueling (brainwashing)
Goal-setting should also be:
• Made measurable (what gets measured gets done)
• Made actionable by setting a daily minimum quota of work
• Made so that, if possible, it involves a visual element to trick your brain that the goal is not only doable, but already a reality.”
You can’t really get anywhere if you don’t have a direction, a step-to-step process and a final goal to focus on.
Now that you do, every action of yours will be connected to it. And when in doubt when taking a decision, you’ll just choose the one that corresponds with your goal.
All this helps you see the bigger picture, think long term, become serious about your change, and actually start doing something about it.
Things to Do to Change Your Life
Whatever the change you want to make happen is, you’ll need to become another person, too.
As your current self can only achieve so much with these qualities and experience.
But in order to move forward, you’ll need to develop new skills and habits, gain knowledge and change your approach, thinking and attitude.
After some time (if you stay focused and on track), you’ll have boosted your motivation, confidence and concentration, and this itself will make you take opportunities you would otherwise never consider.
It will help you speak up, get out there, find other people that can help you with your goals.
Then you’ll start trying new things and thus facing your fears, you’ll become open to new ideas, will have more experience and initiative.
So here are some things to start working on now that will help you with your transformation and will eventually become the pillars of your success:
Change your habits
The actions you take daily determine your future and the person you’ll be then. If you replace the bad ones with positive, successful and healthy behaviors, and just do what productive, determined and remarkable people do, you’ll become one of them after some time.
Here are some great habits, which if practiced daily, can help you achieve a lot and build discipline:
• getting up early;
• morning routine;
• working out;
• eating well;
• getting enough sleep;
• evening ritual;
• reading;
• journaling.
Change your mindset
The next thing you’d want to work on if you’re asking yourself ‘How do I change my life?’ and ‘Where do I start?’ is your mindset.
Meditate daily, visualize success, be positive, expand your consciousness by talking to smart people, generating creative ideas, trying to focus on something for a while.
Find your mentors and read what they have to say. Follow successful bloggers, listen to podcasts, check out biographies, success stories and classic literature.
Never stop learning. It’s a lifelong process which only makes you find out new ways to do old stuff, helps you come up with great ideas and implement them in your life in the smartest and fastest way possible.
Change starts in the mind. It’s created there before you see any signs in real life.
And that’s why it’s important to get rid of the limitations of the mind you currently have.
Learn how to let go of worries, doubts and comparison, understand and overcome procrastination, fear of failure and other people’s opinion. Stop having regrets and reliving the past, or trying to prepare for the future.
All these are a result of the constant process of gaining knowledge, getting to know yourself and working on all areas of your life. Practice, practice, practice.
Read also: How to Think and Live Like a Millionaire: The Only Guide You’ll Ever Need
Prioritize
Know what’s important, be ruthless and say ‘no’ to other things because of it. In this case, it’s your goal.
If you want to change your life and yourself, you’ll have to fill your time with activities that will get you there. And – which is harder – to eliminate the ones that only waste your energy, focus and time.
The thing is, if you don’t take control over your time, other people will.
You may think that you have too many tasks to do now and can’t think of a way to find any time to work on your goals. But the truth is that most of these tasks are unnecessary, just seem urgent, can be done by someone else, and won’t help you in any way in the long term.
Also, you don’t find time. You make it.
Your job now is to dedicate time every single day to taking action towards your goal – and that happens by following the steps you carefully planned and wrote down.
That leads us to the last thing you need to keep in mind…
Consistency is Key
If you do all the things mentioned above with all your attention and effort, you still won’t see any progress if you don’t stay consistent.
Whatever you do today, you’ll need to find the willpower to get up and do it again tomorrow.
That’s why you need to develop long-term thinking, and stop being impatient and wanting results now.
Know that what you do matters, and if you do it long enough, it will pay off in ways you haven’t imagined.
Now you know where to start if you’re thinking ‘I want to change my life’ again. It’s your turn.
