Zap your autopilot for a sensationally enviable life
Your first step to a shamelessly fulfilling life worth living every day
Are you on a merry go around, running around in circles?
Or chasing after goals and dreams that may not even be your own (anymore)?
You’re not alone.
So many people live on autopilot continuing to chase the goals and dreams they once had — or were conditioned to having — when they’ve lost their allure a long time ago.
I certainly did too. But that’s not for this sidenote.
Does your life feel like that?
It doesn't have to. You don't have to stay on a merry go round going nowhere, or on a fast track to somewhere you don’t have a taste to be.
You can take back your power, design the life that gets you out of bed with eager anticipation, and embark on making small changes that'll compound into big ones.
The first step is to get real about where you are and where you’re currently headed.
That awareness alone will start to change your trajectory.
So take 5 minutes a day to reflect using these prompts
(though not necessarily all of them every day!):
How does it make you feel?
What do you like about it: what did it bring you that you love about your life?
What you hate about it: what did it bring you that you would gladly do without)?
What if you had to continue this for the next couple of years?
What thoughts keep you stuck in the hamster wheel?
Continue this for 5 minutes a day — brain dumping / stream of conscious writing / or any other technique that fits you — until nothing new comes up. Take as long as you need to. There are no rewards for finishing first or fast. This is about your future, taking enough time up front will save you a lot of heartache later.
I don’t have the time!
I know. Yet another thing to do when you’re already so busy.
But internalize this:
If you can't find 5 minutes a day, then you really, really, really need to stop and reflect!
You don't have time not to take the time!
Because every change worth making starts with awareness. Without that change happens, but it’s up for grabs what it’ll be and whether you’ll like it.
And remember, you can go at your own pace. No need to make it into a gruesome exercise. In fact, you don’t want to do that at all. It would only serve to get you to stop.
So, yes, do take that time to reflect. Don’t just escape.
I have done that on more than one occasion and don’t recommend it.
With hobbies: great. When you’re bored with one, pick a different one.
But with work? Not so much. When it’s about what you spent most of your time doing, merely escaping is not so cool. I hit the jackpot once1 but most of my escapes from one job to any other made the expression “jumping from the frying pan into the fire” feel like a tea party.
I’d do anything, but I won’t do that!
I get it. Reflecting on your life, and unavoidably yourself, isn’t the most enjoyable pastime imaginable. Especially when you have an overactive inner critic. Then it can — and will — be uncomfortable, even confrontational.
But…
if you want a different outcome, you have to change what you're doing.
And:
you can’t set a course to a different outcome,
without knowing where you are.
Sorry about that.
Oh, and — before I forget — have fun with it!
Don’t let the discomfort and confrontation get to you. You don’t have to make reflection into torture. That torture comes from how you talk to yourself about it. And there’s absolutely no reason to be heavy handed.
You can tame that inner critic, but don’t use it as an excuse to procrastinate. Taming that critic is not a requirement for getting started.
Keep in mind that it’s not an exercise to flagellate yourself.
It’s an exercise to lay the foundations that’ll help you change your thinking, your choices, and your actions. Which will inevitably create a different outcome. And that’s what you want, right?
Resolve to look at it with a light heart, as if it was about a best friend you’d never want to make feel bad, and play with what you find.
Smile at the silliness involved in some of your thinking and choices.
Realize that hindsight is always perfect and conveniently forgets about the very real pressures you dealt with at the time.
Acknowledge that you made your choices not knowing what you know now.
Most of all: be kind to yourself — you’d probably, already, make different choices now. Because, even on a merry go around, you can’t help but change.
Reflect, disengage that autopilot
Take the time to disengage your autopilot, to start changing your life’s trajectory before you’re entirely deflated. As I said, the awareness you create alone will have an effect. And I can promise you doing it only when you’ve completely run out of gas is that much harder.
So start now. Start reflecting on the prompts I gave you.
It will set you up for the next steps in making rewarding changes: intentionally designing where you want to go and mapping out a course to get there.
Stay tuned for sidenotes on how to go about that: subscribe
(it’s free unless you choose to support me financially)
And then stuck it out too long because I didn’t want to acknowledge that my pot of gold had transformed into a pile of mud.