Checklist: 6 signs that you do not live your life
Text: Yana Shagova
The expression "live not your life" It does not apply to professional psychology, but it is intuitively understandable. Usually, it means that a person does not follow his own desires and goals, but tries to fulfill a certain average life scenario, “written” for him by other people. Most often we are talking about the parental family, although it also happens that we use samples that are offered by glossy magazines, films and popular culture. We understand how to understand that you are following someone else's installations - and what to do about it.
1
You unbearably want to criticize the lives of others.
You are annoyed wildly by a former classmate who, in her twenties, jumped into marriage and gives birth to children one by one: "Well, why did she need a higher education? She buried herself in pampers!" Or a career girlfriend, "obsessed" on their projects: "In general, he does not see life, he sits in his office from morning till night." Or a freelance friend, the third month "messing around" in Thailand. But irritation often hides envy, and envy - a sense of their own lack of realization and confusion. This does not necessarily mean that you like the specific scenario of the lives of these people - maybe not. But the general feeling is furious that they seem to know what to do with their lives (well, or they pretend very well): they make some plans, carry them out and seem satisfied. And for some reason you do not.
2
You are constantly bored
You are bored at work. Uninteresting conversations among friends. You are sad to go on vacation, uninteresting excursions or clubs, boring to discuss pets, children, building cottages or travel, or someone's third higher education. It is very important to note here that if such a condition lasts longer than three to four weeks, it can hide depression or somatic problems. Therefore, if you feel that you have lost interest in everything around you, be sure to go to the doctor.
If the experts did not find you have any depression or somatic diseases, this means that, it seems, you simply did not “feel” your interests and your life path. The interests of other people do not suit you, and you can not separate them - hence the boredom.
3
Alien enthusiasm infuriates you or bores you.
A logical consequence of the previous paragraph. It is said that boredom is repressed aggression. Indeed, in a boring job, colleagues, a manager and daily duties begin to enrage, I don’t want to either improve my qualifications or work in a team. In the company of friends with whom it’s boring, they can gradually start annoying conversations and someone else’s laughter, a discussion of the fact that you personally don’t feel at all fascinating: “Painting with paints on water is so great!” let's come next time with us! "," They started repairing the apartment and, imagine, we can not find the right tile in the whole city! We'll have to go to ... ". At this moment you want to shout: "What are you kidding me ?!" or "How can you seriously be interested in such garbage?"
4
You build unobvious multi-step plans
For example, if you want to get a job in an adjacent specialty, you are not looking for vacancies and are not enrolling in courses - but instead you are constructing an intricate, multi-part plan that includes another higher education, unpaid internship and other non-obvious components. When friends, rounding their eyes, say: "Wait, but this can also be done faster and easier - just go to the site with vacancies!" - you are very angry.
The secret is simple: people who do not live their lives, usually have a taboo on the realization of their own goals. Therefore, the path to the desired achievements should be as long and difficult as possible to get confused along the way and certainly not reach.
5
Formal achievements for you the main criterion of success
Status, money, someone's praise for you - the main engine of progress. No doubt, money for life is necessary, praise and support “feed up” our self-esteem, and the high status and respect of others is pleasant. But for people who have found their vector of movement in life, this becomes a necessary, but not sufficient condition for success: the desire to realize their abilities and goals comes to the fore.
Those who act according to someone else’s life scenario and have not found their own, may be inclined to compete. Often these are incredibly competitive people - though, the joy of winning them is often short-lived, and it does not bring real satisfaction. And the truth is, how else can you measure achievements, if you don’t really strive for this? Then the averaged measures of success, inspired by culture and society, come to the rescue: status items, countries where you can afford a vacation, the number of zeros in your salary, envy in the eyes of others, an instagram photo.
6
It seems that life passes by while you are sitting here
When you leave work, you feel as if you were burst from captivity. With relief, sigh, leaving the guests. And even entertainment, such as going to the cinema and to concerts, leaves a strange feeling that the “real” life happened somewhere else while you were dancing on the dance floor or sitting at the screen. This feeling signals that you do not find meaning in what you are doing. Many are beginning to rationalize this feeling and build theories - for example, how modern art is commercialized, how it is pointless to work for the benefit of capitalism, and the like. It is important to listen to this feeling of discomfort and nonsense and draw conclusions. It means that going to the cinema was meaningless not for everyone, but for you personally.
What to do
Finding your goals in life is not an easy and large-scale task. Psychologists are often approached by clients with the request “Something is missing, although everything seems to be all right” or “I have everything, but nothing pleases”. Under these complaints is often hiding precisely the lack of their own landmarks in life. Usually, the search for meaning is advised to begin by remembering what used to be enjoyable, it seemed meaningful and important. But, unfortunately, this is not always the case. Sometimes life is so full of unnecessary and energy-consuming activities and communication that there is no space, no strength for anything pleasant.
In this case, it makes sense to go back and try to gradually eliminate the most unpleasant and power-consuming things from your life. For example, refuse to communicate, if the interlocutor criticizes you a lot, devalues what is important to you, and communicates from the position “from above”. To quit a low-paying job that you do only because you are ashamed of abandoning it, or because of “you have to do something” (of course, this is not an extreme situation, when this is the only available way to feed yourself). If there is such an opportunity, leave the team, where they humiliate and discriminate others. Rethink too dense relationships with parents who want to control your life and build their own plans with the help of you. Leave a partnership in which there is violence and no joy.
Get used to asking yourself about your desires - from eating habits to life plans. Sometimes it's easier to start with small interests, like your favorite music or whether you really want to go to a party that you are invited to today. And sometimes entire projects for transforming one's own life come up in my head - and you understand that they have always existed, just been “blocked”.
If your desires and plans do not harm others and do not endanger them, you can safely implement them - and there is nothing selfish about it.
People often say that they are afraid to turn into "egoists" by doing what they want. But if your desires and plans do not harm other people and do not endanger them, then you can safely put them into practice, and there is nothing selfish about it. Perhaps you are really scared by the sense of responsibility for all successes and failures. But only you are the author of your own life - whether you choose to write it according to the “original” scenario or copy it from the “replicated” one, like everyone else’s.
Finally, another useful tip is to deal with family settings. Regularly ask yourself the question: "Who is it for?" If you have chosen a specialty and a career not for yourself, then for whom? For mother, who could not be realized in the same arena? For dad, who saw this as a "true piece of bread" and "worthy occupation"? If you don’t like the current social circle, why and for whom did you create and maintain it?
Answers may be unexpected. For example, you suddenly remember that your beloved grandmother had not liked her all her life, that you are friends with a "dubious" company. And after a while after her death, you suddenly found out that you changed your social circle and now strive to be friends only with "good boys and girls." Although in reality you do not want to talk with them about your career and achievements, and you like Bohemians, poor musicians and poor travelers.
By the same principle, you can choose a partner or partner, employment outside the workplace or a way to rest - to win approval and earn the love of someone from family members. It is important to understand that loving your loved ones and following their scripts prepared for you are not identical things. Love can be shown by actions: to those who are still alive - by care, attention, phone calls and visits. Those who died can be remembered, visit their grave in the cemetery, talk about them with those relatives who remember them, or tell them to children and nephews who did not have time to catch them. But if you make yourself unhappy or unhappy because you do not live your life, this has nothing to do with the expression of love. And if someone demands this from you - unfortunately, this person does not really care about you. So, you should not give decisions about your life in his hands.
Photo: Dmitri Stalnuhhin - stock.adobe.com, andersphoto - stock.adobe.com, Andrey Burmakin - stock.adobe.com