There are many factors which create stagnancy in our life. Some of them were mentioned in the post yesterday. In sequence thereto, some more factors are being given below which may help you to identify if you cause stagnancy yourself or not:You’re too stuck in your ways.
You insist on doing things a certain way. You don’t open yourself up to new ideas. Guess what? You’ll remain stuck in your situation, too. You must open yourself to new methods. Experiment. You can only improve if you are willing to try new things.
You do not have enough belief in yourself.
All successful people have enormous self-belief. They know that they have something special to contribute and they are determined to make their mark. This does not mean that they are arrogant, narcissistic or complacent. On the contrary, they are self critical and push themselves hard because they know that they can achieve more. What is it that is special about you? What is the talent that you have not developed? What do you know you are capable of?
You do not measure yourself against written goals.
It is hard to make progress if you have no clear goals for your life. Most of us muddle along from one thing to the next. Successful people define their objectives and measure progress against them. You should set yourself targets in the areas that are important to you e.g. career, wealth, health, relationships and social life. There are many books giving detailed advice on goal setting and they reinforce the point that the most important thing is to write your goals down and track progress. If you do not achieve some of the goals then reset them. You can be flexible and adjust how you move forward but you must keep moving. Do you have written objectives that you track regularly?
On the other hand, even if you are an experienced goal setter, there are times when the goals you set in the past lose their appeal now. It’s normal and it happens to me too. Sometimes we lose touch with our goals, since we are in a different emotional state compared to when we first set them. Sometimes our priorities change and we no longer want to work on those goals anymore. However, we don’t consciously realize this, and what happens is we procrastinate on our goals until it compounds into a serious problem. If that’s the case for you, it’s time to relook into your goals. There’s no point in pursuing goals that no longer inspire you. Trash away your old goals (or just put them aside) and ask yourself what you really want now. Then go for them.
The only way to reach your goals is to set reasonable sub-goals and tackle those as soon as you can. This goes back to the first saying. When we allow ourselves too much time to think about an unpleasant task, we are less and less inclined to actually get ourselves into gear and just do it
You are too comfortable where you are.
It is easy and natural to settle into a rut. Why try something new when you are already doing that you are good at? High achievers go further. They take risks. They move out of their comfort zones. They take on difficult challenges. They push themselves to acquire new skills and to face new examinations of their abilities. This means that they run the risk of failure. Where are you right now – inside your comfort zone or taking risks?
You are not mixing with high achievers.
Let’s face it – your friends and family are really nice people but they are not challenging you to achieve more. Spend more time with high flyers and positive thinkers who understand ambition and achievement. Share some of your thoughts, dreams and challenges with them. They will encourage you and give you the direct advice you need. How much time are you spending with really successful people?
The person who can motivate you, change you and get the most out of you is in the mirror. Build your self-belief. Set yourself clear goals and measure progress against them. Push yourself outside your comfort zone. Take on some difficult challenges even though you risk failure. Significantly increase your work rate. Mix with high achievers. Ask yourself this – do you want a safe, comfortable existence or do you want a life where you achieve something really worthwhile?
Just we may realize that we are not alone.
Everyone stagnates at some point or another. We are not alone in this and more importantly, it’s normal. Realizing we are not alone in this, makes it much easier to deal with this period. By trying to fight it, we’re only fighting ourselves. We must accept this situation, acknowledge it, and tell ourselves it happens in others’ life too. That way, we can then focus on the constructive steps that will really help us.
We must find what inspires us.
Stagnation comes because there isn’t anything that excites you enough to take action. If you don’t have a habit of setting goals, and instead just leave yourself to daily mundanes, it’s not surprising you are experiencing stagnation. What do you want to do if there are no limitations? If you can have whatever you want, what will it be? The answers to these questions will provide the fuel that will drive you forward.
Give yourself a break
When’s the last time you took a real break for yourself? 3 months? 6 months? 1 year? Never? Perhaps it’s time to take a time-out. Prolonged working can cause someone to become disillusioned as they lose sight of who they are and what they want.
Go take some extended leave from work. A few days at bare minimum; a few weeks or months will be great. Some of my ex-colleagues have quit their jobs and took months out to do some self-reflection. Of course, some of us might not have that luxury, so we can stick to a few weeks of leave. Go on a trip elsewhere and get away from your work and your life. Use this chance to get a renewed perspective of life. Think about your life purpose, what you want and what you want to create for your life in the future. These are big questions that require deep thinking over them. It’s not about finding the answers at one go, but about taking the first step to finding the answers.
Shake up your routines
Being in the same environment, doing the same things over and over again and meeting the same people can make us stagnant. This is especially if the people you spend the most time with are stagnant themselves.
Change things around.
Start with simple things, like taking a different route to work and eating something different for breakfast. Have your lunch with different colleagues, colleagues you never talked much with. Work in a different cubicle if your work has free and easy seating. Do something different than your usual for weekday evenings and weekends. Cultivate different habits, like exercising every day, reading a book, etc. The different contexts will give you different stimulus, which will trigger off different thoughts and actions in you.
When I’m in a state of stagnancy, I’ll get a sense of what’s making me stagnate. Sometimes it’s the environment I’m in, sometimes it’s the people I’ve been hanging out with, sometimes it’s my lifestyle. Most of the times, it’s a combination of all these. Changing them helps to stir myself out of the stagnant mode.
Start with a small step
Stagnation also comes from being frozen in fear. Maybe you do want this certain goal, but you aren’t taking action. Are you overwhelmed by the amount of work needed? Are you afraid you will make mistakes? Is the perfectionist in you taking over and paralyzing you?
Let go of the belief that it has to be perfect. Such a belief is a bane, not a boon. It’s precisely from being open to mistakes and errors that you move forward. Break down what’s before you into very very small steps, then take those small steps, a little step at a time. I had a client who had been stagnating for a long period because he was afraid of failing. He didn’t want to make another move where he would make a mistake. However, not wanting to make a mistake has led him to do absolutely nothing for 2-3 years. On the other hand, by doing just something, you would already be making progress, whether it’s a mistake or not. Even if you make a supposed “mistake”, you get feedback to do things differently in the next step. That’s something you would never have known if you never made a move
Don’t Think much, But Do
Although it can be hard, it is this simple phrase but great one for some reason even the simplest task seems too daunting to tackle, I just try to stop thinking all pending jobs together and start doing one by one.
Easier said than done, you may think? Sure, but just give it a try. Often we are so busy finding reasons why we can’t (or don’t) do something, we spend more energy and time than we would just doing it.
Kill stagnancy, fight against stagnancy bravely and be happy.
No comments:
Post a Comment