3 Steps to Help You Get Your Shit Together
Do you ever feel like you’ve lost control? You can’t seem to get a handle on things? And things are just coming apart? Everything you’ve tried to do just seems to bring you into a deeper spiral. Your life is messy, you’re messy, and you wish you could get your shit together. On the outside, everything actually looks fine, but you seem to have fallen off the course. Last you checked you wanted to go in a particular direction, but as life would have it, here come a hundred curve balls. SIGH. This can be really frustrating.
You see, generally we all know where we would like to be going, what we would like to do, and what kind of person we would like to evolve into. But somewhere along the way, we may tend to get lost, lose sight, and basically - panic. Have you ever gone on a hike, wandered off the path, and realized you had lost the crowd? It’s almost happened to me and it can get pretty scary. Especially when you’re travelling alone!
So what can we do to make our way back on the path and get our shit together? Here are three easy steps that will help you:
Re-calibrate.
To calibrate is to mark or adjust in order to take external factors into account or to allow comparison with other data. When we come into overwhelm, our mind tends to shut off and spiral downwards, bringing us into a state of anxiety or a habit called rumination. So, pause. When you feel fear creeping up, take a deep breath. And then another, and another one, until you can feel yourself become calm. The only way you’re going to be able to re-calibrate and shift is if you can lead yourself back to neutral and into the breath. It is in this space of pure silence, Deepak Chopra says, that we come into a field of “infinite organizing power”. So breathe.
Once you’ve come into a breathing pattern, you’re going to have to acknowledge the thoughts that are coming up. List them down like you would take notes from a lecture. Whatever it is your mental space is dictating, notice them. Maybe there are memories that are coming up, fears, preferences, rules, associations, and whatever else. Acknowledge their presence. Take a look at what is there as if you would look at an object - understand its depth, weight, and size. Explore. And whenever you are ready, just gently and very carefully let them go.
Re-align.
You got lost for a reason. Now that you have taken a step back and seen what thoughts have presented, it’s time to grab your map. Where were you intending to go in the first place? What was your intention? Are other people involved? What kind of outcome were you hoping for? Align with your end goal - what it was you wanted to achieve, why you wanted to get there, and what intention you brought forth in the first place.
By getting honest with yourself and aligning yourself with your initial intention, you should be able to see if you were on the right path to begin with. Perhaps you made a few wrong turns? Made poor choices? That’s fine, now ask yourself how you can get back on the path you originally intended.
Re-write the plan.
So let’s say, you’ve re-aligned and you' just realized that getting back on the path isn’t just about going back to “how things were” - for you or for those involved. This is where you need to re-write the plan. Re-imagine the picture, make your adjusts and re-write.
Know that when you re-imagine the picture, you can still come from the same intention - whether it is the intention for adventure, expansion, success, love, connecting, and so forth - you will see how the intention can help you enhance your quality world picture. Maybe now that things have changed, connecting to other people simply means being in a space of peace so you can extend peace to them. Maybe expanding your business means taking it to a new audience, or simply changing your message. You get the drift.
What I’m saying is that you have not lost it all completely at this point. And it is when we re-calibrate and re-align ourselves that we can step into the courage to re-imagine old dreams in new ways.
