Take a time out - to clear your head and get back on the path of knowing what you want
It is a proven fact, that to be happy and successful in life, regular self – reflection is key. What this means is to regularly look at our life in a self-critical way and ask ourselves if we are happy and at ease with how things are going or if we need smaller or even fundamental changes because we feel we are not aligned between what is in our life and what we want to be. What is important here, is that we don’t just go about passively living our life, but that we take time to actively evaluate where ewe see our life going and plan. However, self-reflection is not the only thing that is important, even more so, when we see that something does not feel right, we need to be honest to ourselves and accept that we need changes, even if this means risk and uncertainty for us.
In line with reflection, being honest to ourselves is therefore of fundamental importance in this process. Most of us struggle to talk about things that are not going according to plan to others, but at least we should be honest to ourselves that we need to correct the direction in some ways that we chose for our lives.
The next question is where we best do this type of self-reflection and identification of potentially required change and correction. Many of us are not very good in making time for this in our often-hectic day to day routines. For most, reflection best works when we are taking active time outs. This does not always have to be the long-term holiday, where we detach from daily routines completely, it can also be a walk in the forest or just taking out an hour of our day to relax and do something that we enjoy with family or friends.
Taking a time our actively to reflect and question things can be extremely rewarding. Usually, people do this when they have the desire to change but are not very sure what the next step could be. It is therefore important to use this time out time the best we can to make it productive for us to find answers we are looking for and define next steps. The idea here is to come back with a solid plan and idea of what it is we need or want and what we need to adjust or change to get there. Of course, there is no guarantee that the plan will work, but at least we have a sense of structure again to get us where we want to be. Where we want to be is our goal that we need to define as best and as precise as we can, the path is then the plan and milestones of how we get there. If we come back from a time out and can answer those questions for us, this is ideal.
However, very often this takes time, lots of conversations and a lot of information gathering and research. The less we know what we want, the more research and talking to others are required to form a clear picture. Talking to other can help and finding out what could interest us while being open to get to know many alternative ways of doing things. Being open minded in this context will help us forming a clearer picture of what we want and what we don’t want much faster. We don’t have to know all the answers ourselves; we can get others to help us.
Taking a time out and effectively using this time to get clarity on what we want and don’t want and where we need things to chance in an honest and self-reflective way is key to get back on track and live a happy and fulfilled life in the long term. The time is therefore well invested and we should make every effort to take it regularly.
