Create a Life You Love: Are These 4 Habits Keeping You Stuck?

To create a life you love, it’s essential to be very clear about your vision, so you know exactly what you are working towards. We can change things we are not happy with, even if we start with the smaller aspects of our lives. Small steps are still steps.

If you often feel stuck and unfulfilled in your life, you may be engaging in these four self-sabotaging behaviors, which can limit your progress and stop you from creating a life you love.

 

1. You break your own promises.

Have you ever told yourself, “I will never let them disrespect me again,” or “I will go to the gym three times this week,” and then you do the complete opposite? You broke a promise to yourself. Think about that. In any relationship, the more one lies to us, the less trust there is. If someone kept breaking their promises to you, would you trust them? How confident would you feel about the strength of that relationship? Trusting yourself builds confidence. It is self-worth manifested into action! Every time you permit yourself to dismiss a promise you made to yourself, you’re allowing your future self to do it repeatedly. It creates a pattern, and this becomes your life. A life of broken promises.

2. You don’t set boundaries.

Saying no to people and things that don’t serve you is essential! People-pleasing is a great way to slowly rip apart your self-confidence, inner knowing, and relationship with self and others. Why? Because you are prioritizing someone else above yourself. You are listening to the needs of others instead of your own.  Your needs will not be met this way, and this can eventually lead to depression, anxiety, and resentment. When you are not setting boundaries, you are not following what is true to you! When you are not following what is true to you, you are following what is true for someone else.  Part of setting boundaries also includes self-awareness. Are you aware enough of when your body is saying “yes” or “no”. When you strengthen this part of yourself, you are better able to appropriately communicate with others. This allows us to create a life we consciously chose, not one that was chosen for us because we were unable to assert ourselves. Sometimes boundaries will not be respected, and this is a big red flag, telling us that space may need to be created to respect your own needs. Remember, boundaries are not “please do this”; it is “if you cannot respect this boundary, this will happen”. This is the difficult part of honoring your boundaries.

 

3. You are not proactive, and you let fear determine your choices, instead of choices that create a life you love.

There are so many beautiful ideas in our head that we never manifest. Why? Perhaps it’s a fear of failure, a fear of incompetence, or the fear of what others may think. Release this fear! Often, we only give space to the worst-case scenarios and allow this to limit us. We want to learn to hold space for the positive outcomes that are just as available and possible for us. Life was meant for creation and exploration!! That skill you want to learn, learn it! That class you want to take, take it. You may realize that you’re great at it! This builds confidence! There is no growth in the comfort zone. I repeat, comfort is nice and fluffy, but this is not where you learn! Fear does not need to be completely gone. You just have to do it, despite the fear! “But what if I fail?” you may ask. Good! Fail! Fail a hundred times! Why? Because if you’re failing, it means you’re trying! This leads to my final point…

4. Get out of your comfort zone.

The comfort zone can be a dangerous place. Change is difficult. Change is scary! So, we avoid it as much as we can, especially if nothing is necessarily “wrong”.  We tend to usually get out of our comfort zones when things become unbearable, and ONLY then. However, sometimes change is needed simply because where you are is not fulfilling you anymore, or you have stopped growing as a person, or your soul is just asking for something different. Fear may place rose-colored glasses on your situation, telling you it’s safer where you are, but we are responsible for identifying when the comfort space is safe and healing or if it is holding us back. Permit yourself to release stagnation and comfort to reach your full potential. Take the leap! Do it afraid.

 

When we are not truly happy, change can feel difficult. We have all heard the saying “Better the monster we know than the monster we don’t”. But creating change requires change: within ourselves and our external life. If you resonated with these four self-sabotaging practices, it may be time to take charge of creating a life you love.

 

Written by Licensed Clinical Therapist, Diana Tavares, LCSW.

If this post spoke to you, you see yourself in these four habits, and are ready to create a life you love, therapy might be the next step. Let’s explore how we can work together—book a free consultation here.