5 Ways to Take Control of Your Life

It’s expected for you to take control of your life and yet it seems like a difficult thought to process. We live in a society that turns our behaviors into automatic traits (such as waking up at the same time every morning to go to work and looking forward to weekends.)

When we get sucked into the basic mindset, the importance of having control over our lives seems irrelevant. Our choices are limited due to the conveniences we face, eventually settling for daily rituals that doesn’t let us grow as individuals.

A few years ago, I fell into the trap of repeating redundant tasks daily. I went to work, returned home, binge watch my newest show, maybe played some video games, spent time with friends and then repeat the same process the next day. Though that lifestyle was enjoyable, I never experienced any personal development. I didn’t grow as a human being by expanding my knowledge or skills to further my success.

To give an example of how this lifestyle affects someone’s mind, consider the act of eating sweets vs exercising. Why spend 30 minutes performing an activity that’ll exhaust you when you can enjoy a bowl of vanilla ice cream and chocolate cake? Though instant rewards does appear to be the favorable choice (such as doing nothing, relaxing, and eating junk foods), it’s the challenging activities that makes us more satisfied with ourselves in the long run.

You may be happy eating cake for the first five minutes, but after a few days of repeating the same pattern, you start noticing the excess weight you’re gaining and the sudden fatigue you’re experiencing. Those instant satisfactions will suddenly become great regrets and to get rid of those horrible feelings, you’ll seek after more unwanted sweets.

On the other hand, by overcoming each exercise routine, you receive a proud mentality of knowing you pushed yourself by working out and receiving it’s benefits.

1. Live in the Present

Maybe you heard the saying, “you can’t control everything,” but never looked deeper into it. We’re naturally made to want to take control of everything that’s within our grasp, especially in regards to our lives. But to give you a deeper look into the saying, it means taking control of the present.

The past is outside of your control and your future continues turning into your past. Your ability to manipulate your future is limited and you must take control of the present to shift it towards your desires. By ignoring your control over the present, those decisions lead to a future of piled up regrets left in your past. (Mind blowing, right?)

You may not like the idea of exchanging pleasurable activities for something challenging, but recall your past. Do you remember the time you studied for a test and how annoying it was? Wasn’t it one of the greatest feelings after you received a passing grade? Even today, you’re still able to recall your greatest achievements because you choose to take a difficult path that developed your productivity and self development.

Don’t be afraid of eating something unhealthy from time to time or spending a few hours watching YouTube videos, but don’t continue dropping productive choices for them. When you’re depressed, it’s tempting to ignore productive decisions by jumping into instant joyful ones instead.

But as hard as it might be, ignore that mindset and go for challenging roles. It might be hard to start exercising, studying, or practicing an instrument but the patience of living in the present and working on meaningful tasks gives you pleasurable feelings that last longer than instant pleasures.

2. Become a Boss Over Yourself

As my readers are familiar with, I enjoy telling people to become a boss over themselves. That’s because we’re quick to accept the idea of blindly following someone else’s ideals without thinking for ourselves or what we want. People are more accepting of handing their lives away to build someone else’s dreams instead of their own.

What makes the concept of becoming a boss over yourself so powerful is the ability to control your responsibilities. What separates children from adults is the level of responsibility they accept. This builds their maturity and independence, allowing them to make firmer decisions. Accepting responsibility over your actions, whether positive or negative, will lead to an increase commitment to your goals and actions.

When you become a boss over yourself, you won’t know everything immediately. You’re going to make mistakes and question your own decisions. But what makes a boss great is trial and error. You learn from your mistakes and become wiser in the process. You learn what makes you productive and what you’re capable of.

That means dividing your tasks into roles you have to complete. Focus on your top priorities and what you have the energy to accomplish.

3. Create Strategic Guides for your Work Schedule

There’s nothing wrong with working on a list of plans you prepared, however without a break or proper time management, you’ll eventually exhaust yourself. Once humans grasp a passion they’re devoted to, they find themselves continuously working on it without the need of a break. They have a need to push themselves further to complete as much as they could within a single day.

What helps manage your productivity is writing your tasks down for that day and preparing yourself to complete them. I personally use a journal to write my tasks down and ensure I get them completed.

There are times where it’s difficult fitting all my tasks into my schedule because there’s only so many assignments I could complete in one day. So I list what’s most important to complete, and spend more time in an area that needs attention. Then, if to relax my mind, I schedule a time to take a break despite how difficult it might be.

Whether it’s working out, watching Netflix, or taking walks outside, I find time to balance my mind. That way, before returning back to my tasks my energy will be rebuilt to finish whatever is left on my list. Hard work is important, but rest accordingly to how you’re feeling to prevent exhausting your mind.

4. Don’t Think. But Act

We think about doing things we want to do throughout the year. We imagine receiving the easy life but make no effort to making those dreams come true. (I like to pretend to be an singer sometimes.) But instead of acting on them, people continue dreaming while struggling with their job, family, or social situation.

To take control of your life, start changing your daily habits by acting on your thoughts. Don’t yearn the desire to want to exercise. Act on it by changing into your workout gear and running shoes.

A way I usually beat the method of only dreaming is no longer thinking about the obstacles I face. I stop imaging the ways I could fail or the emotions I’m feeling. Because if I always acted on my emotions, I would sit on the couch playing with paper airplanes.

It’s easy to get comfortable with the art of laziness and settling for pleasurable emotions. But such as anything, too much of a good thing could become bad. Without proper self-discipline to manage your productivity, you get blown in the winds of life like a paper bag.

Write down your goals and what you want to complete or improve on. Know the reason why you want to complete them and what your end goals are. Without a designation you’re aiming for, you’ll easily get caught in the automatic will to live a repeating lifestyle. Motivation comes through achievement and a vision. Start small and build your motivation daily.

5. Understand Where Your Desires Are

Oftentimes, we imagine ourselves settling for a certain lifestyle not for the experience but for the results. People imagine themselves becoming professional athletes, Doctors, or Lawyers not because it’s their passion but because of what the results are. It’s not that someone has a passion to become a well-known businessman, but they want the relaxing lifestyle of becoming wealthy and living comfortably.

I will admit that career goals to only live comfortably will always be very tempting and convincing to jump into. But this direction of thought is normally brought to you because of past experiences. When someone is searching for what they want to do with their life, they ask other people who already had years of experience.

But as effective and useful as their advice could be, it will always originate from their perspective. They’ tell you what to do based on their life experiences and how they would live your life.

Though some advice may be helpful, it’s important to always form an opinion about them too. The only reason your father might tell you to become a Doctor is because he always wanted to become one. Or maybe your mother always wanted you to become an actress because that’s something she wanted to do when she was younger and now wants you to live her dreams.

Know what your aims are and envision what you want out of life. If it helps, read books and determine exactly what you want. What you begin understanding towards the path of self-discovery is that happiness isn’t what we receive or gain. It’s how we get to where we want to be and the journey we experienced along the way. It’s overcoming your major challenges, getting through those dark thoughts, and defeating your fears.

That’s why you’ll often find stories about lottery winners who end up going mad. When people are given what they want without effort, they feel a strange emptiness because they’ll never have a true appreciation for what they received.

Decide what you want not by the rewards you’ll receive whether it be fame, money, or cars. It might take hours or days of self-reflection to understand your dreams, so don’t expect the answers to come to you immediately.

Avoid imagining having the perfect life that the average person dreams about. Instead, imagine the type of relationship you want, the career you’d like, and the lifestyle you’ll be satisfied with.

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