In this post, I am going to give my suggestions on how we can live a happy life, the life we really want instead of just surviving.
I believe that one of the main reasons why we are unhappy is because we are not satisfied with our life, we might feel stuck in a situation we think we don’t belong to, and we end up feeling miserable most of the time and just surviving…
How many times you have heard the expression, I am just surviving not living?
I personally know how one can feel, I have been there, but fortunately, now it is something that belongs to my past.
What do I mean for surviving?
Here are some examples:
1 We are surviving when we are living a life that is not ours and we feel that it does not belong to us. A life that we are not satisfied with and that does not make us happy and we are not doing anything to change it but we just accept how it is.
2 Sometimes even if we are happy with our life, we go through periods of “survival”, periods when we are at the mercy of our emotions or external events. Therefore, we do not feel in control of our lives because we live under stress so we do not live in the present because our attention and our thoughts are focused on our past or our future.
Basically, when we live, we focus on doing things, on growing and achieving and doing so, we embrace life to the fullest.
Surviving, instead, is just the opposite. It means to succeed in keeping alive against odds. We focus on staying away from hunger, thirst, mortal wounds, and other such life-threatening things. We focus on keeping our head over water.
But if we are not happy why don’t we do something to change our lives? What is stopping us?
These are the main reasons why we do not do anything to change our lives:
- We don’t know how to change it because we don’t know what we really want.
- We don’t want to change it because we don’t want to disappoint people we care about.
- We know what we would like, but we are afraid to change.
- We are not satisfied with our life, but we don’t want to change our lives because we believe that is better “the devil that we know that the devil we don’t know” and we are not willing to take a chance.
- We are not happy with our lives but we accept it because we are convinced that our destiny is already written and there is nothing we can do to change it and then we resign ourselves to a miserable life.
What do you honestly think, are you living or just surviving?
Either way, don’t worry, keep reading and you might end up with some suggestions on how to change your life for the better.
We are the directors of our lives
We have the opportunity to create our lives, but do we really take that opportunity?
I believe that we begin to live our lives to the full when
- we decide to live the life that we really want
- we stop doing what we do not want just to please other people
- we learn to not be at the mercy of our emotions and of our external environment
- we learn how to cope with stress
- we stop complaining and we start focusing on our blessings
- we learn how to deal with problems and
- we learn to live in the present moment, happiness is in the present moment, the only moment we are alive.
To live a happy and serene life is important we have a purpose and some goals.
Benefits of having a purpose in life: https://howtobehappy.guru/step-6-how-to-be-happy-in-7-steps-happiness-triggers/#purpose
When we have a purpose in our life, it is more likely we are happier because we are motivated, when if we don’t have a purpose we are likely to feel empty, unsatisfied and without any motivation.
This does not mean that we will not have difficulties situations in our lives, but if we learn how to deal with them we will always stand land on our feet.
Life is a bit like the sea, we have to learn to swim to stay afloat (survive), but if we learn to surf it becomes easier to stay afloat and we will have even more fun.
Despite, some beliefs in our society, that I personally don’t believe, such as our destiny is already written, or being born under a lucky star then be lucky or unlucky, and so on, I am totally convinced and I am not the only one who thinks so, that we have the choice of how to live our lives.
The life that we are living at the moment is the result of a series of decisions we have made in the past. Yes, consciously and unconsciously we are responsible for what we create in our lives, even of what it has happened to us and we didn’t really want it.
No doubt there are factors that can have both positive and negative influence on our lives, like the environment in which we grew up and we formed, like home, family, and school, but at any time in our lives, we have the power to change it if it is not as we want it.
It is normal that parents tend to make their children do what they consider to be right for them. Not always, however, the children feel the same way but sometimes just to please the parents, they agree to do what has been suggested, reluctantly.
With this I don’t mean we shouldn’t listen to our parents or to people dear to us, this is not what I mean.
What I believe is that, when we become adults, everything that we decide to do in our life, we should decide to do it because it is our choice, it is what we really want to do and not because we are listening to what other people are telling us.
Sometimes we decide to listen to the advice of other people because we don’t know what to do. It’s always good to hear what others have to say to us, makes us grow, helps us open our minds as see things from a different perspective, but then again, the decisions we make about our lives, they must be taken on the basis of what we want, what we like and not based on what others think it’s better for us.
Oh yes, this is also a decision we have to make, let me explain it, not making a decision on how we want to live our life is like making the decision of not wanting to be in control of our lives, it is like we are not interested because we are too scared and so we end up to be at the mercy of the environment around us.
In life, it is normal that we may encounter various difficulties, but it is important how we deal with them, it is important that we have the right attitude.
We can’t avoid difficulties or problems, it would be nice if this was possible, but we can learn to control our emotions and to deal with the various situations that arise in our lives with a positive mental state. We are responsible for the state of mind that we have when dealing with various situations of our lives, the success or failure often depends on that.
How can we change our lives?
We can learn to live our lives in a different way, conscious of what we are and what we want.
Here are 7 Tips on how we can change our Lives and Stop surviving:
# 1 We are responsible for our lives
First of all, we have to be convinced that we are responsible for our lives and our actions, and believe we can change it.
Without belief, we don’t go anywhere, and this is true in everything we do in our lives. If we are not fully convinced and believe in what we are doing, it is best just leave it because we will only be wasting time and energy.
You might also like to read: “To live a happy life we need to be in charge of ourselves“
# 2 Make a Decision
Once we are convinced that we are the architects of our lives, the second step is to decide to change, but how? Simply making a decision.
In every moment of our lives we are able to make a decision and, as a result, we can change our lives.
We can choose to live our lives as we would really like to, planning it step by step, and achieve our goals, or choose to survive, don’t have a goal or purpose and not being in control of our emotions, be at the mercy of events of situations that happen to us, or do what other people think is right for our own good, in short, a bit like a ship going around in the sea without a destination and with a crew that does what they want without listening to the captain because he is not able to give orders.
# 3 Stop Being Afraid
If you don’t deal with your fears, your fears will take control of you and your mind, body, and spirit. You’ll never reach your dreams.
Here is a post on “How to Overcome Your Fears”
# 4 Stop Complaining
Stop complaining and take Action. Here is a post on: “Complaining Is Bad For Your Health and Here’s How To Change”
# 5 Stop Feeling Sorry for Yourself
Feeling sorry for yourself is absolutely detrimental to your health. Here is a post on: “How To Stop Feeling Sorry For Yourself With Easy Steps”
# 6 Stop Seeking Approval
One of the biggest enemies of living the best life we can is simple, the approval of others. Here is a post on: “Cast Down The Need For Approval and Start Living A Beautiful Life”
Living also means learning to make decisions.
# 7 Stop Procrastinating
Procrastination prevents the majority of human beings from getting the most out of life. Here is a post on “Stopping Procrastinating make us Happier”
We also need to keep in mind that our attitude towards life is very important, or precisely the attitude we have towards the situations or events that occur daily.
Another key factor to keep in mind that is very important for living and not surviving is to live the present, which is the only moment we are alive.
I would like to end this post by reminding that the choice is ours, we can decide whether to live a beautiful Life or … just surviving.
Start Living A Beautiful Life and Stop Surviving!