Does it feel like you are waiting for things to happen for you? Expecting a big turn around that will improve your life? This can make you defensive, constantly limiting you. If you're ready to unlock the greatness within you, but not quite sure how, start by moving beyond surviving and live to thrive. Surviving is doing just enough to stay afloat, to get by somehow but it keeps you from getting ahead. It keeps you in waiting mode and to break free from this it requires thriving in your mind first that leads to action that creates progress.
What it means to thrive
To thrive means to grow, develop, and live life on your terms to be fulfilled. It is envisioning a life of abundance and opportunity and working to make things happen. This empowers you to fully take control of yourself and put your future in the best hands, which is yourself. It still involves pain in whatever you do, but the perspective you gain allows you to use your experiences to grow, be better and stronger from it. You’ll lean into adversity and find great knowledge in the setbacks you encounter. Through all this you become better at handling the inner struggles you face. Problems will always exist but understanding how to navigate your inner self will help adapt and align your actions to fuel your growth.
When you grow, you become more confident in yourself and more comfortable swimming in deep water. You become more comfortable in the unknown of the things surrounding you. It requires constant effort to remain in deep water but as you're swimming in it, the more you do it, the more acclimated you become to not having the safety of something to stand on. It further taps into your resourcefulness that makes you more independent and composed. The vastness that engulfs you will not seem as daunting that allows you to operate efficiently.
When you're in shallow water the base of what you're standing on gives you comfort that you are less likely to drown, that you can walk to safety if something is a danger to you. And when you become accustomed to the shallow water you limit the growth that you can experience that's going to restrict your confidence in the things you really want to pursue. It keeps you in what is familiar even if what is familiar can feel suffocating.
Living a life where you thrive breaks free from limitations and is an ongoing journey that is continuously surrounded around making progress in any part of your life. It goes beyond just meeting your goals, while it can feel great and satisfying to reach the goals that you set for yourself, that feeling only lasts so long. Thriving gives you the ability to focus on the process and your satisfaction comes from the journey along the way.
It removes the need of comparing yourself to others to validate how you view yourself and it becomes more about focusing on yourself that helps you exclude the outside noise of appeasing what others want. This gives you the ability to harness more of your energy on the things within your control. It is amazing how much you can get done when you remove these distractions. Focusing on one thing at a time is your superpower because all your energy is put into what you're working towards. The more dialed into what you're doing, the better chance you have of making progress.
For you to thrive it's all dependent on what you see fit. It is a very specific path that you take. While others might thrive in their own life, following that same path might not work for you. It very much is a customized route for each person. And when you find that right fit, you become more excited about the future, of what yet is to come because you will seize opportunity when it arises. This gives you such a fulfilling experience because you understand you have the power to mold your future as you want.
It doesn't mean it will be smooth throughout the journey, but that understanding of continuous progress will lead to breakthroughs of things that sometimes you might not even have imagined, that it can be better than what you envisioned. As you grow so does everything else in your life, your confidence, your appreciation, your resolve, your grit, just everything about you. Abundance just comes about that continuously gives you hope.
Tear down limitations
To begin to thrive start by tearing away at all the limitations that you think you have through questioning them. The more time you can spend questioning and analyzing these limitations, you can erode at that discomforting feeling that you might be experiencing. As you come to understand more about it, you eventually come to find that you might be getting in your own way by setting limits on yourself. To get past this, change a few simple words such as those with negative connotations like can't, impossible, unrealistic and it's already been done. Instead replace it with “I can become better by ….” or “I need to find a way to overcome….”
This is going to help you focus on the things that are possible as you're able to move past the limitations. Many of these limitations are actually just an illusion because not enough thought has been given to overcome certain scenarios. It becomes easier just to say, “it's not possible” or “it can't be done” if it is difficult. But once you commit enough time to solving ways to make it happen, you can begin to thrive.
Find ways to grow
Ask yourself how can I grow, how can I get better and take action towards it. It is all about progress and not results alone. If you were better today in some way or another then you were yesterday, you're beginning to thrive. And it can be anything really such as improving how you handle failure by doing difficult things, gaining more knowledge through actively reading, taking on new experiences that you are unfamiliar with to gain perspective.
The action that you take to build yourself up is strengthening and preparing for something greater. It doesn't matter what your circumstances are as we all have different starting points when we begin but the intention is to move forward even if it's in small incremental steps. And this can start off by fostering the right thoughts to move from surviving to thriving. The thinking should be what are the possibilities out there and you start leaving behind the survival mode that holds you back.
Determine what you want and why
One of the things that you're going to have to figure out for yourself is what do you really want, why do you want it and what are you doing to make progress towards it. When you can answer this, it becomes a lot clearer what you're striving for. You can build yourself up to that vision that you have.
Knowing what you're striving for helps you identify what behaviors you need to incorporate to get closer to it. The more you know what you're working towards the better you can gauge how far you need to go to get there. And this motivates you to work for something as it becomes more tangible and real. Without it, it becomes more and more vague. If you can measure it, the better chance you have at managing your growth.
Start building momentum through the actions you take, no matter how small. If you have a thought that will help you thrive, run with it and it can be as simple as speaking it out, writing it down, or doing something to get that thought in motion. This is going to help condition you to follow through on the things that you set your mind to. It makes you take yourself more seriously. So, when you say you're going to do something it actually means you're going to do it.
The small, consistent action you take will lead to bigger actions and more growth. The more you continue to build momentum, the bigger and faster the snowball you created gets. This builds the foundation of great habits that continues to add what you built yourself into.
Value effort over results
To continue to thrive, reward yourself for the effort you put in. Generally, we're so conditioned for results that everything else becomes irrelevant. We're so consumed by which team won the game, what grade did I get on my exam, how much money did I earn, or the list of my accomplishments. What gets lost throughout the process is the effort that was put in. Because we are consumed by results, it is so easy to cheer for the winners, but this comes to devalue effort. And effort is what makes things progress in the face of adversity.
Work to reward the efforts that you put in whatever you're doing. Cultivate the constructive self-talk that values effort, things such as I'm going to give it my all until I'm exhausted. Or I'm going to try my guts out. And the more that you can foster this, the less dependent you will be on the outcome. This will help you develop an internal satisfaction of the things you do.
Take time for yourself
To keep thriving, make yourself a priority, take the time for yourself, to rejuvenate, to process, to enjoy, to grieve. Whatever it is that is going to benefit you, take the time to do so. Survival mode keeps you giving your time and yourself away to other people and things for their benefit. Looking to satisfy their needs, their expectations to see if they approve of what you're doing for them is taking away from you. Thriving means breaking free from that and diverting more of your time for yourself, so you can be better and have more opportunities. It does not mean you don't do anything for anybody else, but you got to get yourself in a position to thrive before you can help others that does not come at your expense.
It is not selfish to make yourself a priority, it is a basic requirement for you to thrive at whatever you're doing. Give yourself the time to develop and get to a place mentally where you can truly be yourself. Too many times people tone down themselves so others can feel comfortable. This just conforms and restricts the greatness with inside you. While other people are walking on eggshells it's OK to stomp all over them. Just remember the goal is not to be belligerent to other people but living to appease others can slowly erode at you.
Final thoughts
Challenge yourself to be more, and to be more you have to do more. Yes, it can be scary and unsettling in the beginning but as you commit to a life where you will thrive, an amazing transformation will take place. Unlock the greatness with you.
Commentaires