Life has the tendency to turn into sets of uninspired actions, namely routines.
We are creatures of habit and while it’s soothing to know what’s down the road and around the next corner, there is the danger of over-comforting yourself and losing sight of your quest: Living your adventure.
You already know this; you can’t grow if you keep doing the same thing. Familiarity will eat away at your curiosity and dull the essence of life.
So, ask yourself, are you stuck in over-comfort and in need of some inspired action?
These are the symptoms: You suffer from the “What? It’s already March?” syndrome. Most days you feel un-inspired. You keep asking yourself if this is all there is to life. You wish you had more time to do the things you love.
If you have the feeling that some inspired action will do you good, take another look.
What do you enjoy doing every day? Not every habit, not every routine is bad. You may have some rituals that make you happy and add to your aliveness. What are those? Make a list.
Make another list of everything that leaves you feeling drained and empty – and, one by one, start eliminating those items from your life. I just deleted a bunch of games from my iPad that I kept playing and that, I had to admit, where nothing but mind numbing time-stealers. Gone.
Now comes the best part. Take inspired action. Add to your schedule activities that make you feel electric. Things that take your breath away, the “I can’t believe I just did this” kind of stuff. I just added a new Empowerment Group for Women to my Meetup events. Something I had been meaning to do for a long time. I finally realized that I was spending way too much time working on the phone and in front of my computer and not enough time doing the things I love in person, talking to people, empowering women and making new friends.
Inspired action.
This is what my 70 and 80-year-old aunts in South America told me when I asked them for some pearls of wisdom for living an inspired life:
“Do more of the things you want to do and less of the stuff you don’t.”
“Enjoy every day, you never know what’ll happen tomorrow.”
“If there are opportunities in life and you tell yourself ‘nah’, take them.”
“My recipe for staying young? Play bridge with your girlfriends. It keeps your mind sharp, it challenges you and you’ll enjoy the company and the camaraderie of your friends.” This was from a 90-year-old vivacious lady who still goes to her office every morning at 7am sharp and is curious and happy as a little girl.
Inspired action. The things you do to make your life more exciting and worth living.
What is it for you? Take the first leap and share with us the inspired action steps you are going to take.
As always, thank you for reading!
Karin
Also,
You might enjoy this blog post by fellow blogger Chris Guillebeau that hits a similar nerve: Will It Always Be Like This?
Photo Source: Scott McLeod via Flickr under a Creative Commons License.
