You can’t create a new reality until you have enough mental, physical, and emotional space in your life for it to appear. No matter how much you want your dream life, until you make the right changes, it’s not going to happen.
In this series, I’m going to walk you step-by-step through the process I used to create a life that I love waking up to every day.
A couple years ago, I was exactly where many of you probably are: overwhelmed, distracted, burnt out, overscheduled, and running on 3 coffees and a granola bar. If you’re a high-achiever who is exhausted all the time, your calendar is booked solid for the next month, you’re not sleeping well because of stress and anxiety, or you start crying irrationally at 11am on a Tuesday because you dropped your favorite pen on the floor, this post is for you.
The first step to making a change in your life is to do things differently than the way you have been doing them up until this point. Think about it, if you just keep living the same way you have been every single day, there is no room for you to manifest a different reality.
I’m going to tell you exactly what you need to do, and it’s pretty simple, but it does require some commitment from you. If you want massive growth, massive change, and to have the life you always dreamed of, you also have to be willing to take the right steps to get there. That means, you need to DO LESS. You’re doing too many things right now, and honestly, at least 80% of them aren’t that important.
Let’s dig into that.
If you’re a type-A, high-achiever, you might be thinking that this means to multi-task less, maybe only looking at 2 screens at once, adding a self-care night, or going from 5 projects to 4. But we have to go deeper than that. You can’t just “take a break” for 1 extra hour (during which you check your email 3 times and make a to-do list for tomorrow). If you want big change, you have to make big space for that change to happen.
There are two steps to this, there is the short-term and the long term. Today, we’ll cover the short-term step. The long-term will be covered later in the series, so make sure you subscribe so that you don’t miss anything.
So how do we make big space?
Short-term, you need to take a step back from all the chaos in your life so that you can get clear on what you want long term and have a solid plan to get there.
This means you need to cut out 80% of what you’re doing right now. Get rid of everything that’s not essential for a while. This should be at least 2 weeks, but if you can do longer, that’s even better. This is just to give yourself breathing room and space to reflect on where you’ve been and get really clear on what you actually want going forward.
Essential means:
- Eat
- Sleep
- Work
- Other survival basics (childcare, pet care, etc.)
It sounds drastic, but it works.
And it works because big change can only happen when we make big space.
Let me give you an example of how I used this method to start picturing the life that I’m living right now. A couple of years ago, I reached a point where I hated waking up to the life I was living every day. I knew something needed to change, but I wasn’t sure what. So: I made big space.
I went to the farthest western point of Washington state, to a rustic cabin with no internet, no cell service, no TV, and I spent a few days sleeping, eating, journaling and drinking in the nature. And that’s where the seeds of my new life were born.
Now, I get that not all of you can go away for a weekend, but you can also do this in your day-to-day life. It’s all about carving out that space and time, cutting out everything that’s not essential, and tuning in to what your mind and body are trying to tell you. The magic is always there inside you, you just have to stop doing so much, so that you have the space to hear what it’s telling you.
This step is critical because until you’re willing to get really honest with yourself about where your life is currently headed, you can’t actually do anything to change it. But there are also a few things you need to be aware of to make sure that you’re successful with this step.
First, be prepared for big feelings, both physical and emotional. A lot of different things might come up when you enter this container. You may end up sleeping for 10 hours on a Saturday. Emotions you didn’t realize that you had might come to the surface. And that’s ok. There is a reason this happens when we stop and finally take a break. It’s because your body and mind are finally processing all the stuff you’ve been pushing into the corner for years.
Second, it’s crucial that you don’t fill this big space you’ve created with new stuff. Pay attention to your mind and body and what they are asking for and let that be your guide. There are no goals to achieve, just notice and sit with whatever is coming up for you. If you have the capacity, you can try some mindfulness activities like:
- Gentle walks in nature (not hiking/running/etc.)
- Gentle yoga (think yin, not power vinyasa flow)
- Guided meditation
- Journaling
- Cathartic crying (let that stuff out)
- Meaningful connections with other humans (that don’t add stress)
- Other no-stress (physical or mental) things that you enjoy
The idea here is to give your mind and body a break. You’ve essentially been pushing yourself past your limits for way too long and you have to give your mind and body a chance to catch up, rest, and recover so that you have the capacity to start creating the dream life that you’ve always wanted.
Third, make sure you have the support you need. When you start to go through this process, you need to have a support system you can reach out to. This might be family, friends, the Hustle + Flow Community, other communities you’re a part of, a doctor, a therapist, or a coach. You know what you need, so make sure you give yourself those resources.
Ok, so to recap, the first step to creating a life you don’t need a vacation from is to make big space. Cut out everything that’s not essential, you should only keep things like eating, sleeping, showing up for work and caregiver activities, for 1-2 weeks, and allow yourself to recover and process the things you’ve been ignoring in your life. Get really honest with yourself, and make sure you have a support team to reach out to.
In part 2, I’ll be talking about how to get crystal clear on who you are and what you want your life to look like. It’s time to get real, so you can get what you want out of life. If you’re not subscribed, make sure you go ahead and sign up, so you don’t miss it!
