Change Your Life for the Better

Changing your life for the better is about you, the details of your life, your specific environment, your goals and aspirations, and your motivation to continue to strive for a fulfilled and healthy life. Life is a journey, and one way to change your life for the better is to accept that there are many things about life that are out of your control.[1] What is in your control is your attitude, perspective, resilience, emotional health, and how you choose to react to any situation life throws at you. Changing your life for the better is always a process and not a simple fix.[2]

Steps

Becoming Self Aware

  1. Embrace your internal locus of control. The internal locus of control is a fancy way of saying how you view yourself in relation to events in your life and your attitude towards situations that happen to you.[3] A strong internal locus of control means that you take responsibility for things in your life, and you have a hardy sense of being able to manage problems or difficulties that may come your way. To begin changing your life for the better, beef up your internal locus of control.
    • In contrast, if you have an external locus of control, you feel as though things just happen to you, you are a victim of your circumstances, and you don’t feel as though you have much agency in your life to deal with challenging events.
    • An easy example is to imagine you have been in a car accident, no one is hurt, and you and the other driver are both at fault If you are oriented in having an internal locus of control, you will accept the situation, have confidence you will be able to deal with the consequences, and feel that, even though this is a challenging situation, you will be able to handle it. If your locus of control is external, your thoughts may be a long the lines of, “Why does this always happen to me? Nothing ever goes my way. I always mess everything up. The world is out to get me, no matter what I do.”
  2. Determine where your current locus of control is. There is an easy true and false test available online that you can take and score in about ten minutes that can tell you where your locus of control is.[4] Take the test and figure out your score. This will let you know where you are so you can start to understand your approach to life.
    • Understanding what your beliefs are and your ability to handle adversity will help illuminate where to begin changing your attitudes towards life in a more positive, empowered way.
  3. Know why you need to change. Feeling like you have no control over yourself or your life can lead to feelings of stagnation, depression, helplessness, and hopelessness. How can you change your life for the better if you feel so stuck in this way? Are you living your life or are you letting life live you? Most people tend to take on negative thoughts about themselves when life doesn’t work out the way they imagined. It’s a normal reaction, but that doesn’t mean you can’t change it.[5]
  4. Start a journal of change. Now that you know where your locus of control is and why you need to shift it, you can start to move toward a more internal, empowered approach to life. Write down recent examples of times in your life that made you feel angry or disappointed, such as tests at school, performance at work, your self esteem in relationships, or your general success and ability to deal with life in the face of adversity. Write down all of the examples you can think of that cause you to feel worry, anxiety, anger, or guilt. Next to these events, write what your natural reaction to these things would be. Write down as may examples as you can think of, real or imagined, and your honest thoughts and reactions when life doesn’t go your way.
    • For example, people often stress about school and work performance. For example, write down, "If I fail this test, I am a loser and I am stupid. The test was probably unfair and I don’t have enough time to study. I can’t do this." These are all statements that relieve you of any responsibility of the actual outcome of the test.[6] This will help you access your feelings and start to change them.
  5. Re-frame your thoughts. Start to create the shift to a more empowered view of life with your journal. The power of your words will help you clearly see the choice you have in how you view your life. Becoming aware of that choice and internalizing the power you have to put your life in your perspective on your terms will help you begin to change your life for the better. Using your listed feelings in your journal, begin to re-frame your reactions from the perspective of choice, empowerment, and positive esteem. Own your choices, own your time, own your consequences, and be realistic about your role as a person in the events that happen in your life.
    • For example, you could write about a test, “I didn't study as much as I could because I went to the movies, and that’s okay. I didn’t do as well as I wanted to, but next time I will do better. I know that I could have done better because I am capable of better study habits and time management. I’m only human, and sometimes I make mistakes. There will be more tests, it’s not the end of the world. I can talk to the professor to see if there is anything else I can do to help my grade.” [5]
  6. Change negatives to positives in your life. Begin to take this new perspective of choice and empowerment into the real world. Changing your life for the better starts with your attitudes about yourself and your life. Listen to how you talk to yourself when you feel disappointed and upset. Use your journal to write down the negative things that immediately pop into your brain throughout the day. Set an alarm on your phone so that the message “Talk positively to yourself today” pops up every hour. Make small posters that you can place by your bed, your office walls, or inside your notebooks that say "Only positive self talk."
    • Take responsibility for how you treat yourself and how you talk to yourself. Feeling like you deserve to change your life for the better will create positive change in your life.
    • For example, you dropped a plate and broke it. Instead of thinking, "I am such a clumsy idiot!", start to change the toxic patterns and write down positive re-framing thoughts in your journal. You aren’t a clumsy idiot, you are a person who sometimes drops plates. Even in that simple statement, you are shifting the responsibility from being a helpless clumsy idiot that can’t help but break plates, to a human being that isn’t always perfect and makes mistakes. You are not as powerless as you may feel. [5]
  7. Acknowledge your courage. Changing your life takes bravery and, even if you think you aren't courageous, you are. In your changes journal, write down all the times in your life you felt brave. Write about all the times you were faced with situations that you thought you could never deal with or situations that scared you that you did indeed survive. Honor your courage for just living in this world.
    • For example, write about how you showed up at school to take the test even though you failed it. Sometimes just showing up takes courage. Courage is not an easy talent and having it does not mean that you don’t fear things. It just means you know you have the power to face your fears and deal with life.
    • Try getting creative. Make a collage about how brave you are, write a poem about courage, or make a poster about all of your courageous attributes.[7]
  8. Realize it takes time and effort. Changing your life for the better does not mean you will suddenly have a better life where everything falls into place and you sail along blissfully satisfied with your better life. Changing your life for the better takes courage. Changing your attitude from feeling as though there is nothing you can do to rise above the adversity of life and that you are stuck and stagnant, to feeling as though you have a healthy, resilient, positive attitude and belief in yourself is essential in changing your life for the better.
    • You cannot change life, you cannot predict life, and often the best laid plans can always fall through. However, you can change yourself and how you view life events.[7]

Getting to Know Yourself

  1. Assess your self identity. Developing a healthy identity is essential to changing your life for the better. Who are you? Who do you want to be in the world? How do you see yourself? How do you think others see you? Exploring and changing how you view yourself and how you feel others see you is an extremely important factor. This can lead to real world change in behavior and give you the motivation to continue the strive to change your life for the better.
  2. Take the Briggs, Meyers, & Jung personality test. To learn more about yourself, take the Briggs, Meyers, & Jung personality test, which is a short questionnaire that can give you insight into general components of your personality. The test uses general personality types as explains where you fall within them. Use your results to explore what feels true about you. This will help you with understanding some basic functioning of your personality, which can help you change your life for the better. Self awareness and understanding is the leaping off point in making positive change in your life.
    • This test is freely available online.[8]
  3. Focus on what you admire about yourself. Using your changes journal, write down attributes about yourself that you admire. Are you kind? Do you make people laugh? Remembering that intelligence comes in many forms and not just book smarts or credentials, do you feel intelligent? Are you curious? Start with the positive aspects of who you are and use your journal to create a robust list of things you truly like about who you are.
    • Don’t restrict yourself! Write freely about anything large or small that you like about yourself. Do you like your hair? Your fingers? Do you like your voice or the way you speak? Do you like your sense of style? You are a whole human comprised of many parts that you perceive about yourself.
    • Surprise yourself with how complex you really are and dig deep to reveal the many facets of yourself that you truly admire. Creating positive change in your life means finding the person you really are and honoring that person.[9]
  4. Decide what you want to develop. Now that you have a long list of the things you like, make a list of things about your personality that you want to develop. Remember, change and development is something you strive for and won't happen overnight. Just because you write about how you hate losing your temper in a journal, does not mean you will wake up tomorrow without a temper. Writing it down helps with self awareness. You can’t change or develop what you aren’t aware of.
    • Don’t be too hard on yourself as you journal. Avoid using black and white or extreme statements like “I’m stupid” or “I never do anything right”. Keep the focus on being a human who is not perfect and makes mistakes. Try to think about personality traits, such as being less shy, having more control over your temper, being more organize, or becoming a better listener.
    • Everyone is flawed, and part of the striving to make changes for a better life is looking at yourself and your personality as a work in progress.[10]
  5. Set small, achievable goals. After you know what you want to change, set small, achievable goals that will help you change small parts of your personality. Focus on one attribute at a time. For example, tell yourself that you are going to use active listening in at least one conversation today. Write about ways that you can actively listen in your everyday interactions and implement them.
    • At the end of the day, journal about your experience and how well you did. Where there times you were successful? Where there events where you did not listen as well as you could? Journal about how it feels to start changing facets of your personality.
    • Start slow because you don’t want to overwhelm yourself by trying to change all at once or expecting perfection. Stay positive that it will happen. The more proactive you feel about creating a more grounded, fulfilled self, the more motivated you will be to continue to change your life for the better.[11]
  6. Be grateful for who you are. Take a moment everyday to be grateful for exactly as you are. Part of changing your life for the better is getting to know yourself, embracing your strengths and flaws, and feeling comfortable in your skin. Acceptance of yourself can help you feel confident about yourself, your life, and the changes you want to make.
  7. Seek emotional support. If you are having trouble changing the way you think about yourself, find someone who can be there for you emotionally. This may be a family member, a friends, or a coworker you trust. Educate yourself about ways to change negative thoughts about yourself.
    • If you feel as though you could benefit from counseling, find a counselor that you feel comfortable with. If you feel overwhelmed by becoming more aware of yourself, your choices, and your emotions, you may want to seek out a therapist. Changing your life on a meaningful level is a challenging journey, and being strong also means knowing when you can benefit from guidance and help.[12]

Setting Short Term Goals

  1. Assess your life. After becoming more aware of yourself, your personality, and your identity, you can begin to look at pragmatic, real time changes that you want to make in your life. Using your journal, make a list of short term goals that you can begin changing in the near future and long term goals that may take more time and effort to realize.
    • Only you know what you want your life to be and only you have the power to make choices to create change in your life for the better.
  2. Increase your physical health. One of the best ways you can change for the better is to get your physical health in order. If your body feels better then so will your mind. Make goals to get into shape. Start a workout plan where you run, walk, or do some kind of physical activity three to five times a week. Add in strength training to make yourself stronger. Also try eating better to help with your overall health.
    • If you smoke, try to quit. It is bad for your health and the health of those around you. Incorporate things into your routine that will help you quit, such as nicotine patches, gums, lozenges, vapor cigarettes, or support groups.[13]
  3. Express yourself with your physical appearance. If you are not happy with your personal style or physical appearance, make plans to make it evolve. Adopt a new style of clothing or change your hair to better suit your identity and how you feel about yourself. Start wearing things that make you happy and feel more comfortable in your skin. Wear fun accessories that add a bit of your personality into your everyday appearance.
    • These can be small or gradual changes if you are not ready to change all at once. Do what feels right for you. [10]
  4. Improve your living conditions. Your personal living conditions can easily be changed with some effort. If you are prone to messiness, try cleaning your space, your room, or your home more often. Having a clean living area generally makes you feel better and more in control of your life. Try to implement more cleaning into your routine because maintaining a more organized and clean living space can help you feel better and make your life better. If you are tired of your old designs or living area, try decorating your space, home, or room in a fashion that you feel more comfortable with. Add new pillows, change the color of paint, or rearrange your furniture to make your area feel more like you.
    • Your environment does have an effect on your overall well being and can be a creative outlet to express the change you are feeling towards your life.
    • Try becoming more eco-friendly or reducing your carbon footprint. Use less electricity by turning off lights, use less water in the shower, or try to be less wasteful in your living spaces. Start a recycle bin in your house or carpool to work. This is an easy way that you can improve your living conditions but also help the environment as well. [10]
  5. Get involved in your community. Feeling connected to others can help you get in touch with others and yourself, as well as be a helpful tool in learning about life and how you want to change yourself for the better. Volunteer at a soup kitchen, a homeless shelter, an animal refuge, or a food co-op. Most places require a small time commitment, sometimes as little as an hour a week or as you have time.
    • Volunteering to help a cause you believe in is a great way to boost your self worth and strengthen your feelings of empowerment, since you are actively involved in helping others.[14]
  6. Cultivate new hobbies. If you want to make your life better, start cultivating new hobbies or doing the things you love. Take an art or dance class, start music lessons, or enroll in a class about birds. Read more books or go somewhere you have always wanted to explore. It doesn't matter what it is as long as it is something that you want to do.
    • Nurturing your sense of self will help you develop motivation to continue to strive to change your life for the better. [10]

Setting Long Term Goals

  1. Change your job. There are some goals that are more long term than others. If you are unhappy at your job, think about ways you can improve your situation. Think about any other realistic career goals that you have in mind for yourself and try to move toward that goal. If you like the profession you're in but not your specific situation, think about looking for a promotion or changing companies.
    • If you want to be something different, get educated about what you really want to do, and make steps in the direction you want to go.
    • This will take time, so go slow and make solid, financially smart decisions. Remember, using the short term goals while you strive for change can ease the time it takes to create long term positive change.[15]
  2. Go back to school. No matter your age, you can still learn new things and change your career and life path. If there is something that you have always waned to study, figure out classes that would work for you. If you need a degree for whatever new career you want, find a degree program that you can do in your current situation.
    • Trust yourself and your ambition. Make smart, researched decisions about your future and how more education will help you achieve these goals.[15]
  3. Work on your relationships. Take stock of the people in your life, both social, familial, and intimate, and decide if you are satisfied with them. Changing your life for the better also means surrounding yourself with people who share your same desire to strive for a better, more robust and fulfilling life. Take your time, listen to how you feel when you are around the people you are close to. Make decisions that empower you to feel safe, positive, and emotionally healthy. Ask those around you for help with your life changes and see how they react. This may help you decide which of your relationships are healthy and beneficial to your life.
    • Don't make hasty decisions about the people in your life. Think through each decision and how each relationship makes you feel. If you are trying to change you life, you need people that will support you and empower you to be who you want to be. Focus on cultivating these kinds of relationships.[16]
  4. Evaluate your location. Decide if you are happy living where you do. Is there somewhere else you see yourself living? A change in location can change your life and perspective, but moving to a new place also takes planning, financial responsibility, and determination. It can be a good thing, but it also may upset the balance of your life and change things you weren't expecting.
    • Get as much information as you can as far as cost of living, job availability, consequences on your life or family, and the stress of moving to a new place before you make a final decision. [10]

Taking Care of Yourself

  1. Be aware of how you feel. Changing your life for the better can be challenging. It is important to take care of yourself and make sure you don’t burn out and give up as you embark on the journey of changing your life for the better. Honor yourself because you are brave just for entertaining the idea of change, especially since it is never easy. Learning about yourself and finding your ability to be courageous, responsible, and empowered can be daunting. Being honest about your personality, not only how you perceive yourself but how you think others perceive you, can be emotionally wearing. Making choices about what you want to change in your life can be scary and change itself is exhausting.
    • Be proud of yourself for even attempting to change your life for the better. Life is hard, and becoming proactive in who you are and what you are capable of takes strength.
  2. Reduce stress in your life. If you are feeling overwhelmed by all the changes you are making, take a break. Watch a movie or a TV show, read a book, or play a game with a friend. Go for a night out with your friends to unwind and relax. Talk to a friend that always makes you laugh. Take a hot bath or shower to relieve some of your tension.
    • If you want, talk about the changes you feel in yourself with your friends and let them give you advice or support.[17]
  3. Stay calm. There are points in the day where everything may seem too much. When this happens, remember to breathe. Take ten minutes out of your day to sit with your hands on your belly and just breathe all the tension and changes out. Remember that changing your life does not mean being perfect. Every day is a journey, and even the days that make you feel stuck and frustrated are still a part of the striving towards a better life.[18]
  4. Reward yourself. As you progress through your life changes, take time to reward yourself. Eat some of your favorite candy, go out or cook yourself a nice meal, or buy a new shirt, video game, or other prize you've been eyeing. Try to remember that you are on a journey and that you are amazing for continuing on the path. Reward yourself for embarking on the challenging voyage to changing your life for the better.
    • If you are also stressed, treat yourself to a massage or ask someone you love to give you a massage.

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Sources and Citations

  1. ↑ Luhmann, Maike; Orth, Ulrich; Specht, Jule; Kandler, Christian; and Lucas, Richard E. Studying Changes in Life Circumstances and Personality: It's About Time. European Journal of Personality. May/Jun 2014, Vol. 28, Issue 3, p256-266
  2. ↑ Kenneth Bradford, G. and Sterling, Molly Merrill. The Journey Is the Goal: The Legacy of James F. T. Bugental. Journal of Humanistic Psychology. Jul 2009, Vol. 49, Issue 3, p316-328
  3. ↑ Chen, Jingqiu and Wang, Lei, Locus of control and the three components of commitment to change. Personality & Individual Differences. Feb 2007, Vol. 42, Issue 3, p503-512.
  4. ↑ http://www.oakland.edu/upload/docs/Instructor%20Handbook/Locus%20of%20Control.pdf
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 Jemmer, Patrick. Self-Talk: The Spells of Psyhco-chaotic Sorcery. European Journal of Clinical Hypnosis. 2009, Vol. 9, Issue 1, p51-58. 8p
  6. ↑ http://virgil.azwestern.edu/~dag/lol/ControlLocus.html
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 Wong, Paul T. P. Meaning Therapy: Assessments And Interventions. Existential Analysis: Journal of the Society for Existential Analysis. Jan2015, Vol. 26 Issue 1, p154-167
  8. ↑ http://www.myersbriggs.org/my-mbti-personality-type/mbti-basics/
  9. ↑ http://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-living/stress-management/in-depth/positive-thinking/art-20043950
  10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 10.2 10.3 10.4 Van Deurzen, Emmy. Life is for Living. Existential Analysis: Journal of the Society for Existential Analysis. Jul 2009, Vol. 20, Issue 2, p226-239
  11. ↑ Padesky, Christine A. and Mooney, Kathleen A. Strengths-Based Cognitive-Behavioural Therapy: A Four-Step Model to Build Resilience. Clinical Psychology & Psychotherapy. Jul/Aug 2012, Vol. 19, Issue 4, p283-290
  12. ↑ http://www.helpguide.org/articles/emotional-health/finding-a-therapist-who-can-help-you-heal.htm
  13. ↑ http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/nicotine-dependence/basics/coping-support/con-20014452
  14. ↑ Adler, Alfred. The Practice and Theory of Individual Psychology, 1925
  15. ↑ 15.0 15.1 http://www.mindtools.com/page6.html
  16. ↑ http://www.apa.org/helpcenter/lifestyle-changes.aspx
  17. ↑ http://www.mindbodygreen.com/0-13868/28-easy-self-care-practices-anyone-can-do.html
  18. ↑ http://www.mindbodygreen.com/0-13868/28-easy-self-care-practices-anyone-can-do.html

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