Most of life is about making choices. You will choose a career, relationships, and other everyday requirements like what you eat and how (and if) you exercise. These daily choices can either make or break your success and happiness in life.
While some options are obviously bad, that doesn’t mean every single decision you make will be. It takes mindfulness, awareness, and a deep understanding of yourself to see the warning signs to change your bad habits.
Here are five signs you’re making the wrong choices in life.
Increased Anxiety and Emotions
While some anxiety and emotions are natural when you do the things you love, they shouldn’t be overwhelming or hard to control. If you are constantly feeling overwhelmed, sad, or depressed, something in your life needs to change. First, make sure it is nothing related to your health.
If it’s not about your health, then you need to stop and evaluate exactly what you want and need from life to feel better. Then, create a way to recognize the moment the feelings come around to see if your actions or inactions are responsible. For example, maybe you feel down because you told your boss no when you wanted more responsibility.
Unexplained Fatigue
Beyond mental, physical, or health reasons, fatigue can also be a sign of not being happy or content with your choices. Stress and high emotions are draining and don’t make sleeping easier. This means you will always be running on empty until you can solve the underlining problem.
Lack of Self-Awareness and Evaluation
Ignoring red flags and gut feelings, or thoughts such as “I should be doing this instead,” are signs of lack of self-awareness or evaluation. These factors are critical to the decision-making process. Ignoring these thoughts or red flags means you are not taking the time to get to know yourself and what you want. Just because others are going after certain things doesn’t mean you have to. If you feel this way, you need to stop and evaluate yourself, your goals, and what you want from life.
You Have Become a Master Procrastinator
Have you started pushing off important tasks until the last second? Developing this habit spontaneously can mean something is out of place or missing in your life. It can also highlight that the work or hobby you chose to do is no longer fulfilling – meaning it is time to make a change.
Unclear Goals or Sense of Purpose
No deadlines and a lack of direction or a sense of purpose in daily life are also clear warning signs that your choices or lack thereof affect your overall enjoyment in life. Conversely, creating goals provides direction and motivation essential to enjoyment and purpose for most people.
Being aware of these five signs can help you change your bad habits before they consume your life and prevent success. Making the right choices in life is about understanding who you are, what you want from life, and creating clear goals to get there. In other words, when you make the right choices, you will feel happier, inspired, motivated, and fulfilled.