PSST: This post is meant to accompany one of my podcast episodes. If you'd like to dive deeper, you can listen on the attached players or on iTunes & Spotify under Bloom Where You're Planted.
I remember being DONE with making decisions. They caused me a lot of anxiety & I’d wobble back and forth for days, obsessing over tiny details & draining my mental energy over what should have been quick decisions. I was so exhausted that I would just shut down, refusing to engage in decision making in fear that I’d be sucked in and drained beyond repair. Shutting down my decision-making left my best interests in the hands of other people, but fear left me unable to take the control of my life I ultimately needed to so I could live my best life.
In the past few months, I’ve found some ways to help me make confident decisions that move me forward quickly and easily. It’s easier said than done, but its a muscle that you can exercise to become stronger over time. As you learn to trust yourself more with big decisions, you’ll really grow into the awareness of your life’s potential, and girl, you will glow.
These tips are easy steps to implement everyday. That way, when you’re surprised with a big decision, you’ll have already been doing the work that makes it easier. You might find that some of the tips feel more natural to you, and ultimately, you can try what you like & leave the rest; the best self-growth work is the work that gets done.
1. Visualize Your Dream Life Everyday
When you visualize your dream life everyday, you’re immersing yourself in the feeling that goes along with it before you can actually experience it. That way, you’ll know how it feels to live in your dream life, and you can use those feelings as a barometer to guide your decisions.
If you feel warm and tingly when you’re envisioning your dream life, and an upcoming decision has a choice that leaves you with that same warm, tingly feeling, that’s a good sign you’re on the right track.
2. Set A Timer & Free Journal
Feeling stuck when it comes to making a decision often comes from a place of fear and overwhelm. The decision triggers a lot of unrelated thoughts, and they all become a swirling mass of thoughts that come into play whenever you think about the decision.
Getting these thoughts on paper by free journaling is my favourite way to deal with this. I like to set a short timer to get my thoughts on paper & in front of me. That way, I can look at them more objectively & deal with them.
I know this isn’t a super quick solution, and does require a little upfront time, but if you’re facing the type of decision that has left you waffling back and forth for days in the past, this is probably time well spent.
3. Leave Enough White Space in Your Life
Making time for leisure or just "shutting your brain off" is crucial. If you're always making your brain perform, you can't expect it to be rested when Making time for leisure or just "shutting your brain off" is crucial. If you're always making your brain perform, you can't expect it to be rested when you really need results.
My favourite ways to make sure I have enough white space are: meditation, exercise, just general relaxing/downtime, a nap, a bath, a walk & time in the sun. Ultimately, the best way for you to recharge is what feels best to you, the list is just for ideas. Try different things out and see what works best!
4. Prep + minimize your decisions wherever you can
This requires a little discipline, but it's worth it.
The point here is to take care of those easy-to-overthink decisions (like what to wear, what to eat) the night before while also streamlining your morning as much as possible.
For me, this looks like:
- planning my meals in advance
- laying out my outfit
- organizing my purse & laying it out with my keys
- packing my lunch the night before
- setting my work priorities in advance so I always know what to work on
By streamlining stressful tasks in the morning, you're not bogging down your mental energy with grunt work. Instead, you're saving your energy so you can kill it on the daily.
5. Get crystal clear on what your dream life looks like
Have you ever been told to go get something, but when you ask where to find it, you're told something like "oh, next to the thing". Yeah, you need more info than that to actually get to a destination, and planning your life is the exact same. It's hard to get where you're going & be confident in your decisions if you don't know what the destination looks like, but that's not always easy.
I'd love to help you out with this one, I'm hosting a FREE 5 day challenge from April 2nd-6th to help all of my people get crystal clear on their dream life . The struggle was real when I realized I need to start putting in some hard work to start living the life I deserved, so to help you all out, I piled everything i learned from months and months of trial and error into this challenge so you can take a shortcut to clarity. Scenic routes are nice & all, but this one was all about taking one step forward and two steps back, so I figured I'd save you the frustration. what I learned into a free challenge to help you get there without all of the trial and error I had to deal with.
You can sign up to join my challenge at www.northinbloom.co/dreamlife and I'm really excited about the confidence & clarity it'll bring you. Its way easier to make moves when you have this confidence + clarity, so I can't wait to see how it levels up your life, so reach out to me on instagram and let me know how you're liking the challenge!
Just a reminder, this blog post is also a podcast, so you can listen on the players attached OR on iTunes & Spotify as Bloom Where You're Planted. It's a great way to dive a little deeper into this topic, and honestly, it's my favourite way to connect with you guys & I'd love to know what you think.
Lotsa Love!
Andrea
