I feel aimless, I have no goals, and I've lost any and all purpose or meaning. What now?

[afacc123]

What now? First this truth: it's perfectly okay to feel aimless and not to have goals or purpose!

Second, repeat that once more: it's fine to feel this way.

Why? Because there is no manual of life according to which you or I are supposed to have a purpose or meaning or a goal for that matter. What you are likely feeling is a bit of social conditioning by which you feel that you are always supposed to be "heading somewhere". There is a lot of hype and near-worship of the ambitious person in just about any book, magazine or general news media. What people admire - and encourage you to admire as well - are "driven" individuals who have some kind of goal and do what it takes to reach it.

That is certainly one acceptable way to live. But I think what gets lost (or simply: not mentioned) is that living without all that drive and ambition is just as acceptable. I think it's important to remember that THERE IS NO RACE in life. That means that there is not one set of rules, one destination, or anyone almighty measuring our worth by our ability to reach a certain place by a certain time when our lives reach their end.

Do not forget this assumption you might be making - and which might be causing your suffering. Because once you free yourself from the idea that there is no one right destination (e.g., becoming wealthy, famous, powerful, respected, etc.), you also free yourself from believing that you need to have a "sacred goal" that you hoped was going to set you straight, clear up all that existential confusion and make the task of living that much easier.

But back to my point about an alternative acceptable way to live (and I mean not just short-term but also long-term). You can live a happy, relaxed life anytime if your attitude shifts from feeling you are somehow "behind" others who seem to have clear goals that they are pursuing, to an attitude of detachment from it all. In other words, one way to feel the sting of aimlessness is to feel the smallness of, well, just about everything in human life in the grand scheme of things. Have you been to the Grand Canyon? If not, I literally suggest you go visit it or any other mighty shrine of nature that makes you feel so darn small that you realize this beautiful thing: we ALL are small, no matter how much you think others have it so much better figured out with their sacred goals.

To your point about "drifting and waiting" for interesting things to happen, I take a similar stance to Vivek in his answer. It's okay not to have goals and focus on doing what you enjoy. When you do not know what you enjoy, however, the onus to take action to figure out what that might be is on you. So in that respect, I would recommend to shed this desperate desire for a goal but embrace the fact that the responsibility to lift yourself out of inaction lies with you alone. The good news is there a billion ways to do something. If you are fortunate enough to enjoy good health, have enough time, a little money available and maybe know someone to hang out with you, the world is your oyster.

Or at least, what I mean to say is that if you want something interesting to happen (and if sitting in meditation is not interesting enough for you) - and if you want to feel like you have some control over WHEN that might actually happen - you need to do something, go somewhere, meet people to invite motion into your life.

Long story short: goals and purpose are overrated, but staying in deliberate motion is mandatory to lead an interesting life.

Best of luck to you.

[afacc123]

It's weird how not having something to chase in your life spells disaster.

"What?! You don't know what you will be majoring in?"

"You don't know what you'll do after your studies?"

"You don't know what type of career you want?"

"What are you doing with your life?"

It's upsetting, sometimes even unnerving to think that you're expected to know every second of every minute in your life what you'll be doing next.

It's not your fault. Take a deep breath, calm yourself down. I repeat: it's not your fault. It is really okay to not know what you want to do with your life. It happens. What makes it worse is the people who keep on asking you the same question over and over again, as if knowing what you want to do is an absolute measure of a life well lived.

Well, it's not.

I have been in these situations so many times before that I no longer get scared when I don't have a purpose. And every single time, it has worked out. I know what I want to do as and when the choice comes before me. You know why? Because I don't try to define my purpose. I don't try to cook up stories to make choices for myself. I let my heart decide what I want to do. And then I reason out the options I have.

Whenever you feel like you don't have a purpose, just calm down and do something you like doing. Don't hold a gun to your head and ask your brain to make a choice. When I get lost without a purpose or a goal (which happens a lot), I just pursue what I love to do; I follow my heart. It might not brighten up my resume, but it gives me satisfaction. It makes me happy. And I value that more than a brightened resume which gave me no satisfaction at all.

You don't have to wait for interesting things to happen. You have to make interesting things happen. Just follow what you want to do and forget about having a solid goal or a star to shoot at. Once in a while, it's good to live without having a sword hanging over your head. No one came into this world with a to-do list. And while you follow your passions, remember to help other people reach their goals. You'll have the kind of satisfaction that no other accomplishment can provide you.

[afacc123]

As I see it you only have two real options:

1. You don’t do anything - You stay lost, do not try to find out what is next and do not test out anything. This will largely keep your life the same it is now.
2. You try something; anything - You try your best to figure out a direction. It may not be the direction, but as long as you have something to do you will find out at least something.

If you go with Option #1 we are done here.

Do not read on and enjoy living the life you have.

If you go with Option #2 however, then there is something we must address first.

It’s obviously not going to do you any good to try out something random in the hopes that it will get you a goal, purpose or meaning. You’ve tried that until now and it hasn’t helped so far.

Thus, the best thing to do at this stage is to actually sit down and think about your life.

I know this can be hard to some, but it’s essentially the thing that will net you the most benefit if you do it.

What is it that you want out of life?

That should be THE question in your life right now. Nothing should be as important as figuring that out.

Now, this is a very complex answer and something that will most likely feel too large to answer, so let’s divide it up.

Tony Robbins, whose one of the leading people in the area of Self-Improvement, does this by breaking up life into 7 Main Categories.

1. Physical Body
2. Emotions & Meaning
3. Relationship
4. Time
5. Finances
6. Work/Career
7. Spirituality

What he suggest you do when you think about these areas is to rate them from 1–10 twice; once for where you feel you are, the second for where you want to be.

This is a method derived from Psychologys ‘Self-Discrepancy Theory’; the discussion about Real vs. Ideal Self.

When you understand where it is you are and where you want to go you can more accurately draw a path there, much like if you are going on a road trip.

If you are missing either your starting or end point it will be tough to do anything about it.

That being said, here are some things to think about when you consider each of these Categories:

• Physical Body → How fit are you right now and where do you want to be? Do you want to be healthy, skinny, buff, fat, muscular, big, compact etc.? How do you want to feel physically every day? Do you want to be feeling light and fit, or heavy and slow?
• Emotions & Meaning → How are you generally feeling? What are your emotions like right now and how meaningful is your life right now? Where do you want it to be? Why are those emotions important?
• Relationship → What are your relationships like right now? Do they fulfill you? Are you happy being around other people or do they drain you? Are you missing some friends or a partner in your life? How do you want your relationships to benefit you? What do you want them to be like?
• Time → How much time do you currently have in the day? Do you have enough to do everything you want or is something missing? Are you stressed out or do you have enough time? How would you like to spend your time? What would a perfect day look like for you?
• Finances → Where are your finances at? Do you have enough money or are you missing something? Where do you want to be financially? Why is it important to have that amount of money? What would you do with the money if you had it already?
• Work/Career → Is your job fun and fulfilling? Do you love going to work or do you hate it? What meaning do you gain from your work? What do you want your job to be like? How do you want to feel when you go to work and while you’re at work? How do you want to impact the world? Why?
• Spirituality → Is your life making you grateful? Are you loving life or hating it? Do you wish you had more time to find out about yourself, your spirituality and god, the universe or life itself (depending on what you believe in)? Where do you want that part of your life to be?

Answering these questions should spark your ideas and it should give you something to work towards.

And that is exactly what will ultimately lead you to find more purpose and meaning.

Purpose, Meaning, and Fulfillment in life are all dependent not on the actual goals you achieve but on the progress you make towards them.

It’s the journey towards the goals, the feeling of your life moving forward and the positive feedback you get when working on these goals that makes you create a meaning for life.

Which means, the last step to removing this feeling of aimlessness is to create something to do.

Based on what we discussed before, the easiest thing for you to do would be to set up at least 1 Habit for each of the Main Categories.

In creating this habit ask yourself what habit would get you from the score you are currently at to just one score higher.

Do not try to do too much. This will be a long process. It is supposed to be.

Again, the point is not that you reach your goals insanely quickly or effectively. It is not the goals itself that matters but the journey there that will make you feel like you have an aim in life.

The stronger the desire pushing you towards the goal the greater your sense of purpose will be, but as long as you have a goal it will at least remove this sense of being lost.

Find a direction by dividing your life into it’s simplest form and doing something in every area; you will find your aim sooner than you think.

[afacc123]

Answered June 4

 

Your Life is like that friend….. you've got that problem from chapter which you've left and new to study, sounds funny but not.

So how to tackle this situation, the answer is start a new chapter which you could Love and enjoy.

But first we need to know what is Love and how one enjoys the situation. There are certain indication in body which makes it.

• Love is the situation in body when our oxytocin, serotonin and endorphins levels are increased to certain levels. So how to increase these magic chemicals, dont start taking externally but certain things surely helps to increase then, like eating sweets, and fruits daily.  

• And when start having these chemicals we feel good and start enjoying things, which leads to more of it and cycle continue. 

The other reason you are feeling that is just because you have lost something important and very close to life. That has created the feelings of emptiness in life and you feeling aimless.

But remember this nothing is permanent in life and things changes people loses in life. This is important and basic truth of life .

There is another thing it's not important to have goals in life because life itself does not have a particular goal. Life is to live happily.

Spread Love and happiness do not run behind goals. Life should not be goals oriented. Feel the life around nature and one's own body too.

But if you are depressed please talk to people that can help, you can message me too.

You are awesome just feel it once you will forget this thought.

[afacc123]

 

You ‘feel’ lost.

It’s a feeling, stop trying to resolve it with thinking.

You are thinking too logically — “I have a degree in this, so this career makes sense for me” “I am this type of person so it makes sense to be with this person”

Stop fooling yourself with this rational nonsense. Stop making sense.

The best way to not feel lost is to move closer to the things you like.

What do you like doing? Is it riding a bike, badminton, cooking, running, hiking, visiting tourist sites? I don’t know, what is it for you?

What would you enjoy doing in your free time? — that’s the thing you need to get closer too.

If it’s watching movies, then can you get into movie-making or story writing?

If it’s playing sports, then can you play professionally?

I can’t find what your direction in life should be, only you can.

---

Now some might say — “I don’t know what I like”

The only reason for not knowing what you like is that you haven’t tried enough things.

You are too stuck in your comfortable box. You don’t try anything new. So, go out there and try different things.

Pick one new thing you are going to try this week, even if you end up hating it you will still learn something about yourself.

Only you make life complicated, it’s simple.

[afacc123]

Well, there’s always an alternative way to lead a meaningful life.

At times it’s okay to feel aimless and not to have goals or purpose!

Why? Because there is no manual of life according to which you or I are supposed to have a purpose or meaning or a goal for that matter.

I think it's important to remember that THERE IS NO RACE in life. That means that there is no one set of rules, one destination, or anyone almighty measuring our worth by our ability to reach a certain place by a certain time when our lives reach their end.

I would recommend to shed this desperate desire for a goal but embrace the fact that the responsibility to lift yourself out of inaction lies with you alone. The good news is there a billion ways to do something. If you are fortunate enough to enjoy good health, have enough time, a little money available, and maybe know someone to hang out with you, the world is yours.

Worry not, cherish the present! The universe will lead to the right path at the correct time.

#giveyourselftime #motivation #inspiration #selflove #life #phasesoflife

[Biskot2]

ok

[r2d2]

there is hope here..

 

[Dyud]

time for divorce may be? 

[Catalpha]

I have purpose in life, but I have been slacking because of stress. 

[Pitta]

kick the bucket 

[VenkyBabu]

Binod

[afacc123]

4 hours ago, r2d2 said:

there is hope here..

 

FYI....That is not hope

[afacc123]

22 minutes ago, Dyud said:

time for divorce may be? 

-ve thinking 

not good for you

[afacc123]

18 minutes ago, Catalpha said:

I have purpose in life, but I have been slacking because of stress. 

stress is something everyone has

you are no exception

who handles stress in adversity would be the star of the show