Aggressive Life Advice You Need To Hear

As we enter February, I’ve had some time to reflect over the first month of 2020. Maybe it was a rough month for you, or maybe it was the best month ever. Regardless, I think it’s time we all hear a little life advice. And I don’t mean the fluffy stuff that makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside, I mean the nitty gritty, down and dirty things that will change you’re life. Time to get down to business.

If you spend your life constantly trying out to do everyone, you will loose every time.

Here’s the thing, we all want to be the best we can be. But sometimes, that mindset changes to beat everyone else. We get paranoid that we’re falling behind and everyone is our enemy, someone we have to beat. But I’ll tell you that mindset will fail you every time. At the end of the day, we all die. And when you die, all the hard work you put in trying to beat everyone won’t matter because someone new will take your place. It’s an endless cycle that will get you nowhere. Don’t fall into that trap.

Hustling can only get you so far.

Today’s society is all about the hustling and bustling. Work till your bones are tired and living the #BossBabe life. And, in moderation, those things are okay. But constantly hustling will leave you feeling drained and less than. We were never designed to work our lives away. Work on what you’re passionate about, do good work, but don’t let your work consume you.

You are not defined by what you accomplish.

Self worth is easy to replace with negative thoughts that bring you down. And the quickest way to ruin your self esteem is to place your worth in your accomplishments. YOU ARE NOT YOUR ACCOMPLISHMENTS. You are more than your job, your awards, or your grades. Those things do not define you. They never have and they never will. End of story.

Your life cannot be dictated by relationships/jobs/family.

As hard as it is, you must own your life. Every decision you make is ultimately yours, no one else’s. Until you take your power back from whatever is stealing it, albeit your family, your job, even fear, you will never be truly satisfied. We live in such a way that we think we have to please everyone, be everyone’s friend, make the right choice, but there is no right choice, there are just choices. God’s got you, he didn’t need the approval of the world and neither do you.

Don’t live a life you’re not proud of.

Hypothetically speaking, we all get 100 years. 100 years to live and love and learn. But how do most of us spend that time? Not living a life we’ll be proud of when we reach the end of our rope. Does that mean you have to drop everything and move to New Zealand? No, but taking small steps everyday that make you happy and bring you into a higher consciousness will pay off in the end. A little courage can take you a very long ways, if you can only take the first step.

If you’re miserable/depressed/unhappy where you are, you can move. You are not a tree.

This one gets us all. And for good reason. We can all take a big talk, but at the end of the day, how many of us are actually willing to put what we say into action. “I hate it here, I’m going to move to Colorado.” But are you? I’m not saying it doesn’t take time and money and planning to move, it does, but saying you are and never actually taking viable steps to reach that goal is not only setting you up for failure, it is instilling unhealthy boundaries and mindsets in those around you. It will be the scariest, most irrational thing you will ever do, but it will give you the wings you need to fly. God’s got a plan, when he says move, move. He is with you!

Don’t just live for yourself. That is selfish and immature.

The world screams at us to “follow your heart” and “do what makes you happy” but those statements can be poison if you’re not in the right state of mind. Sure we all want to be happy, but if we only live for our own happiness, we are dying. We cannot live a selfish life and be truly happy, it does not work that way. Humans are made to connect with other humans. Don’t let your desire to be “happy” steal you away from the true happiness that lies in our friends, our families, and our relationships. It’s not what we have, but who we have that truly counts.

At the end of the day, don’t be afraid to make a decision.

Sometimes, making a decision can feel like the end of the world. No matter what we choose, someone gets hurt. And that’s true, you can’t make everyone happy, that was never your job. Our purpose is to take the big, scary steps in pursuit of God’s will for our lives. If we follow our own paths, we get nowhere. But God has a grand plan for our lives, better than we could ever plan. Take joy in that! We don’t have to figure it all out, but when the time comes to say yes or to say no, to pack up and move or stay where we are planted, have courage. None of us feel like we make the right choices all the time, but regardless of what we feel, God is working and moving in our lives, writing a story that we will share with the world.

None of us have it all together all of the time, and that’s okay. What’s not okay is allowing ourselves to get stagnant, to loose our faith, to become complacent in our jobs and in our relationships. We are made to be strong in our faith and brave in our lives. Do not allow yourself to live small. Make the hard choices, take the path only you can see, do grand things in your life.

God has a purpose and a plan for you, do not trap yourself into thinking otherwise. He hasn’t forsaken you so don’t forsake him. Whether you’re 24 or 82 or somewhere in between, if you have a little courage, you can change your life. The time is right now, what are you waiting for? This is your sign.