Life isn't about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.
-George Bernard Shaw
The only limits are the ones we impose on ourselves.
We all the capability within us to have a better life. You just need to commit to re-designing your dream life. Remember what is coming is better than what is gone. There are a lot of life changing strategies that is mentioned here and there and which you might be knowing. But who has the time to try all of them out. However, there are a few, which are really beneficial that we should all consider. Well, it’s a good thing that you’re here, because I am going to talk about 10 things that we can do to have a better life.
I have been looking at quite a few interesting answers on Quora on “What things to do for a better life”. A lot of really useful and practical answers were given. Many people who answered the question gave that from their personal experiences which makes their answer to that famous question pretty much valid.
I feel that we all need to do certain things in our lives to make it worth living for. Something that helps us to fulfill the purpose of our existence. And that’s why after going through all those answers, I have come with The Top 10 Things To Do For A Better Life. I am going to make these practices a part of my life and you can also do the same.
It is not selfish to do what is best for you, you know.
What you think you become, what you feel you attract, what you imagine you create.
So, here are the top 10 things to do for a better life.
1. Get Outside of your Comfort Zone
Life begins at the end of your comfort zone.
-Neale Donald Walsch
Our comfort zone is a very beautiful place, no doubt. But nothing will ever grow there. Comfort is a drug. It becomes addicting once you get used to it. The comfort zone is where dreams go to die. Everything that you ever wanted is on the other side your comfort zone. It’s hard leaving our comfort zone but you have to take the risk if you want to live the life of your dreams.
To get out of your comfort zone, take ownership of your life. You are the only one who is responsible for your life. We have a normal. As you move outside of your comfort zone, what was once the unknown and frightening becomes your new normal.
In our comfort zone, we feel safe and secure, but success is not created within our comfort zone. If you really want to make an impact in the world, make a difference, and live an above average life then get up and explore life. Take risks and challenge yourself. Amazing things have happened to people when they did this. Bill Gates, J.K.Rowling, Steve Jobs, Jeff Bezos and Warren Buffet just to name a few successful people, would have been ordinary people with average lives like most people if they hadn’t taken risk and explored other possibilities and opportunities in their lives. If you want to change your life, do something different, something unique and creative.
Sometimes, getting out of your cage is all that, that makes the difference. Real change is difficult at the beginning. But as you move forward, it keeps on getting easier and easier. It’s going to be hard to adjust in the beginning but it will be definitely worthwhile and rewarding.
2. Just Start
Whether you want to lose weight, hit the gym, start a new business or a new habit, you just need to start. A lot of us have the problem of getting caught up in overthinking and making strategies without even taking any action. We wait for the “right time”, but you know what- the right time never comes. We make New Year’s resolutions and by the end of the year, we haven’t done anything about it. You say to yourselves:
- After a few months I’ll be ready for it
- I don’t have the time for it now
- When I get time off from work, maybe then I can think about it
These are just some excuses we come up with.
The time will never be just right, so don’t wait and delay your success.
You need to take action against your goals and move on with your life. You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step. The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking down your tasks in smaller tasks and then executing the first one. As you go along you will be motivated and inspired by your progress.
Remember, an ounce of action is worth a ton of theory.
3. Learn Marketable Skills
Developing marketable skills will definitely be worthwhile and rewarding in days to come in your life. Employers want to hire employees based on their skill sets and character traits. Developing high income skills will not only look on your resume but you can also use them to become an entrepreneur or freelancer and achieve a greater financial independence in your life. Here are just some marketable skills which you can develop:
- Copywriting
- Email Marketing
- Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
- Social Media Marketing
- Graphic Design
- Coding ,Programming, Web development or Mobile App Development
- Learning a new Language
- Digital Content Creation like Blogging
- Video Production and Editing such starting your own YouTube channel
If you practise any skills everyday, let’s say for at least 2 to 3 hours you are sure to become a pro in that field in matter of months. Just think the level of price you can command with such a level of expertise. Some people are able to earn what many people earn from their jobs in a year in a matter of days by freelancing. Yup, that’s absolutely true. Many people are able to earn a six-figure income from their high-end skills. You can either run a side hustle with those skills or just do some freelance work. A great place to earn money from your skills is Fiverr and Upwork.
If you develop such professional high-end skills, you would never have to worry about getting a job or how to make more money. You can create a side project on work on it every now and then. Who knows it can just change your life.
4. Work on Yourself
Become addicted to constant and never-ending self-improvement.
-Anthony J. D’Angelo
Turn yourself into your most best and valuable asset.
There is always something which you can do that will make your life better. Finding it out may take some thinking, but once you know you can commit yourself to the process of perfecting yourself.
However, there are some common things which everyone can do to perfect themselves. Let me give you few suggestions.
- There’s nothing more valuable than your health. Everyone knows how important health is, but a few take heed of it. You should take all the actions you can in order to take care of your health. Taking care of your health makes you feel better about your body. When you feel better about your body, it gives you confidence and self-esteem. That’s why working on your dream body and becoming healthy as possible will empower every area of your life.
- Reading will also sharpen your mind and intellect and increase your general knowledge, something that is very useful in today’s information age if you want to be ahead of the crowd.
- Your voice is an instrument. Knowing the art of communication will make you look smarter. Even if you don’t know about a particular subject but speak with confidence and ease, people will take note of that.
- Knowing which clothes match your body, face and personality is fact that shouldn’t be ignored as well. Your clothes convey a lot about you in a silent way to people. Wear clothes that have a harmony with your face, body and personality.
- Meditation is a popular nowadays, people have said that it increases happiness, calmness, inner peace and reduces anger, depression, stress and fatigue.
Likewise, there are many things, which you can do to re-design and re-invent yourself- go ahead. Create an energetic, dynamic and charismatic version of yourself.
5. Create Your Standards and Follow It
One of the most powerful things which you can do that will greatly impact your life is to decide what type of person you want to be.
You just have to ask yourself some real simple question:
- Who do I want to be?
- What do I want to be known for?
- What type of qualities, traits and virtues do I want to imbibe in myself that people will recognise and appreciate?
All these questions boil down to one word that we are all familiar with and that is – Character.
Our character is set of distinctive qualities that define us. Be more concerned with your character than your reputation, because your character is what you actually are and your reputation is merely what people think of you. I read a wonderful quote that pretty much puts everything into perspective and it goes like this:
Watch your thoughts; they lead to attitude.
Watch your attitude; they lead to words.
Watch your words; they lead to actions.
Watch your actions; they lead to habits.
Watch your habits; they form your character.
Watch your character; it determines your destiny.
It is important to consider that our character is our choice. Day by day what you choose, what you think and what you do is what you become. Bruce Lee says that knowledge will give you power but character will give you respect. We may reach the top, but it takes character to keep us there.
To have a good character, to have good virtues and to have good ethos it is important to have good thoughts. After all, our actions portray our thinking, character and virtues. Top of Form
I’d like to end this discussion with this quote of Aaron Rodgers:
Authenticity is everything! You have to wake up every day and look in the mirror, and you want to be proud of the person who’s looking back at you. And you can only do that if you’re being honest with yourself and being a person of high character. You have an opportunity every single day to write that story of your life.
6. Follow Proven Success Habits
The difference between an amateur and professional is in their habits. An amateur has amateur habits. A professional has professional habits.
-Steven Pressfield
Successful people are those people who follow success habits.
People just don’t find luck and become successful. Successful people are those people who establish habits that unsuccessful people don’t like. At the end of the day, the quality of our life is determined by the quality of our thoughts.
It’s important to follow proven success habits to make the best of your life.
Some habits that I’d like to recommend are:
- Make your health your priority
- Make a habit of reading and learning something new everyday
- React to your goals
- Have a powerful “why”
- Use your time effectively
- Prioritize important tasks – No one is too busy in this world, it’s all about priorities.
- Have self-control and self-discipline
- Keep a good company
- Focusing on personal and professional development
- A “Can Do Attitude” to find solutions to problems
- Before you speak- learn to listen, before you spend- learn to earn, before you write- learn to think, before you quit- learn to persevere and before you die- learn to live life.
In fact, any habit that promotes positivity, well-being, your growth and your success should be incorporated into your life. Our daily habits have a massive impact upon our happiness and success.
It’s quite simple- our wealth, health, happiness, fitness, prosperity depend on our habits.
The good and bad things in life all come from our habits.
8. Invest your Savings
Never depend on a single income. Make investment to create a second source.
-Warren Buffet
Investment is simply using money to make more money.
Most of us depend on a single source of income. It’s okay to do that, but you can’t have financial freedom with only a single source of income. Financial emergencies would be much easier to handle if we have more than one source of income. If you look at wealthy people’s lives, you will find that they all have more than one source of income.
Money is always eager to work for anyone who is willing to employ it. Napoleon Hill has said:
Make your money work so hard for you; so that you don’t have to work for it.
The irony today is that most of us work for money rather than making money work for us. If you have any talent, skill or hobby that can make money for you, go ahead- get started. You don’t have to sit at 9-5 job all your life doing something which you totally despise.
Perhaps, one of the best investments you can make is in yourselves. The more you learn, the more you earn as Warren Buffet emphasizes. If you use your saved money to invest in yourself to learn something worthwhile, it’s going to reward you in the future in ways which you might have not imagined. After all, an investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.
Some people may ask, hey I have good job and a stable life, why the hell should I invest my money? Let give you a few reasons:
- One day you might not have your so-called good job. You’d need money to survive and pay your bills. Your investments can come in handy in such situations.
- If you invest your money in properties such as land or real estate, it’s going to increase in value in future. In this way, you can increase your wealth and financial assets.
- If your investment earns a higher rate of return, you can use that money to fulfil your financial objectives such as buying a new car or home.
- The best part about investing is that it gives you real financial freedom and independence.
You can invest your money in mutual funds, stocks, real estate, and cryptocurrencies or even start your own business. There may be many diverse options available depending on the country or region you are living in. If you are really serious about investing your money- do your research and evaluate the risks and benefits. Then you can come to conclusion on whether to invest or not. The best way to grow your money is by learning how to invest.
I found some good articles on another website on investing which you can read.
- How To Invest Money: The Smart Way To Make Your Money Grow
- How To Start Investing For Beginners With Little Money
- How This 28 Year Old Retired With $2.25 Million
In my opinion, I think investing your money to start your own business or any form of trade that you can specialize in such as app development is one of the best ways of gaining financial freedom and increasing wealth. I say this because I have seen that many people had taken the bold risk of investing their money in their own business and reaping rewarding results after a few years.
From your earnings, you should save a certain portion of money which you can invest in yourself and in appreciating assets. One of the greatest truth about investing is compound interest. Whether you invest in yourself or in assets-, it has the possibility of producing a compounding effect. Albert Einstein describes compound interest as the eighth wonder of the world.
Start investing now and you’ll thank yourselves later.
8. Create Meaningful Relationships
The best and the most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched- they must be felt with the heart
-Helen Keller
Creating meaningful relationships with people that matter to us makes a huge difference in our lives. After all, we deal with people all the time, whether they be family, relatives, friends, workmates or just an acquaintance. All of this people form a very important aspect of our lives and without them life will not be complete.
So how can you make a meaningful relationship with every one of them?
It’s simple rule that everyone knows.
Treat others, as you would want them to treat you. What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others.
Be careful with your words, once they are said, they can only be forgiven, not forgotten.
The biggest communication problem is we do not listen to understand. We listen to reply. Always aim to give the best side of yourself to all those that matter to you. No matter in what mood you are, never leave a family member, friend, or partner on a bad note. We at times take out our work related stress and daily life frustrations onto our family and friends in our lives. People can be tolerant and forgive you but they will remember what you said and how you made them feel.
Always be kind to everyone irrespective of their gender, race, religion or age. Kindness is a gift that everyone can afford to give. Kindness softens the heart and mold relationships that can last a lifetime. People will remember you and respect you. Whenever you are in trouble, you will surely find help, if you’ve helped someone when they had their bad time. Little acts of kindness go a long way.
To add on to what I have said above, it’s important to have good social skills. It’s a valuable skill to get other humans to trust, like and know you. If you can understand people, you can get them to like and trust you. One of the secrets of success is knowing the right people and how they can help you.
To simplify things further-
Good relationships creates a Good Life. Bad Relationships creates a Bad Life
9. Don’t just work hard, work smart
You cannot reach success only by working hard, you also need to be working smart
-Charbel Tadros
A popular mantra that everyone believes in is that- hard work leads to success.
Well yeah, that’s true. But if you worked smarter along with working harder, you’d get things done quicker in a more efficient manner. Hard work plus smart work equals success.
Here are just some tips on not just working hard but also working smart:
- Planning- planning your day the night before gives you a clear vision of what to do the next day.
- Get enough sleep. Getting enough sleep will help your body and mind to function not only properly but also efficiently. Sleep deprivation can cause many productivity problems for you.
- Do your research and find better, smarter, quicker ways to execute a particular task.
- Do the most urgent and the most important tasks first. In this way, you can use your time wisely to complete all that you have. As time goes on, you will enhance your ability to perform other tasks and consequently results can be obtained faster. Prioritize those tasks that has the highest impact on your goals
- Know how to measure your own success. Know your finish line.
- Design a no-distraction environment. Know what is going to distract you and how you can remove these distractions. Know how to design a work environment that helps you to focus. Focus is what allows you to do things faster and effectively.
- Look for ways to better organize your tasks so you can more done in less time.
- Do not try to waste time doing everything yourself. If you don’t know how to do it, seek help from other people.
- Reflect on your accomplishments. Find out what worked well and what needs improving.
- Just Relax- take out at least 1 hour to do something that you enjoy so you can rejuvenate and relief stress. Don’t underestimate the benefits of doing this.
Working smart is all about maintaining a high level of focus and mental sharpness that you require to fulfill your objectives. It’s all about working on what truly matters. And getting that done ASAP.
You’ve gotta keep in mind that working hard gets you started and working smart guarantees your success.
10. Create a unique vision for the future
Visualize what you want to do before you do it. Visualization is so powerful that when you know what you want, you will get it.
-Audrey Flack
What you visualize you can materialize.
Knowing what you want to become and how you can become that is important if you want to create a successful life for yourself. You must recognize that the best version of yourself should be your own vision and not anybody else’s.
If you’re just going to be lazy and follow everyone else without having any unique vision for yourself, you’re just going to end up having a non-meaningful life.
And you certainly don’t want that.
Right!
Every one of us have a vision about ourselves that we have nurtured right from our childhood. A dream that meant the world to us. A dream that if fulfilled would fill our hearts with delight. It’s all up to you to take action to make that dream a reality.
Ask yourself “What is my life’s ultimate concern?”, “What is something that I do that brings me joy?”, “What can I do to become the greatest version of myself?”, “What do I want to gain out of life?” and “What would I like to achieve?”
Once you know the answer to these questions, you can create a vision for yourselves that aligns with your life. Envisioning and deciding the course of action that we should take requires deep inner reflection. You have to sit down with yourself and really have that hard talk with yourself. This unique vision can only come when you do research on yourself.
Our unique vision blooms from our aspirations, dreams and expectations. That vision will resonate with your values, ideals and beliefs. That vision is your map, showing you the road that you need to take in your life and in the future.
Whatever you want to become in life, don’t aim to become a average one. If you want to become a doctor don’t just become an average doctor, become the best doctor. If you want to become a lawyer, don’t just become an average lawyer, become the best lawyer. When you attain the status of being called ‘one of the best’, your work naturally speaks for itself. And then life gets interesting. New opportunities for an even better life begins opening.
Whatever you do-
Have a vision for yourself that helps you to become the best version of yourself.
If you’re following at least one mentioned strategy above….Congratulations!!!
And if you’re not what are you waiting for, Start small and build the momentum.
It definitely going to be worthwhile and rewarding in the end.