Going through life disconnected from yourself feels haphazard and as if you are at the whim and mercy of every wave life seems to send your way. Life isn’t really doing that though, you just aren’t currently rooted within yourself.
In this article, I discuss how to find yourself again when you feel lost, ranging from getting clear to utilizing self-care to letting go and moving forward.
Understanding how to find yourself again
When you find yourself feeling anxious, stressed, or uncomfortably aimless a majority of the time, it’s an indication that you aren’t connected from within.
Being rooted within yourself provides an inner sense of calm, stability, and trust no matter what appears to be happening on the outside. This is our natural state and it’s why we feel called to come back to our center when we’ve become disconnected.
I always picture The Truth of who we really are to be like a bright light, and when we turn around and face the dark for too long we feel lost, anxious, unsure, and uneasy in life.
Taking the time to reassess your life is like turning yourself back toward The Light, which then gets you back on solid ground with deepening roots.
How to find yourself again
Let’s discuss some processes that will help you to come back to yourself when you’ve been feeling out of alignment and disconnected.
Some of these steps are a one-time activity, while others are things you’ll want to incorporate into your daily routine to nurture your connection with self.
1. Self-reflect to get clear
Journaling is one of my top used, daily self-care practices because it is so very helpful in untangling the thoughts and emotions going on inside of you.
I love different journaling prompts, but the ones I would recommend when you want to get clear would be:
- how I’ve been feeling
- how I want to begin feeling
Why are these two prompts so powerful? Because the first one helps you sort out where you’ve been and currently are, and the second one helps you to focus in on how you want to feel.
How you want to feel is more important than what you want to accomplish or experience, because behind what you want to accomplish and experience is a feeling anyway. By getting clear on how you want to feel, you create a guiding light that will attract to you the experiences, people, and actions that will create that feeling within you.
2. Identify core values
Respect, loyalty, courage, integrity, kindness, curiosity, open-mindedness, compassion, independence–these are just a few examples of core values.
Just like knowing how you want to feel helps you to attract feeling that way more often, knowing what truly matters to you acts like a compass that will guide you through your daily actions and decisions.
If curiosity is one of your core values, by acknowledging this you will find yourself being less judgmental or hesitant when difficult situations pop up because you’re reminded that it’s important to you to be relaxed and open to life.
I think it’s helpful to have your core values written down and stored in a place where you can see them often, like on a notes app or a desktop screensaver.
As we develop and expand, our core values shift and change, so doing this exercise once a year is very beneficial. When you feel lost, creating a list of your core values will act like roots grounding you and helping you to feel clear.
3. Mapping it out
There is something so powerful and magical about writing down what you want. So often I have found old journal entries detailing what I wanted my life to look like and was shocked at how many of those things had come to pass.
Get out a piece of paper and make a few categories in your life that are important to you, such as career, relationships, health, finances, fun, etc. Under each one, write down your ideal wishes and desires for that category.
You can then write it all out like it’s already happened. Bob Proctor said in The Secret to start it out by writing “I am so happy and grateful now that…” and then fill it all in as if you’re telling someone the good news of how your life is now.
Clarity is key when it comes to attracting the people, circumstances and opportunities into our lives that will bring those visions out of the ethers and into the physical.
4. Self-care: giving yourself what you need
Self-care is doing certain things every day that help you stay centered and rooted within yourself. It also includes those things that you might not necessarily feel like doing but that improve your overall well-being.
Get out another sheet of paper and create two categories. At the top of one side, put “Things that make me feel disconnected/bad” and on the other side “Things that make me feel connected/good”.
Some examples in my own life of things that make me feel disconnected are too much social media, not spending time outside, a messy house, cluttered drawers, etc. Things that make me feel connected are meditation, reading, quiet time, journaling, cleaning, exercising, going for walks, long baths, doing my finances, spending time with my kids, etc.
Some of these things I like to do daily and others weekly or monthly. Look at your list and come up with a self-care routine that works for you.
It is so incredibly helpful to become aware of the behaviors and actions we are taking that are to our detriment and replace them with activities that make us feel calm and connected inside.
5. Assessing relationships
Our relationships are probably the biggest factors in our lives when it comes to our quality of life and satisfaction. It’s important to be as honest as you can be with yourself when assessing your relationships and where you want them to be.
Make a list of the important people in your life that you interact with frequently. Under each name, assess whether the relationship is in good standing or if you’d like to improve it. Does more quality time need to be spent with this person? Or perhaps less time would be more healthy.
If a relationship is less defined but takes up a significant portion of your energy, perhaps place some boundaries around it to seal up any energy leaks. Define what you get from the relationship and what you are willing to give to it, and don’t allow yourself to do more than that.
6. Exploring new interests
Having hobbies and activities that you do on a regular basis brings more energy and fun into your life.
I started bowling with my sons once a week and now the entire staff knows us as well as the other regulars that bowl there on the same days. We’ve learned so much about bowling but most importantly, we laugh and bond every Thursday afternoon at the bowling alley.
Exploring new interests could include anything that you’ve ever enjoyed doing to things that you’ve been curious about. If you’ve always wanted to crochet, go get some beginner tools and crochet something! Start going on hikes, or cooking things you’ve never made.
Trying new things helps you to explore yourself and brings more pleasure into your life.
7. Mindfulness & meditation
Being present in our lives and connecting to the stillness within is a huge component in feeling grounded and rooted. Mindfulness is bringing yourself into the present moment as often as you can throughout the day.
The power in this practice is that you become less and less lost in the “illusion” and drama of life, and more connected to the observer that is always present within. You are lifted up into the bigger picture rather than being lost in the woods.
The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle is a book I highly recommend to anyone who wants to become more present, more detached, more centered, and more at peace. I was going through extreme health anxiety at the time that I read the book, and it not only brought me out of anxiety but also showed me the immense joy that could be felt no matter what I was doing or who I was doing it with.
Meditation is another practice that will keep you connected within. This can be done for fifteen minutes after waking, or before going to bed, or anytime you’re able to find the opportunity. You can meditate with the intention to silence your mind, or do one of the many guided meditations that are found all over the internet.
I personally recommend Hemi-Sync meditations simply because it’s the only technology that will put your brain into a meditative state, therefore helping you to get deep even when you’re feeling distracted.
8. Aligning with your passion
Lots of people stress over figuring out their passion or calling. I don’t believe we all have one purpose that we have to figure out. If there is a purpose for your life, it will show up when it's meant to. I don’t believe something as important as your purpose or calling would pass you by because you were never able to figure it out.
I do believe though that when we are in alignment with ourselves, we receive communication from our higher selves in a much clearer way and will be guided to whatever it is that is in our highest good at that time.
If money weren’t an issue, what would you like to be doing? That’s an ongoing question I ask myself. Don’t stress if you don’t have an answer to that. In some seasons of your life, the answer might be something like “I’d be chilling every day and just enjoying my life!”
Let that be a good enough answer if that’s where you are. It’s more than good enough, truly. But rather than trying to figure out what your passion or calling is, understand that it’s more about coming into alignment with yourself first, and from there receiving and following the ideas that come to you.
9. Overcoming challenges
When you take the time to restructure your life and are super excited about it, disappointments and challenges that crop up can feel extra defeating.
You messed up, did this thing again you really wanted to not repeat, and now you’re feeling regretful and awful. Maybe you slipped back into a habit that disconnects you from yourself and it makes you feel hopeless.
Understand first that this is normal. Babies that are learning to walk fall down and what do they do? They get back up. We aren’t after perfection, after all. We’re only after alignment with our true selves, and mistakes are actually experiences that give us greater clarity about what we do want.
It’s important to remain surrendered and open, with compassion towards yourself and others. You can always pivot and ask yourself “what feels like a good idea for me to do right now?” If you had a drink and regret that action, it might feel like a good idea to tidy up the kitchen and go to bed early. Or if you yelled at your child, it might feel like a good idea to go spend some quality time with them.
You’re not asking yourself what you should do, but what would make you feel good in this moment. This is because you’re always being sent breadcrumbs of love and fun from your higher self, and you can tap into this when you get still and really feel into the answer. It will excite you in some way, or just feel like a really good idea to do.
The way I see things, we exist forever, therefore you have eternity to learn, grow and expand. Mistakes are part of the process. Everything is on a continuum. All of your experiences hold purpose and clarity, so let go and flow. The more you can forgive yourself and have compassion, the lighter and higher you go in frequency where all the fun things you want to experience are.
10. Conclusion: embracing yourself
Trusting where you are is paramount. Understand that your thoughts and emotions create your reality, and trust the inner work that you’ve done to map out your desired life.
Embrace the disconnected period you’ve been in because it gave you clarity. Trust that you are always in the right place at the right time. Know that you get what you expect, so check in daily by asking yourself what you’re expecting in any category of life that is important to you.
If it’s not what you mapped out in your ideal scenario, intentionally spend a few moments adjusting your expectations to the desired outcome. Being mindful, present, and intentional are just daily practices that you keep doing despite any setbacks or mistakes.
Flowing, being open, staying curious, loving yourself, trusting the universe, and expecting the best will shift your life in such beautiful ways. You’ve got an eternity to practice, so don’t get too hung up on anything. Embrace yourself, embrace this life experience, and practice having more fun. Wash, rinse, repeat!
EXPLORE FURTHER
Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed this article and found something to take away with you.
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With love,
Jessica
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