Bronwen Sciortino: author & simplicity expert teaching easy ways to tailor-make healthy, happy & highly successful lives. sheIQ Life Pty Ltd
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These days, it can feel like you have to summon immense amounts of courage to simply get out of bed in the morning. It’s hard to know what’s going to happen next, and it’s a constant worry whether you’ll have the energy to survive it.
So much has happened in the world in the last few years. It’s been overwhelming and, quite frankly, exhausting.
Life has been crazy for a while, but the speed and intensity of the last few years seem to have added an extra punch that has sent you reeling.
It’s left you feeling disconnected and "all at sea" within your life—like you can’t get things to sit still for long enough to take a breath and have a moment to get a clear grasp on what’s happening and where you’d like to go next.
According to the "experts," clarity is your way forward. But with everything going on it’s hard to know what that is, what it looks like and where you’re supposed to get it.
You’re pulled from pillar to post... and back again.
Everywhere you look, other people seem to be making decisions for their lives and moving ahead. Some are even moving away and starting new chapters in their lives. Often, you’re the first one called on to help them pack up and move on, thus becoming a spectator to the movement in other people’s lives.
They all seem to have courage and step into adventure with so much ease... but you’re left feeling like you’re locked in the dark with no idea how to get out.
It can be really demoralizing to get stuck here.
It’s easy to start believing that your life is going to be limited to watching everyone else get what they want. And the emotions associated with that can lead you down a pathway that challenges your sense of worthiness.
So, what is clarity anyway?
Perhaps the greatest barriers to welcoming clarity into your life are that you don’t know what it looks like or that you’re waiting to experience it in the way you’ve seen others talk about.
But clarity—for you—will be as unique as you are. It comes in all shapes and sizes, at different times and through different mediums.
It can come through all of our senses. You might see something that triggers your mind to open in a different way. Or you might be eating something and a thought pops into your mind. You might hear a song, and the music allows you to relax... and you suddenly know exactly what you’re meant to do next.
It won’t always come to you in the same way, and you will likely receive it in different forms. But its arrival is usually dependent on your taking the time to create space for it to move into.
Clarity comes when you take the time to breathe.
It seems counterintuitive, but the fastest route to clarity is through taking some time to breathe.
Breathwork can stop the overwhelm, cut the stress and remove you from the chaos of the moment. And it’s in the space that comes with this that you can see things differently.
Gaining access to your own clarity relies on your being able to see different perspectives and find a different way of experiencing the moment that you’re in.
It’s been said that doing the same things day in, day out and expecting a different outcome each time is the definition of madness. I don’t know who first said this, but their words are filled with wisdom.
It takes courage to get started and do something differently.
The first step to doing something differently can always seem like it takes a lot of courage, and maybe with the way you live your life that’s true.
But gaining clarity in your life can be made easier by using these three steps:
1. Take the time to breathe. You can find five minutes a day—and maybe even two or three times a day—to sit still and simply breathe. Inhale for a minimum of four beats, right down into your abdomen. Then exhale for a minimum of five beats, slowly and deliberately releasing the air from your lungs. Engage your mind in counting the beats, and you can disconnect from the chaos of the world for just a little while. It’s easier for you to recognize when clarity comes when your mind is quiet.
2. Know the things you love. When you know what you love, and you let yourself have it in your life, you are more engaged with what you’re doing. You worry less and laugh more, and it’s easier to find yourself in flow. Clarity comes when you’re connected to the things that matter the most to you.
3. Ignore what others are doing. Letting others deal with the "stuff" that’s going on in their lives is one of the quickest ways to drop a whole heap of stress from your life. Letting people learn their life lessons is an important step to take... so the time you used to spend dealing with—and fixing—other people’s lives opens up and makes room for clarity to spend some time with you more often.
Clarity comes more often when you make time for you.
Important things always get done, so making time for yourself has to become one of the most important things in your day. If you truly want your life to be different, then clarity can help you. But only if you make room and let it in.
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