WRITE NOW THERAPY!

This is one of the worst feelings a person can have. I know, I have been there. There was a time where I felt like nothing was going right for me and I had no true recourse for changing things. It got to the point where I felt like I wanted to end it all.

You may not feel like you have an immediate need to hurt yourself but the feeling of being trapped in a life you no longer want can be tragically terrifying. Like I said, I have felt that. At the time, it felt like I was constantly making bad decisions and ulimately I had gone down a path in life that I could not change.

Even though I didn’t think I had a way out, I did. So do you. It just required someone else telling me I had options. I learned I needed to chart a different course for my life when I didn’t like the way things were going for me.

I hated my job. I hated my career. It was not something I had initially chosen but because I needed money I ended up going down a path that guaranteed me the money I needed but not the satisifaction I needed to get from it. I hated myself for making the choices I made. I felt like I had sold myself out and ultimately my value was lessoned by this.

I allowed people at work to treat me poorly and I put up with behaviors from other people my younger, stronger self would have never allowed. I found myself in situations that were counter-productive to what I wanted for myself and hated nearly every day of living because I knew I had made mistakes and now I was living a life I felt like I deserved because I had made such bad decisions.

It felt like I was so far down the rabbit hole there was no real way out. Things were not going to get better, besides I didn’t deserve them. I was trapped and I hated the life I was living. There was no way out and no hope for things to get better. But you know what? They did.

HOW THINGS GOT BETTER

Through the guidance of a mental health professional, I worked on things I had buried in my life that were holding me back. Things that ultimately told me I didn’t deserve better. Things that told me I was getting what I deserved.  I could think of times in my life that proved what I was feeling about myself. had been reinforced by people throughout my life. Oh, the things we tell ourselves that make us question our worth.

What I needed was a game plan for getting my life back on a path that made sense to me. A job and career that aligned with my talents and education in a way I was never really using. I had suppressed much of what I wanted in my own life because other people made me feel like what I wanted wasn’t possible. That I wasn’t good enough or it worthy enough for pursuing something that meant something to me. I’m not talking about some pie in the sky millionaire lifestyle. Our truest dreams have nothing to do with money. You may dream of being a millionaire but your truest dreams are likely more aligned with you doing something that you, yourself, find fulfilling.

CONNECTING WITH YOURSELF

In order to fulfill my personal game plan I had to connect with who I was as a person. What was my true identity. The one I showed at work was not who I was and that was part of the problem. I was suppressing myself because it was conflicting with who I needed to be in the job that was paying my bills.

Once I knew who I was and what part of my life didn’t match the person I was, I had to align myself with my purpose in life. What was my purpose for being alive and what wasn’t aligned with that vision? If it was my job that I needed to change. I wouldn’t be able to change that immediately because frankly I needed the job to pay my bills and fulfill my obligations.

Making a job change was going to take time. My game plan would need to lay out what it was going to take to change my job. What did I need to do in order to make the change a reality? Ultimately, it meant I would have to keep a job that was paying the jobs (although I quit the job I had when things were so bad and started a new job that would pay my bills). It also meant I would start a side hussle aligned with the career I wanted. It wasn’t going to pay the bills at first. It was going to take time to establish myself in my new field and that meant a lot of work after I left my 9-5 bill-paying job but this game plan was giving me hope.

WRITING DOWN STEPS TO COURSE CORRECT

My game plan required that I detail the steps I would need to get going in my new best-life aligned job. What did I need to do to get that started? How many steps was it going to be? It turned out that there were a lot of small steps necessary to get that side hussle going. Yes, it was going to take time but I had a plan and you know what that plan did? It provided me hope.

I found a way out of the life I was feeling trapped in. There were immediate things I could work on; changing my bill-paying job to something fresh and new, even if it wasn’t something I dreamed about. Writing down the steps I needed to take also provided me with a road map to get myself aligned with a job that I could be proud of. It would take me some time to get it all up and running and ultimately successful enough to be able to quit that day job.

CHECKING OFF ACCOMPLISHED STEPS TO SUCCESS

There were steps and each represented something on the way to where I wanted to be. I had things, all be it small things, to do but those were things I was able to check off as I accomplished them and each small accomplishment moved me closer to the ultimately goal. A goal that never seemed possible to me when I had felt absolutely trapped in a job and life I hated. A life that made me feel bad about myself. I hadn’t felt good about myself or good enough to successfully change my course in life because I didn’t know how to make the changes necessary.

There had been a time when I felt so trapped that I wanted to end my life and here I was able to chart my course to a new life. Thanks to the guidance of a mental health professional and a guide book written to help me along the way I established my game plan for this new life. I never imagined that my life could change. Then it did. Step by step it changed.

Part of my game plan called for me to move and invest my time in an education that would get me closer to my goal. My plan led me here. I found my purpose in helping others like me to find their way to their best true self. I wrote articles and conducted counseling sessions designed to help people like you change their lives. Write Now Therapy and my training as a mental health coach aligns me with who I am supposed to be in a place that makes me happier and fulfilled. I left behind a career with countless jobs I hated.

WHAT’S  YOUR PLAN FOR CHANGING YOUR LIFE?

Now is your chance to do the same for your life. You aren’t trapped. It just looks that way because you have forgetten who you are and what you were made to do. Right now, you need to make time to align your life with what you want to be. There is no time like the present to change things for yourself. You can do it. It is in you like it was in me to do.

There is a chinese proverb that says, “The best time to plant a tree was twenty years ago. The second best time is right now.” Now is the time to relaunch yourself into the life you want. I’m here to help you.

Take out a piece of paper and a pen and I want you to think about what you always wanted to do in your life that you have been unable to do? Take time right now to think and write about this. Go on! Now is the perfect time to do it. What do you have to lose?

If you are having trouble figuring out what your new life would look like that is no surprise. When we feel like we are trapped or drowning all we can think about is how we can just barely keep our head above water. If you can’t seem to clealry define what you would like life to look like, I recommend to do my “free writing” exercise first (LINK). This will help you clear your head and give you an opportunity to express all t hat is going on inside of you.

After you have written down what you would like your “untrapped” life to look like, think about what it would take you to get there. Write down the steps from where you are to where you want to be. What will it entail?

Some possible suggestions:

• If you need to change your job, what steps will it take to get a new one? What do you need to get there? Do you need to go back to school? Do you need to find a volunteer opportunity in the career you want to get into? Do you need to find a job where you can start from the bottom and work your way up? How will pay your bills while you are doing any of this?
• If you need to change relationships, what steps will you need to take? Do you need to secure a new place to live? Do you want to ensure you have given this relationship an opportunity to improve? Have you tried relationship counseling? What needs to change in order for you to feel like you aren’t trapped in this relartionship anymore?
• If you are dealing with an uncontrollable addiction, what steps do you need to take to change? What support is out there to help you win your battle with addiction? Do you need to do some online research for support with your addiction issue? (FYI  there is plenty of options out there to help you with whatever addiction you carry). Do you need individual counseling or coaching to help you win your battle with addiction? Are there people in your life that are not helpful in your winning this battle? Do you need to get away from them?

Hopefully, you get the idea. Charting a course for a new life seems impossible when we don’t take the time to think and write about it. Writing our problems down and brainstorming on paper how we can get out of what is making us feel trapped can give us a tiny or big helping of hope for what we can do to change our course in life.

Additionally, there are mental health professionals, including mental health coaches like myself, who can help you with creating a plan and overcoming whatever ails you. Reach out for help if you need it., More importantly than that is taking the first steps and write down your game plan. Writing is one of the easiest and clearly most cost effect way to help yourself on a road of recovery. Try it today.

If you are contemplating hurting yourself or someone else right now, please seek immediate help. Call the 988 hotline or 911 and ask for help. Help is out there and it makes a difference.