Are you on the right track in life? How can you tell? Did you find THAT thing that gets you out of bed in the morning feeling energized and fired up to pursue it? That incredible feeling of fulfillment that what you do actually is making a huge dent in the universe. Some of us call it purpose. Some of us call it passion or being in the state of flow. Many of us, on the other hand, are still searching for THAT thing. We are on a constant lookout for clues that tell us we are on the right path. Here is how you know you have found it or are on the right track towards it.
1. You Know You Are On The Right Track When Your Relationship with Time Changes
You find that you have become hypersensitive about how you spend your time. You start investing your time in activities that are related to whatever it is you have decided to pursue rather than spending it watching shows online.
You become intentional about allocating time for the different things you need to do. You make it a priority to work on the most difficult thing first before allowing your mind to get distracted with the minutiae.
2. You Know You Are On The Right Track When You Suddenly Realize How Time Flies!
24 hours in a day doesn’t seem enough. By the time you get up, and mentally prepare yourself to work, almost half the day is already gone. Hours turn into days, which then turn into months and before you know it, the year is almost about to end. You start to be super aware of how one lapse in productivity can snowball into hours lost endlessly scrolling through social media feeds.
You become protective of your time and try to protect it by implementing strategies to prevent any distractions. You are willing to give up other things just to be able to spend more time working on your passion.
You don’t think twice about deleting facebook from your phone.
You are okay skipping all once a week’s football game with your gang.
FOMO doesn’t get to you. In fact, you find JOMO – the joy in missing out.
3. You Know You Are On The Right Track When You Are More Aware of Your Mortality
You become aware that you have a very short time to live on this earth. The 30 years that previously felt like a lot of time, now seems to be hardly anything.
There is a certain sense of urgency that kicks in and keeps tugging at your collar daily. This sense of urgency pushes you towards your goal. It keeps playing a tune in the back of your head asking you to complete whatever it is that you had planned for the day. It also gives you what some may call superhuman levels of discipline.
4. You Know You Are On The Right Track When it is Easier for You to Enter The State of Flow
You suddenly find that when you are doing the work, you lost track of time.
You are constantly buzzing with energy, fully immersed, completely oblivious to the distractions around you. In fact, if left alone, you will probably only get up to eat and sleep.
You find the work deeply draining but satisfying at the same time. Work doesn’t feel like work anymore. In fact, it is an escape from the daily routine of life. From the trials and tribulations in life.
5. You Know You Are On The Right Track When With Each Success, You Feel More Responsible
You constantly think of creating more value. The better you become at what you do, the more you feel responsible. You are never satisfied with your work and as a result, you are constantly looking for ways to grow, learn and become better!
You are brutally honest with yourself and you also become your worst critic. You stop making excuses for why you couldn’t get something done because frankly, you become obsessed with doing.
6. You Know You Are On The Right Track When You Stop Second-Guessing Your Decisions
You don’t second guess yourself.
You don’t let emotions control your decisions.
You chart a course and dive headfirst in it, adapting as you go along.
You are aware of the opportunity costs that come with every decision and you are willing to pay the price.
It becomes easier for you to say ‘No’ and you start to do that more than you previously did.
7. You Know You Are On The Right Track When You Become More at Ease With Yourself
You are okay going at your own pace because you have stopped running the rat race.
You know what is important in life and you have started prioritizing those things. On most days, you are fully present and engaged with what you are doing, whether you are out with friends or at work.
Have you found your calling yet?
Finding your calling involves a lot of trial and error. Not only that, you make a lot of false starts before you finally make the right one! One thing that is for sure though is if you check the boxes above, you can be pretty certain that you are on the right track.
For me, if you ask me today, writing checks off all the boxes. In fact, I have a feeling that doing anything creative is what checks off all those boxes for me so I am going to continue down that path for now and see where it takes me.
What is it for you?
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