A Guide to Clarity: 5 Steps to Uncovering Your Ideal Self
An introspective guide for those that are feeling lost and seeking direction in their lives.
What does it mean to have clarity? Dictionary.com defines clarity as:
Clearness or lucidity as to perception or understanding; freedom from indistinctness or ambiguity.
When we have clarity in our lives, it feels great. We tackle life with a sense of purpose, and everything we do seems to be heading in the right direction. We seem to know exactly what we have to do, feel confident in our priorities, and see the light at the end of the tunnel vividly.
But eventually, through one circumstance or another, the personal vision we once thought was crystal clear can become muddy, ambiguous, and misaligned — to the point that we fall off our groove, start questioning ourselves and the path that we’ve been diligently on.
Perhaps you worked for something tirelessly but didn’t get the results you hoped for. Or worse, it didn’t bring you the joy and fulfilment you anticipated. The sense of accomplishment and satisfaction you thought would’ve come didn’t, and you’re left feeling lost, confused, and even afraid.
Feeling lost can be scary and unpleasant
Feeling lost deprives us of security, safety, and comfort. When we feel lost — in our careers, personal growth, or relationships, our general instinct is to suppress these thoughts, set bigger and better goals, take action right away in hopes that we can feel secure, safe, and comfortable again.
While being lost without a clear direction is uncomfortable, this is ironically the perfect opportunity to create clarity in our lives.
If we resist the urge to find the next immediate goal to tackle, and instead slow down, take a step back, and thoroughly reflect introspectively, an amazing set of self-discoveries and epiphanies can be formed, which can bring renewed clarity in our lives.
Below are 5 introspective steps that have helped me recently when I was lost, confused, and unclear about where I was heading towards in my personal journey. These steps allowed me to understand why I was feeling lost, and what I needed to realize in order to set a new path that felt clear, aligned, and renewed. I hope they provide you the guidance it provided me.
Step 1: Accept and Embrace Where You Are
Here you are. Lost, unsure of where you are in life and what to do next. We’ve all been here, and it’s a hopeless feeling.
This is the time to be brutally honest with yourself and acknowledge what you’re feeling. If there is unhappiness, dissatisfaction, a lack of passion in your life, this is the moment to bring it to surface.
If we don’t make a conscious effort to stop, acknowledge, and soak in this reality, we can easily end up allowing extrinsic factors such as materialistic goods, social validation, and financial status drown out this realization.
It’s painful, but it needs to be done.
The goal of this step is to strip away your extrinsic validations of perceived happiness, and place the focus on the intrinsic self, and all the raw emotions that come with it. Pretend you are being transported from your current environment into an empty room, with nothing but yourself and your emotions.
Let all your thoughts and feelings flow through without resistance or judgment, and acknowledge that this is how you feel — regardless of what external influences are telling you otherwise.
Your emotions are valid. What you feel is what you feel.
If you’re unhappy in your career even though you have a six-figure job, that’s how you feel. If you’re unfulfilled even though you are praised by others, that’s how you feel. If you’re lost even though you’ve been steadily moving up the corporate ladder, that’s how you feel. What you feel is your version of reality, which is essentially reality itself. Accepting and acknowledging your emotions without the external influences second-guessing them is the first crucial step.
Step 2: Look 5 Years Into the Future
With these thoughts and emotions in mind, imagine continuing life the same way for the next 5 years. Consider no significant changes happen in your life, and you spend the next 5 years in the same career, same lifestyle, with the same priorities.
What will fill the majority of your days? What will your accomplishments be? Where you will be in terms of status and wealth? What value will you bring to society? What will your day-to-day look like with your current path?
Take a hard, honest look at this future you and ask yourself, “Does this bring a sense of purpose, joy, and passion in my life?” Asking this question will allow you step outside of the trenches where you currently operate day-to-day, and take a zoomed out view of your life.
What emotions do you feel? Are they positive or negative? If they are negative, why does this future you bring out negative emotions? Write all the reasons out.
Again, this is an exercise that requires you to be honest with yourself, so feel free to remove all societal expectations and norms from your thought process to bring out the rawness which trigger these feelings. This will be a crucial building block in uncovering a future that truly reflects joy, passion and purpose in your life.
Step 3: Reflect On What Truly Matters To You
Now let’s flip the context and ask a different question. What truly matters to you in your life that brings you purpose, joy, and passion?
Write down everything that has true meaning in your life. We’re talking about your values, principles, and passions that sit close to your heart and truly cherish. What moments in your life did you experience authentic joy and fulfilment that can’t be replicated by a new thing you bought, or a pay check you received in your bank account? And what was it about those moments that brought you joy and purpose?
You are a unique individual, so let it all out.
This is the chance to really dig deep to rediscover who you really are as an individual. What do you truly value, enjoy doing, learning, getting immersed in, and prioritizing above others? What brings you pure bliss that makes it so easy to get into a state of flow?
Chances are, if you’ve been accustomed to the corporate rat race for the last little while, it may take you a while to answer these questions. Regardless, it is imperative that you spend the time and energy to focus, reflect, and clarify what really matters to you. At the end of the day, what should matter more in life than your own happiness and sense of purpose?
If we don’t put in the time and effort to gain clarity in our own values and passions, we will constantly feel lost and adrift in our day-to-day and rely on extrinsic motivators to validate us. And I don’t believe that is a sustainable nor authentic.
So feel free to spend all the time you need to uncover this step until you feel comfortable with what you have. And don’t forget to be true to yourself. Give yourself time and space to really reflect on your core values, principles, and passions.
Step 4: Create Your Ideal Day
By this point, you’ve imagined what it feels like to live two distinct versions of your life. One that brings dissatisfaction, emptiness, angst, and another that brings purpose, passion, and conviction. These two narratives can be used to create your ideal self.
Using the two contrasting emotions and thoughts, start painting a picture of what your ideal day could look like. A day that includes all the values, passions, principles from Step 3, without any of the negative feelings from Step 2. If societal norms didn’t exist, what does living to the beat of your own drums look like? This is the lifestyle that brings you true purpose, joy, and passion. This is the North Star you can march towards which can fulfil you.
Set your vision to something truly meaningful to you.
I believe everybody needs a bold, farfetched vision for their lives. It may seem unrealistic or unpractical at first, but that’s exactly what a vision is — something that serves as a guiding light which we are wholly bought into. After all, what’s more important and rewarding than spending our days full of passion, joy, and purpose?
You shouldn’t need permission to pursue something that makes you happy and are passionate about. I don’t believe we’re meant to live miserable, soul-sucking lives that’s been dumped onto us after graduating university. I believe there is so much more to life than clocking in and out, making ends meet, paying our bills, and saving up for the next vacation or home appliance upgrade.
Everybody, including you, has a unique set of skills, knowledge, perspective, and voice that’s waiting to be heard. You are fully equipped and capable to use that to your advantage to go after something that truly matters to you.
Step 5: Start Small and Slow. But Most Importantly, Start.
It’s completely normal to feel overwhelmed, afraid, and hesitant to look at your ideal day and go all in. Understanding the reality that you need to continue making a living, you may not be able to fully pivot your life to your ideal path. The good news is, you don’t have to change it all right away.
This step is about taking very small, incremental steps that will allow you to slowly redirect your path down a path that brings fulfilment.
It’s okay not to have your new path all figured out. You’ve defined the “why” behind what it is you want to live for, so now it’s time to figure out the “what” and the “how”. And that’s by taking action and moving forward. That’s the only way you will be able to uncover more of what this new path could look like. If you believe in the vision of your new direction, you can figure out the details as you move forward. Momentum is everything, and every small step forward counts as progress to making your vision a reality.
Take your time, take small steps, figure things out as you move along. Stick to the vision, and take incremental steps forward consistently to reach closer to your vision.
In Conclusion
My deep belief is that your happiness and sense of intrinsic fulfilment is more important than any societal norms and pressures that are placed on you. I also believe that breaking out the cookie-cutter adult life and pursuing your passions isn’t reserved for the select “special” few, or for those that are very different from us. Countless people have broken out of the mold because they stayed true to themselves and valued their happiness and well-being above others’ perception of them.
Being lost and confused about your future is the perfect opportunity to reset and re-establish your vision that you want to strive for. Feeling lost is your inner self telling you that something needs to change with your values, principles, and priorities in which you’re currently living with.
Embrace the uncertainty. Dig deep and explore what makes you truly happy and what is a mere facade of happiness. Set course for a future that you want to pursue wholeheartedly with excitement and passion.
Most importantly — get excited! It’s hard enough in our busy days to stop and reflect. Feeling lost forces us to think about ourselves at a deeper level. This journey of uncovering our passions, values, non-negotiables, and dreams is could set you on a path that aligns with you intrinsically as a unique individual, and grant you more certainty and confidence as you walk towards this newly found vision.
