10 Tips On How To Be More Realistic With Your Personal Life Situation

Feeling like your life is out of order can feel confusing, chaotic, and uncomfortable. If you feel like you need to bring more order to your life, it is possible to do so in a realistic and achievable way. 

The key to bringing more order into your life is to meet yourself where you are. Coming to terms with your personal life situation and making smart choices based on your unique needs and situation is key when trying to bring more order to your life. To make this process a bit easier, consider these tops on how to be more realistic with your own personal life situation. 

Tip 1: Get a good grip on your current schedule. 

If your schedule makes you feel like you are constantly sprinting between random events or nearly forgotten appointments, it is time to get a good grip on your schedule. No matter what your days look like, take some time at the beginning of each week to look at the days ahead and get a good understanding of what is going to be happening that week. Rather than feeling like you are being thrown around from task to task or event to event, you can know what to anticipate in advance.

Tip 2: Make some clear-cut determinations between things you should do, must do, and don’t have to do. 

Many people’s schedules are clogged with tasks they do not actually need to do – at least not immediately. Look at your to-do list and determine if there is anything you must do soon, should do eventually, or don’t have to do at all. Adjust your schedule according to this prioritized list and stick to it rather than allowing all the tasks to cloud your attention span at the same time.

Tip 3: Identify anyone who is bringing unnecessary trouble into your sphere. 

Toxic relationships can often make your life feel disordered. When someone is inviting unnecessary drama or problems into your life, it can feel tough to focus your attention where it is needed most. Consider your relationships and determine if any of them are no longer suiting your needs.

Tip 4: Come to terms with things about your life that cannot be changed. 

Everyone has parts of their life that simply cannot be changed. If you are going through a tough personal situation, for example, you cannot always find a quick and easy exit from that problem. Coming to terms with these aspects of your life that you can’t change is the first step toward learning how to handle it more effectively.

Tip 5: Allow yourself to take small steps toward adopting more order into your life.

Bringing order to your life does not need to be a huge, drastic change. In fact, huge, drastic changes rarely work out well – they can be far too overwhelming to last long term. Instead, make some small, simple changes that you can sustainably maintain. These are more likely to become permanent habits that bring permanent feelings of order into your life.

Tip 6: Give yourself permission to compromise when it makes sense to do so. 

Depending on your life situation, you may need to make some compromises about what you can change and how you do things. This is a part of being realistic. Even if you really want to change certain parts of your life, you may not be able to do so, and that’s okay. Recognize these areas, give yourself permission to work with them, and then do the best you can.

Tip 7: Reflect on each of your days. 

Reflection is a valuable tool when you are trying to bring more order into your life by meeting yourself where you already are. Everyone’s personal life situation is different, and reflecting on how your day went, the choices you made, and what you can do better next time is a great way to better understand your unique situation and what you can do better or differently next time to improve it. 

Taking some time to reflect on each of your days is a great way to be realistic with your life situation – you can meet yourself where you are and make adjustments according to your very own specific needs.

Tip 8: Establish some simple routines to automate the predictable parts of your life. 

Some parts of your personal life situation and schedule will never change. For example, activities like getting ready for work, going to bed each night, or running errands will always need to happen, no matter what else is going on in your life. 

Establish some simple routines to automate these predictable parts of your life. Rather than scrambling to figure out what you’re going to eat for dinner or staying up far too late, you will know exactly what to do to ensure these simple tasks are getting done properly each day, which goes a long way toward feeling like you have more order in life.

Tip 9: Allow yourself some grace as you learn new routines or habits. 

Any time you try to adopt a new habit or establish new routines into your schedule, you are likely to find yourself making mistakes or backsliding into older, bad habits. This is fine and totally normal – the pathway to success is rarely linear. Give yourself permission to make those mistakes, learn from them, and then move forward again.

Tip 10: Give yourself an opportunity to enjoy some alone time.

Alone time is a major part of any good self-care routine. No matter what is happening in your personal life situation, make sure you are allocating some alone time for yourself – even if you are merely stepping away into a quiet room for a few minutes to get your thoughts in order sometime during the day. Giving yourself some space to think is a great way to realistically bring some order into your life.