A while ago, I hit a stretch where I kept thinking, “I’m doing so much. Why do I feel so off?” My days were full, and I was checking things off my list, but underneath it all, I felt drained, irritable, and overwhelmed. It turned out it wasn’t one big problem, but a collection of small, unnoticed habits that were wearing me down.
If you’ve felt something similar, it may not be about adding or doing more. Sometimes, change comes from noticing the things that have been subtly sabotaging you and letting a few of them go as you decide what to avoid to make your life better. Here are some of the most common to consider:
1. Comparing yourself to others on social media.
It’s almost a habit to open your phone for a quick scroll during the day. But how often does your mood darken when you do? Your feed pops with videos and pictures of someone else’s travels, lunch dates, and success stories. And when you step back into your life, you suddenly feel much smaller than before. This was especially troubling when I was younger, and on days when I’m more vulnerable, it still feels like I’m not enough.
The problem isn’t about comparison, but rather that you look at your real life side by side with the idealized version of someone else’s existence. That’s like comparing apples with chocolate cake. The result is the ignition of self-doubt, which can burn through your confidence and skew your grasp on reality. Instead, try asking yourself, “Is this helping me right now?” and move on.
2. Focusing on your weaknesses while overlooking strengths.
As someone living with adult ADHD, I tend to focus on the strangest things. With society always sending the message that I’m too much, I’ve become very aware of my weaknesses, but I often forget that I have significant strengths, too. However, my brain decides to replay all the things I did wrong instead of celebrating when I succeed.
If you fixate on your shortcomings, you have forgotten everything you did right, which creates an imbalanced self-view. Interrupt the pattern with balance. I try to list three things I did wrong and three I did right every day. Then I reframe it by seeing the negative ones as opportunities. The goal is balance. Embrace the mistakes as steps toward positive progress and work toward success.
3. Falling into procrastination and rumination cycles.
My husband may love my brain, but there are times when I don’t. I put things off, think about them, feel guilty, and avoid doing what should be an easy five-minute task. Of course, my mind also throws in some replay features, rerunning past failures and “what if” scenarios that make me feel like I am a total waste of time.
When my anxiety builds like this, it’s usually my two favorite “frenemies” — procrastination and rumination. These mental monsters can really cause my mental health to spiral with self-doubt until I hit rock bottom on my self-worth.
Defenses that work for me include practicing self-love through meditation, journaling, or a hot bath. Then I pick a task, do it, quietly celebrate it, and move on to the next.
4. Shutting down your emotions.
“I’m fine.” How many times have I clung to those words, hoping to convince myself? Denying your emotions is like shaking a can of soda, opening it, and trying to stop the resulting explosion. It leaves you sticky and ashamed.
Much of my life, I kept bottling up my feelings. The pressure built, and with the slightest pull on my tab, I would explode and then feel horrible. The result was that I began believing that I was a bad person.
Only when I learned to acknowledge my feelings could I start owning and regulating my emotions. These feelings and sensations you experience are there to prompt action, but when you bottle them up, you become anxious and pressured. Small actions can release that pressure and help you move forward instead.
5. Stopping your body from moving.
A sedentary lifestyle is common among most Americans, especially when you’re working online all day. I think we all know that sitting still isn’t doing your body any favors, but it doesn’t do your mind any favors either. It sounds too simple to help, but if you feel like your life sucks, it may be time to take a gentle walk, lift some weights, or bend like a pretzel at a community yoga studio. If your mobility is limited or you suffer from chronic illness, even bed or chair Pilates can help to lift your mood.
When your body is constantly stationary, you start to stiffen, brain fog sets in, and life seems much more gloomy than when you move. I know that when I start feeling weighed down, it’s time to go for a run or grab my exercise mat.
6. Isolating yourself indoors.
Home is a safe space for most people, because it’s predictable and manageable. But if you start avoiding external influences by staying put, you begin to shrink your world. With that, your perspective also becomes quite narrow.
You miss out on fresh air, casual interactions, and other life-affirming activities. If the years of 2020-2021 taught the world anything, it’s that people need to connect and share experiences to avoid feeling negative, anxious, and more depressed about their lives. There are few people who are suited to a truly hermit lifestyle.
If you’re not one of them, and you fall into the “home alone” trap, you may find that reflections on your life become gloomy. Instead, take a walk, run an errand, or book a weekend away to reset.
7. Setting unrealistic expectations.
When you have unrealistic expectations, you are usually setting yourself up for disappointment. This isn’t because your life is not happy, but because fantasies cannot always be satisfied.
For example, I used to think I’d be a soccer star, marry my high school sweetheart, and have 2.5 kids, but that expectation didn’t account for a real and lived life. When my first marriage ended, I felt like such a failure, not because I was, but because the dream had burst.
Shifting to a more realistic view, where I actually connect with what’s happening and how I interact with the people and places in my world, has brought me more joy than I ever dreamed.
8. Believing your internal critic.
One of the things that will make you feel terrible about your life is believing your inner critic. Everyone has a negative little voice inside. Mine — I call her Alice — loves to tell me how much of a failure I am. Alice likes to point out every mistake, look, event, or moment in my day. According to her, I’m always to blame.
Believing your “Alice” can become truly harmful. It makes you look at your day and see it as ruined. There is a way to banish that negativity, and when you practice self-love and self-affirmation, you can quiet the negative thoughts in your mind. For me, that involved turning Alice’s words on her. When she said, “Beth, you are a terrible writer,” I would respond with, “Alice, I am learning about my craft and getting better each day.”
9. Neglecting your physical health.
Our physical health plays a huge part in how we feel, and how we feel about ourselves and our lives. It’s not about adhering to a strict regime or avoiding everything that’s deemed “unhealthy,” but rather the pattern of how we look after our health. As such, consider whether you are regularly doing any of the following:
Relying on alcohol or caffeine. Caffeine props you up and then drops you. Alcohol may relax you, but then it disrupts your sleep, and the cycle leaves you more tired than when you started.
Getting too little sleep. I’ve been in this boat with looming deadlines, and when I haven’t gotten my recommended seven to nine hours a day, everything becomes much heavier. It makes me more reactive, less patient, and much quicker to feel overwhelmed.
Poor sleep is linked to feeling anxious or engaging in anticipatory thinking that can lead you to believe things are much worse than they really are. When I began regular therapy sessions, my sleep quality became a firm indicator of my life perspective.
Eating on autopilot. When you rush through meals, your energy will dip. Before I had kids, I often skipped meals, which left me drained and kicked my bipolar disorder into overdrive. While I don’t need to follow a picture-perfect food triangle, eating consistent, healthy meals makes me feel better.
10. Trying to do and be too much.
We live in a world where being special has been elevated to a mystical “must-have” level. Today, people confuse having a purpose with something “big” that they must achieve. However, being yourself is the most powerful thing you can do.
Perfectionism sets unreachable goals, and even if you do somehow reach them, you may feel disappointed because they’re not what you actually wanted. Instead of feeling accomplished, you are stretched because you try to do too much or be something you’re not. This can twist your self-view and make you feel worse about the life you are leading. Instead, set realistic and truthful objectives that help you become more at peace with yourself and more resilient. A good enough life really is good enough.
Final thoughts …
When I began to really look at myself, evaluate what makes me happy, take care of my physical needs, and protect myself from my inner critic, I began to see the possibilities and opportunities around me. Suddenly, my life didn’t look so bad.
I realized that it is possible to stop self-sabotaging and live proudly, but first, I had to make positive choices to light the way. What can you avoid to make your life better? Which of these 10 things can you stop doing to live a life you feel happy about?
