30 Things to Stop Doing to Yourself

When you stop chasing the wrong things you give
the right things a chance to catch you.

As Maria Robinson once said, “Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending.”  Nothing could be closer to the truth.  But before you can begin this process of transformation you have to stop doing the things that have been holding you back. You may not even be aware of these things that you have to stop doing to yourself.

Related: Hard times without the right support can leave you miserable and lonely. You are responsible to know if your habits are similar to truly miserable people and you must take action for a better and more fruitful life. Here are 15 Habits of Truly Miserable People.

Here are some ideas to get you started:

1. Spend no more time with the wrong people.

Life is too short to spend time with people who absorb all the happiness out of you.  If someone genuinely wants you in their life, they’ll make time and room for you.  You shouldn’t have to fight for a spot in their life.  Never ever insist yourself to someone who can’t appreciate your effort and continuously overlooks your worth.  And never forget, it’s not the people that stand by your side when you’re at your best, but the ones who stand right beside you when you’re at your worst that are your real friends.

2. Stop running away from your problems.

Face them – head-on.  No, nobody ever said it would be easy.  There is not a single person in the world that is capable of flawlessly handling every punch thrown at them.  We aren’t supposed to be able to instantly solve our problems.  That’s just not how we’re made.  In fact, we’re actually made to get upset, sad, hurt, stumble and fall. That’s the whole purpose of living – to face problems, learn, adapt, and solve them over the course of time. In the end, this is what ultimately molds us into the person we become.

3. Love yourself enough to stop lying to yourself.

You can and you will lie to anyone else in the world, but you can’t lie to yourself.  Our lives improve only when we take chances, and the first and toughest chance we can take is to be honest to God with ourselves. 

4. Stop putting your own needs on the back burner.

The most painful phase in life is losing yourself in the process of loving someone too much, and forgetting that you are your own individual.  Yes, help others; but don’t forget to help yourself too.  If there was ever a moment to follow your passion and follow something that matters to you, that moment is now.

5. Let go of trying to be someone you’re not.

One of the greatest challenges in life is simply being yourself in a world that’s always trying to make you like everyone else.  Someone will always be prettier, someone will always be smarter, someone will always be younger, but they will never be you, and that’s a fact.  Don’t change so that people will like you.  Be yourself and eventually the right people will love the real you.

6. Stop trying to hold onto the past.

You will never be able to start the next chapter of your life if you keep re-reading your last one. It is your responsibility to keep moving forward no matter how hard your past was. What’s happened has happened, don’t hold on to it.

7. Stop being scared to make mistakes.

Doing something and getting it wrong is at least ten times more productive than doing nothing at all.  Every success story has a trail of failures that followed behind it, meaning that every failure leads towards success. You end up regretting the things you did NOT do far more than the things you did. Read that again.

8. Say ‘Enough’ to berating yourself for old mistakes.

We may end up loving the wrong person and cry about the wrong things, but no matter wrong things go, one thing is for certain, mistakes bring us one step closer to the person and the things that are right for us.  We all make mistakes, we all have struggles, and we all even regret things in our past.  But you are not defined by your mistakes, you are not defined by your struggles, and you are here NOW with the power to shape your day and your future.  Every single thing that has ever happened in your life is eventually preparing you for a moment that is yet to come.

9. Quit trying to buy happiness.

Many of the things we desire and long for are expensive.  But the sweet truth is, the things that really satisfy us are totally free – love, laughter and working on our passions. Reach out for happiness instead of trying to buy it.

10. Stop exclusively looking to others for happiness.

If you’re not happy with who you are on the inside, you won’t be happy in a long-term relationship with anyone else either.  You have to create a stable sense of happiness from within in your own life first before you can share it with someone else. 

11. Get up and stop being idle.

Don’t sit with your thoughts for too long or you’ll end up creating a problem that wasn’t even there in the first place.  Evaluate the situation and take decisive action.  You cannot change what you refuse to confront head-on.  Making progress involves risk.  Period!  You can’t make it to the second base with your foot on the first.

12. Destroy the voice in your head that tells you that you’re not ready.

Nobody ever feels 100% ready when an opportunity arises, although they may look like it.  This is because most great opportunities in life force us to grow beyond our comfort zones, which means we won’t feel totally comfortable at first but will get used to it in the process.

13. No more getting involved in relationships for the wrong reasons.

Relationships must be chosen and nurtured wisely.  It’s better to be alone by yourself than to be in bad company.  There’s no need to rush anything.  If something is meant to be, it will happen – at the right time, with the right person, and for the right reasons. Fall in love when you know you’re ready, not when you’re lonely.  

14. Let go of the habit of rejecting new relationships just because old ones didn’t work.

You’ll realize and understand that there is a purpose for everyone you meet at different stages of your life.  Some will test you, some will use you and some will teach you.  But most importantly, some will bring out the best in you – those are the people that matter.

15. Stop trying to compete against everyone else.

Never worry about what others are doing better than you.  Concentrate on beating your own records every day and being better than you were yesterday.  Success is an everyday battle between YOU and YOURSELF only.

16. Grow up and stop being jealous of others.

Jealousy is the art of counting someone else’s blessings instead of your own.  Ask yourself :  “What’s something I have that everyone wants?”

17. Stop complaining and feeling sorry for yourself.

Life’s curveballs are thrown at you that way for a reason – to shift your path in a direction that has always been meant for you.  You may not see or understand everything the moment it happens, and it is bound to be tough.  But reflect back on those tough curve balls thrown at you in the past.  You’ll see and understand that eventually, they led you to a much better place, person, state of mind, or situation.  So smile and look at curveballs dead in the eye with excitement for the future!  Let everyone know that today you are a lot stronger and developed than you were yesterday, and you will be.

18. Stop holding grudges.

Don’t live your life with hate in your heart.  You will end up hurting yourself more than the people you hate.  Forgiveness is not saying, “What you did to me is okay.”  It is saying, “I’m not going to let what you did to me ruin my happiness forever.”  Forgiveness is the answer… let go, find peace, liberate yourself!  And remember, forgiveness is not just for other people, it’s for you too.  If you must forgive yourself, move on and try to do better next time.

19. Never let others bring you down to their level.

Refuse to lower your standards to accommodate those who are not willing to raise theirs. Maintain the standard you’re at and keep moving forward.

20. Save your energy and stop wasting time explaining yourself to others.

Your friends don’t need it and your enemies won’t believe it anyway.  Just do what you know is best for you and know in your heart is right.

21. Quit doing the same things over and over without taking a break.

The time to take a deep breath is when you don’t have time for it.  If you keep doing what you’re doing, you’ll keep getting the same results.  Sometimes you need to distance yourself to see things clearly to work at it from a different angle.

22. Don’t overlook the beauty of small moments.

Enjoy the little things, because one day you will look back and discover that they were the big things.  The best parts of your life will be the small, nameless moments that you spent smiling with someone who matters to you.

23. Let go of trying to make things perfect.

The real world doesn’t reward perfectionists, it rewards people who get things done. Perfection is a state that is unattainable as long as we are the humans that we are.

24. Stop following the path of least resistance.

If you haven’t realized by now, life is not easy, especially when you plan on achieving something worthwhile.  .Never take the easy way out.  Do something extraordinary and leave a legacy.

25. Never act like everything is fine if it isn’t.

It’s okay to fall apart for a little while and it’s normal if you do so.  You don’t always have to pretend to be strong, and there is no need to constantly prove that everything is going well when it’s not.  You shouldn’t be concerned with what other people are thinking of you either – cry if you need to – it’s healthy to shed your tears.  The sooner you do, the sooner you will be able to smile from ear to ear again.

26. Stop blaming others for your troubles.

The extent to which you can achieve your dreams depends on the extent to which you take responsibility for your life.  When you blame others for what you’re going through, you deny responsibility – you give others power over that part of your life.

27. Understand you can’t be everything to everyone.

Doing so is impossible, and trying will only burn you out till you have no energy left for yourself.  But making one person smile CAN and will change the world.  Maybe not the whole world, but their world.  So narrow your focus because it matters.

28. Stop worrying so much.

Worry will not strip tomorrow of its burdens, but it sure as hell will strip today of its joy.  One way to check if something is worth mulling over is to ask yourself: “Will this matter in one year’s time?  Three years?  Five years?”  If not, then it’s not worth worrying about in the present moment.

29. Shift your focus from what you don’t want to happen to what you want to see happen.

Positive thinking and taking action is at the forefront of every great success story.  If you wake every morning with the thought that something wonderful will happen in your life today, and you pay close attention, you’ll often find that you’re right and you’ll thank yourself for thinking right.

30. Stop being ungrateful.

No matter how good or bad you have it, wake up each day feeling grateful for your life.  Know that someone somewhere else is desperately fighting for theirs. Instead of thinking about the things that you’re missing, try thinking about what you have that everyone else is missing. Practice having an attitude of gratitude.