{"id":2814,"date":"2012-11-29T16:25:12","date_gmt":"2012-11-29T21:25:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/?p=2814"},"modified":"2012-11-29T19:00:39","modified_gmt":"2012-11-30T00:00:39","slug":"work-before-play-or-play-before-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/?p=2814","title":{"rendered":"Work Before Play or Play Before Work?"},"content":{"rendered":"

I feel really stuck in life right now.\u00a0 I\u2019m doing everything that I think I want to be doing (pursuing my master\u2019s degree, working in my chosen field, developing my spirituality, maintaining my health) yet I often notice that amidst it all I feel stagnant and unfulfilled even.\u00a0 It doesn\u2019t seem to add up.\u00a0 I don\u2019t necessarily want to change anything about my life right now, at least the direction of it, but I also know I don\u2019t want to feel this way.\u00a0 I would appreciate any insight you have on this please.<\/em><\/p>\n

Roberta, Michigan<\/em><\/p>\n

Hi Roberta,<\/p>\n

I\u2019m going to answer your question with a question: what are you doing for fun?\u00a0 You see, in the quest to live a fulfilled life, we often put a lot of focus on the stuff that we believe brings us happiness (career\/purpose, money, stability, health, family, personal growth, etc.).\u00a0 None of that is bad, of course, it just tends to carry a heavier energy of \u201cseriousness,” an urgency to \u201cget it done so I can be happy.\u201d \u00a0Without a healthy dose of fun and variety in the mix, as well as inviting mindfulness (aka \u201cbeing\u201d within the \u201cdoing\u201d), it\u2019s very easy to find ourselves feeling stuck and even unfulfilled.\u00a0 In fact, I believe fun is completely underrated in our society, that the mindset many people have that there\u2019s only time for fun after the work is done is a huge disservice to their own happiness and well-being.\u00a0 Fun and variety are the fuel that allows us to keep going with all the other important things in life!\u00a0 And if you\u2019re not having fun and enjoying what you\u2019re doing, then what\u2019s the point?\u00a0 (Okay, so you can tell I\u2019m a bit passionate about this subject.)<\/p>\n

Now, I recognize that I don\u2019t know everything about your story, and I\u2019m sure there are probably some other contributing factors to your feeling stuck, stagnant, and unfulfilled, but I\u2019m going to give you a place to start:<\/p>\n

~ Ask yourself how much \u201chealthy\u201d fun and variety you currently have in your life (i.e., the kind that fills you up, makes you feel good and doesn\u2019t hurt anybody, least of all you).\u00a0 Then, if you can\u2019t think of anything or there are only one or two things that you \u201csometimes\u201d do, ask yourself:<\/p>\n

~ \u201cHow can I add more healthy fun and variety into my life on a regular basis?\u201d\u00a0 This may look like taking a class just for fun, joining a club, scheduling in consistent time to hang out with friends, or even including at least an hour of fun into your day EVERY day. Then do it. (I do the last one, by the way, as part of my work day.\u00a0 And I work more efficiently because of it.)<\/p>\n

~ Also, ask yourself how you can be more present in each of those areas you\u2019ve identified in your life (school, work, spirituality, health).\u00a0 A place to start might be in noticing what you love about each of those areas.\u00a0 Another idea would be to choose the state of being you wish you were in on any given day and simply be that (a whole other topic).<\/p>\n

~ Finally, if all else fails, partner with someone to help you through it, to help you get to the underlying reason behind your \u201cstuckness\u201d and who can help you navigate your way to flow, fulfillment, happiness, joy and freedom.\u00a0 Hire a coach, work with a therapist, a spiritual counselor, whatever you feel drawn towards but do something.\u00a0 It\u2019s so much easier (and faster) than trying to do it alone.<\/p>\n

(Nova Wightman is a CWG Life Coach, as well as the owner and operator of Go Within Life Coaching, www.gowithincoaching.com, specializing in helping individuals blend their spirituality with their humanity in a way that makes life more enjoyable, easy, and fulfilling.\u00a0 She can be reached at Nova@theglobalconversation.com. )<\/em><\/p>\n

(If you would like a question considered for publication, please submit your request to: Advice@TheGlobalConversation.com, where our team is waiting to hear from you.)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I feel really stuck in life right now.\u00a0 I\u2019m doing everything that I think I want to be doing (pursuing my master\u2019s degree, working in my chosen field, developing my spirituality, maintaining my health) yet I often notice that amidst it all I feel stagnant and unfulfilled even.\u00a0 It doesn\u2019t seem to add up.\u00a0 I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[171],"tags":[661,656,659,658,660,657],"class_list":["post-2814","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-advice","tag-coaching","tag-feeling-stuck","tag-fulfillment","tag-fun","tag-mindfulness","tag-variety"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2814","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2814"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2814\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2820,"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2814\/revisions\/2820"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2814"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2814"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2814"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}