A downtime refers to a period of time when a person may be struggling with personal or professional challenges, experiencing a loss, or feeling overwhelmed by stress and negative emotions. This can be a difficult and challenging experience, and it can be hard to know where to start when trying to bounce back. The process of bouncing back from a downtime in life will vary for each individual, as it depends on the specific circumstances and the person’s unique needs and resources.
Here is how you can bounce back strong after a downtime.
1. Do your life audit
Doing a life audit is crucial for pinpointing where to make adjustments to jumpstart your new journey, time to relook into your skills, validate your expertise and practices. Start by figuring out where you stand in the 8 areas of life – health, finances, personal development, career, relationships, self-care, home life, and free time. Write down, what changes would make the biggest impact in your life for each area?
Seek help from trusted people and mentors if you cannot figure it out on your own and start implementing it right now, this is the phase to take tough decisions and cut corners, you need to be extremely critical in analyzing deep root causes, pros and cons of all these 8 areas, have complete trust in your new checklist before implementing it.
2. Make a mindset shift
Your mindset is what sets the tone of everything in your life, changing your mindset is what will change your life. What we think and believe is what we act upon. Change your perspective; from now on anytime anything negative happens, instead of feeling like a victim ask yourself what you can control or change, staying strong and focused is crucial at this point, try going places, start doing good stuff.
Being strict and tough on yourself in the initial days is not a good idea, being clueless, partying, binge screen time, endless social media scrolling is okay initially but you need to quickly make a shift. You can play chess, cricket, camp, solo drive, and read self-help books, see what’s your interests and engage in activities that make you feel good in and out.
3. Create a vision
Having a vision will help to have a clear sense of purpose, it means we have a much larger picture of our business or our life than simply setting and reaching short term goals and tackling problems as they come along. Visions are driven by passion and dreams and they are reflected through real efforts to create real results.
4. Work on yourself daily
Once you have your vision the fog lifts and your road map starts to become clear again. But, nobody is going to drive the car for you – you’ve got to put in the work to achieve your goals and change your life. Consistent daily practice is how you make that happen, if you watered the plant just a little each day, over time your garden always grew.
5. Design your environment for success
If you want to change your life, you aren’t the only thing that has to change – your environment has to change too. For instance, if you always hang out with negative thinking people, you’ll tend to believe the limitations they’re setting for you. However, if you hang out with “doers” and other people who want to see you succeed, there’s a much higher chance that you will.
6. Learn new skills and improve upon your existing ones
Nothing will change your life faster than building new skills. First things first, create enough time to build your skills, invest in good books, great trips and buy some useful online courses which can further help in strengthening your skillset. You can also learn them freely via books, videos, and podcasts, but don’t forget to physically practise your skills too, new skills are like new wings to fly, it can take you to the places you wish to reach.
7. Lastly, enjoy the process
The whole point of this exercise is to change. That means your thoughts and behaviours, in addition to your surroundings, will change throughout the year. You may realise that what you initially sought isn’t what you want anymore. Don’t get so focused on the process that you lose sight of what you want and most important having fun.
Conclusion
It’s important to remember that everyone’s experiences, resources and coping mechanisms are different, so there isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution. However, by acknowledging and validating your feelings, seeking support, taking care of yourself, making a plan for moving forward, and being kind to yourself, you can begin to take steps towards healing and recovery.
