Why and How to Reinvent Yourself
It is said that no matter how hard, shameful, worthless or painful the past is, you can always start all over again. Chewing over past again and again will not make a difference either or will not help more. But what you need to do firs is:
a) change your mindset
b) change your perspective
Changing your perspective is like changing the window through which you view the world. When you change how you view it, you change how you feel about it.
Thus You can always be better than you were yesterday.
In fact you can even even reinvent yourself, no matter what is your age and how far you have gone. There is always a chance to take a new turn. You simply need to unlearn all the wrong things you were taught in the past. Thus “figuring out what not to do is, in every case, just as important as figuring out what to do,”
Moreover, If you don’t dig enough inside you to find the diamond that you are, you will remain the coal of circumstances.
When life seems meaningless, hopeless, and even pointless and everything seems to be going wrong, and you feel trapped and not wanting to live anymore, it is time to reinvent yourself, instead of attempting to kill yourself. When you are stuck, it feels as though you are just spinning your wheels in the mud and you are running around in circles.And the single biggest thing you need to do is to take charge of your own life by knowing what’s important to you, clarifying what you bring to the table and then focusing entirely on promoting it.
Thus Reinventing yourself means identifying patterns, perceptions, values, thoughts, or activities that not only no longer serve you but are also harmful for you, and make a radical changes in your life to liberate yourself from the yoke of a meaningless life. In other words, it means learning to end the self-destructive thoughts and behaviors that stop you from living a purposeful and gratifying life. More simply, it requires getting rid of the useless or unhealthy thoughts, perceptions, and attitudes or emptying your mind of all sorts of stereotypes and starting life anew. When we choose to start afresh and take hold of the direction of life to change it for better, we create a new beginning that is akin to magic,miracle or a sort of marvel. To sum up, it is the process of transforming your life by making deliberate and conscious changes to your beliefs, values, attitudes, behaviors, and even your environment.
Although the concept of “Reinvention” might sound simple and exciting. Yet the idea (and process) of reinventing yourself is a very very daunting task and many people may find it hard to come out of a rut they are usually stuck in.
It is not just like making funny, stupid or childlike new year’s resolutions like “This year I will take less selfies, or “unfriend some dumb people on facebook,” or “watch less TV… in standard definition.” It is not just childlike, but also a pointless exercise to choose a single day (or the last day of a year) to make a ritual like resolution to start a major life change. And as some commentators rightly point out, “the idea of a “New Year’s Resolution” was invented by the media to have something fluffy to write about during the dead week between December 25 and January 1.” On the contrary, it is a serious, meaningful and a continuous struggle. It can take a lot of reflection, lot of work, lot of time, lot of energy, and even a lot of confusion and trouble to change who you are as a person, how you perceive and think of yourself, of others and of situations around you.
In a nutshell, it is like demolishing the entire old and ramshackle building to construct a new one that serves your purpose better. As a famous quote discloses “the secret of change is to focus all your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new,” you don’t have to waste your energies and precious resources in maintaining as well as defending your old ways or lifestyle that keeps you from liberating yourself and moving ahead.
According to researchers, the body replaces itself with a new set of cells every 7 to 10 years. As our body renews, so does or should our mind and consciousness. And it is a life long process as we have to keep reinventing ourselves from time to time so that we must not become like a stagnant water that could be a breeding ground for germs that can cause serious harms to our health.
Thus it is like redefining everything you have learned throughout your life. It is also asking some questions, that are listed below as an example, and then making an effort to find the answers:
- What is the meaning of life and what is your purpose of life?
- What battles have you fought and overcome in your life?
- Which have been your best moments in life so far?
- What have been your biggest mistakes? What have you learned from them?
- Which past experiences are you most thankful for?
- If you could turn back time, what would you do differently? Why?
- Why do you always feel insecure and unsatisfied?
- Why you keep expecting and then blaming and get frustrated?
- All other people responsible for your life problems and not you yourself?
- Does money really matter and why you love money and hate people?
And last, but not the least, why do you keep repeating the same mistakes or doing the same things and then expecting different results?
As in the words of Einstein, “if you keep doing the same thing over and over again and expect different results, then you are an insane person.” Or as Henry Ford puts it, “if you always do what you have always done, you will get what you have always got.” Moreover doing nothing or leaving yourself at the mercy of outside circumstances is also not a solution. Doing nothing and allowing yourself to get sucked into a terrible rabbit hole will make life more miserable.
Thus you have to start a process of change by changing your thoughts, perceptions, perspectives, and ultimately your attitude. However, reinventing yourself doesn’t happen overnight and you don’t have to do it by staging a sudden revolt or hiding into a cave or going to a mountain top to become an ascetic to practices extreme self-denial and abstain normal pleasures of life. It doesn’t have to imply or involve a wholesale upheaval in who you are and how you do things ― though for some of us at some time, it might actually come to that. It can mean adjusting your attitude
toward life; your body and the shape it’s in or out of; your relationships or lack thereof with people, your community, your beliefs, your ideals etc.
In short, you have to go through the practical baby steps in daily life after the big leaps in your perceptions and thoughts. But You don’t have to renounce the harmless worldly joys and embrace a negative gloominess.
And as some research articles propose, “Reinvention is also proactive, not a reactive activity. People who choose to reinvent themselves, for whatever reason, are, by and large, assertive people, with a sense of personal responsibility and accountability for their lives(Chandler, 2004). They reject the role of “victim of circumstance” and assume ownership, if not total control, of situations and set about seeing what they can do about them. They refuse to be part of the problem; they insist, instead, of being part of and often the driving force behind the
solution (Chandler, 2004).
Although you can do a lot of things such as changing your thoughts and perceptions, building resiliency, being open to criticism, acknowledging your weaknesses and faults, defining your core values, practicing self reflection, defining and setting your goals, but the most important thing to do is to be honest with yourself. Commit to steady self-reflection. Assess whether you have any bad habits/attitude that might get in the way of starting a meaningful life.
Despite the fact that we all know how important it is, honesty can be challenging. Being honest with yourself can force you to deal with some hard truths that are uncomfortable to acknowledge. This makes it all the more important. Lying to yourself will not help you in any way, instead it will make the matter worse and create more problems than solving any. It will only hold you back from personal development. Honesty also helps you detect self-deception that we use as a smokescreen to mask our problems. For an easy solution, we might choose to deceive ourselves, but in the end, self deception does more harm than good.
On the other hand, self-honesty is the practice of always speaking and acting in accordance with what you believe to be true, even if it is unpleasant and inconvenient.
Remember, it’s your life and it’s never too late to course-correct. You have to choose your own path and keep away from the toxic and nosy/intrusive people. It’s not about being arrogant, it is about having a realistic and healthy self-image that does not need constant approval from the outside.
Moreover, according to some pundits, “Reinvention is any type of change, from the material to the spiritual, in which you become a whole person or a different person, hopefully abetter person, but certainly a changed person”
Last, but not the least, as the quote on the top suggest, it is never too late to reinvent yourself and start a new and purposeful life.
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References:
i) https://www.masterclass.com/articles/how-to-reinvent-yourself
ii) https://www.craftdeology.com/the-path-to-self-reinvention/
iii) https://www.betterup.com/blog/reinventing-yourself
iv) file:///C:/Users/computer%20world/Downloads/1264-Article%20Text-1858–1–10–20190517.pdf
