Culture, Media, & Society Influence And Own Our Lives
“We end up reaching what people define as ‘success’ and still feel like we didn’t accomplish anything significant.”
Growing up with our culture, media, and society, we can be influenced by what it means to be successful or how we should live our lives. When we become adults, we’re still living by other people’s terms. Their views, actions, and lives shape us into who we are now. But sometimes we forget to think about who we want to be and what we want actually to do with our lives.
Society tells us success is owning a large house, luxurious possessions, and having a 6-figure salary. Anything other than that and we start to question ourselves whether or not we’re doing the right thing.
We fear criticism if we don’t “succeed” in what we set out to achieve, which prevents us from taking risks and striving for the life we intend to have. As a result, we come home wishing we had time to do what we’d rather do. We end up reaching what people define as “success” and still feel like we didn’t accomplish anything significant. Ultimately, when we don’t take ownership of our lives, we will feel unproductive and unfulfilled.
Living an intentional life is consciously choosing and being purposeful in what you want to do and how you want to live. You can still be inspired and influenced externally, but here’s the thing… you must choose! To take ownership of your life, you must take ownership of the views you want to have, the actions you want to take, and the goals you want to accomplish. It must be your choice! 🙋🏻
Once you understand what you value in life, you can take ownership of what your definition of success and fulfillment looks like.
Believe In Yourself
“You are meant to curate the life that you intend to have.”
Say you do realize that you’re living someone else’s life, by someone else’s terms and standards. Truly taking ownership of your life means taking responsibility for your actions, mental health, and journey. Believe in yourself that you can take that responsibility. 💪 If not, you’re prone to depending on others to control your life.
I believe that everyone has the right to not just live, but to thrive. You are meant to curate the life that you intend to have. It takes self-belief, understanding, responsibility, and action to accomplish this goal.
In a community of friends, family, and peers, we all must support each other to carve out our own paths and live the life we intend to live. Since we all have different definitions of success and what our intentional life looks like, there’s no reason to not support those around you.
Envision Your Newly Owned Life
There are a ton of external factors that may have influenced how you’re currently living your life. An important step to take before carving out your path to understand yourself and to separate these outside influences from your true self. 🤔
To start, you can ask yourself the following questions to get you started:
What are you doing now? Whose life are you living?
What kind of life do you desire, if different from what you have now?
What are your values in life? (link to Core Values article)
What kind of work do you want to have? How do you want your relationship with work to be? What mission do you want to work towards?
What brings you joy and fulfillment?
Who or what do you want to prioritize in your life? (link Prioritization article)
Who do you want to look up to?
Once you answer some or all of these questions, you can begin to understand what ideas and paths are truly yours and what aren’t. Only then can you take ownership of your life and head towards a more intentional one.
Don’t forget to take action towards your intentional life. Plans and dreams are meaningless if you don’t act on them.
What outside influences did you find that wasn’t truly yours? What is the new path you want to take?
Email me with your findings and I can help you head in that direction! I’d love to hear them!