How to improve the quality of your own life. 5 little things you can do right now

Look at the objects around you at home. What feelings do they evoke? How do you feel about them? Do you keep them around you “out of love” because you like them? Or out of fear? Let’s find out with an expert.

Lilia Shergina

practicing psychologist and coach

Paradoxically, important changes often start with small things. And it is not a sin to take advantage of this to improve the quality of life.

Let’s take Olga. Olga felt like a stranger in her apartment and experienced severe anxiety and apathy. To avoid coming home, she stayed late at work, went to help her friends and wandered for long periods of time in shopping centers, exploring the assortment of food courts and buying unnecessary clothes.

In the course of therapy, it became clear that her mother had renovated the apartment and the things that surrounded her every day were disliked and reminded her that she had no say. Olga was afraid to change the interior of the apartment and admitted that she was afraid of offending her mother.

In the process of systemic therapeutic work, Olga rearranged the apartment and hired a designer who designed the new interior. She had to learn to negotiate with her mother and build new relationships. But now Olga spends her evenings at home in the company of friends or books on business development.

She started going on dates and even got a new interesting project at work. After all, now she has much more energy and self-confidence. And that means that opportunities to improve the quality of life have opened up. And it all started with little things.

What to do to improve your life right now

Surround yourself with things that you like. By encountering them every day, your brain and psyche will experience joy and recognition of “yes, this is I chose this,” which means more joy hormones will be produced. Other ways to increase the synthesis of these biologically active substances have been discussed in the link below.

Do household chores that you are good at. And delegate the rest to loved ones or professionals. It is more useful to drink coffee with your favorite husband than to die for ironing hateful socks.

Implement small useful habits on a daily basis. Contrast showers, warm up, more vegetables in your diet. This way you will get the experience to act and make choices that are important to you. Which means your willpower, determination and self-confidence will only grow.

Take time to be alone with yourself. Remember that the most important person in your life is yourself. Make an agreement with your family that you will not be disturbed, asked for anything, or burdened with activities at any particular time. Sit alone with your thoughts, paint, write a memoir, or meditate. Work on your emotional state, strengthen personal boundaries, and practice resilience to the demands of others. Personal time and personal space always stimulate more growth and development.

Communicate more with loved ones. We are the arithmetic mean of our environment. And if you have a disgruntled wife or husband, lonely children and rejected relatives around you, it significantly reduces the quality of life. Talk to your partner and find out what is going on in his life, what he dreams about, what his goals are. Support your children, even if they don’t get straight A’s. Tell your parents about your successes and accomplishments so they can feel comfortable with you. Create new family traditions that reinforce unity and family values.

Not all habits are beneficial to us. Some are important to track and eliminate to make life easier for yourself and those around you. Here are six things that everyone will be easier without.