The Hidden Reality of Being Lost in Life

It takes guts to be clueless about where your life is heading

There is a common misconception in society that those who are lost in life are lazy, lacking ambition, or downright useless.

Often, this misconstrued belief stems from the praise we give to those who do have a plan, which of course is almost always titled, ‘My life over the next 5 years’.

Except, having a plan doesn’t really works for this mysterious being called ‘life’.

We all know this. And yet for some unknown reason, we continue to view those that don’t have a clue about where their life is heading in a slightly dimmer light.

Well, here’s the catch: nobody has it all figured out. We are all lost in some way, shape or form — some of us more so than others, and sometimes more so than ever.

“Sometimes being lost is the best way to find yourself.” ― LJ Vanier

It doesn’t matter who you are, or how successful you’ve become, there will always be — and always was — a moment in your life when you didn’t have the faintest clue about what was next, let alone whether or not you should wear pants in the morning.

And it’s easy to sideline those tough times.

It’s far more comforting to admit to ourselves, and to others, that we had our path figured out all along. It’s as if our biography should only tell the story of how we’ve always been able to perfectly position the ‘marbles of life’ into the perfect place to benefit from the perfect outcome. It’s as if we purposely omit the chapter that narrates how we sometimes lost all of our marbles.

So why do we refrain from admitting that we are, well, lost?

In my view, we — and society in general — need to embrace the fact that it takes guts to not have it all figured out. And if you are reading this with the safety of knowing that you’ve got your life planned to the tee, take a moment to unlock your vault of suppressed memories.

Take a second to genuinely sympathise with the courage that is being shown by those who are where you once were: lost.

So what does being “lost” look like?

Imagine entering into a theme park, only to find yourself captured by these monsters called “life-planners”, and then blindfolded, and then spun around a hundred times until you are about to throw up, and then being forced to buckle-up, only to realise that you are about to ride the scariest rollercoaster ever built, which of course you can’t see because you are blindfolded, only to then remember that you were hung-over from the night before, only to then puke your guts out.

Make sense?

Hopefully this gives you a nice, but distasteful reminder of how there are in fact certain moments in our lives where we’re unable to see anything ahead of us, while our minds, bodies and emotions are busy completing a full 360 for the third time in two days.

That’s what being lost feels like.

Unfortunately, there isn’t much of a way out

No matter what you read, or what others tell you, there is no definitive exit route to snapping out of this phase. If there was, I wouldn’t be writing this piece, and you wouldn’t be reading it. We’d already know the solution by now.

So what can you do when you feel clueless about where your life is going?

Surprisingly, very little.

I mean, sure you can always read your thousandth self-improvement book, hire a life coach, decide to practice mindfulness. These techniques might work, but there is no guarantee that the solution actually lies in reading one more book, hiring one more coach or meditating for 10 more minutes.

So what do you do?

There’s really only one thing you can.

Sit back. Relax. And remind yourself how brave you are.

Seriously, that’s it? Yep!

You see, when you embrace the fact that what you are doing (or rather not doing) takes guts, you remove the negative emotions of disappointment that are attached to feeling clueless about where your life is heading.

You let go of the guilt, and the anxiety that comes from saying to yourself, “I haven’t got it figured out”.

Instead, you remind yourself how awesome you really are for taking that leap into the unknown, and for riding that rollercoaster for the tenth time, and vomiting your emotions out for the twentieth.

Being lost in life takes guts, especially if you have to puke them out along the way.

But nobody ever tells you this because nobody wants to admit that they are, or once were, well and truly lost.

Final thought

When the world, and the people around you are busy constructing their next series of 5-year plans, it takes a weird recipe of strength and resilience to realise that it’s okay not to have one.

There exists, in its strangest form, a sense of hope in knowing that it takes guts to not have a plan in life.

So let’s give the ‘clueless ones’ a break out there. For only they know the courage it takes to be lost in life.