Use This Mindset Shift to Avoid Feeling Behind in Life

Learn to appreciate the gap.

I know something about you. You want to be further along than you are right now. It looks like so many other people are far ahead of you and you wonder what’s wrong.

Sometimes, when you’re all alone and can’t avoid your thoughts, you wonder if you’ll ever get where you want to be in life. Right now there’s a gap between where you are and where you want to be. Am I right?

You have tried to make progress. But every time you start moving forward a little bit, something knocks you down. You have this gnawing sense of discontent and you fall into beating yourself up over past failures or time you fear you wasted.

But that voice in your head that keeps telling you it’s too late, you’re too far behind, and you don’t have a chance anymore is lying to you.

If you’re like most people, you focus too much on where you wish you were, and not enough on how far you’ve come. Why is that?

It’s difficult to appreciate the process as much as you appreciate reaching the goal.

You’re not behind, you’re growing. When you feel behind in life, adopt the mindset of appreciating how far you’ve come from where you started.

Appreciate your battle scars

The experiences you have, the obstacles you face, and the challenges you overcome all leave a mark.

When I was a kid learning how to ride a bike, I ran into a concrete wall. Twenty-five years later, I still have two little scars on my knuckles from the crash. It hurt, but I learned how to ride a bike.

Sometimes the scars are physical, and sometimes they’re emotional or spiritual. They may bleed and hurt, or they may leave you deformed in some way. But every scar has a story, and every story reminds you how far you have come.

Your scars reveal who you are.

The rejection you faced, the relationships that went wrong, the poor financial decisions–each one leaves a scar. Those scars shape the contours of your life. Would you be better off if it hadn’t happened? Maybe. But it’s difficult to say at this point because you’re not far enough along to have an adequate perspective.

When you appreciate your scars, you start to get a clear picture of the gift they can give you.

Appreciate your support

You didn’t get where you are today by yourself. While you may not have had formal support, there is something or someone else behind you.

“No man is an island entirely of itself,” wrote John Donne. That means no one can live independently of support from others.

In a society that worships individualism, it’s time to recognize the role others have played in your life.

You’ve had someone, somewhere to support you. And while it may not be the kind of support you would have chosen given the option, you wouldn’t be where you are today without that support. Perhaps it was a teacher, parent, friend, community, God, or the universe. The fact is someone gave you their time and energy.

Who was there for you when you were at your lowest point? Someone made it possible for you to survive.

When you can truly appreciate those who’ve helped you, it takes your focus off your self-pity and helps you see you are not alone.

One of the greatest human fears is the fear of being unloved. Loss of love means certain death. Though there are times you feel alone, you can trust that you aren’t.

Appreciate the gap

There’s the person you are right now and the person you want to be. The space between them is a gap. The question is, what do you do with that gap?

One of the fastest ways to get depressed and disheartened is to stare at the gap. Even so, this is exactly what most people do. The further away you feel from your goal, the easier it is to give up. Have you ever felt this way?

You can’t cross the gap between who you are and who you want to be by staring at it.

The only way to cross the gap is to keep moving forward. Don’t give in to anger, frustration, or hopelessness. Stop beating yourself up for not being good enough or as far along as you thought you would be by now.

Appreciate the gap for what it is — an opportunity for growth.

The gap isn’t some insurmountable distance between your current and future selves. You can close it through your willingness to stretch and grow.

Final thoughts

You aren’t behind in life. Whose timetable are you using to measure yourself, and what makes them authoritative?

Just because everyone else is doing it doesn’t mean you have to do it too. When you’re feeling stuck and frustrated with the direction of your life, remember:

Appreciate the scars that remind you of all the things you’ve been through.
Appreciate the support of the people who held you up when you couldn’t do it yourself.
Appreciate the gap between who you are and who you want to be because it shows you the path you need to take to grow.