Have an Unfulfilled Life? 7 Reasons Why You’re Not Satisfied

Do you wake up and hit the snooze button? Well, that’s rather normal, so don’t worry.

But if you lack the motivation to get up every morning—even after you’re all showered up and up on your feet—then it’s probably a sign. A sign that you live an unfulfilled life and that you’re not satisfied.

Most people feel confused at some point in their life, but if you feel unsatisfied and unhappy about your life on a daily basis, then it’s time to do something about it.

Maybe you feel like you’re meant for something bigger, maybe you just want to do something different with your life, or maybe you have no idea what you want, or why you feel unsatisfied.

This article will take you through 7 reasons why you might not be satisfied with your life.

Why You Have an Unfulfilled Life

Here’re the reasons why you aren’t satisfied with your life and how to take a step towards a fulfilled and happy life.

1. You Don’t Realize You’re Wasting Time

It’s easy to say you’ll do something. Another thing is to actually do it. We have all tried to put off something for the next day and we’ve said: “I’ll do it tomorrow.” But if you do this often, then it could turn into a habit.

If you feel like you’re meant for something bigger, but you’re not moving forwards at all, then it’s time to take a look at your day and your time management. You might not even realize that you’re wasting your time.

Sometimes, people tell themselves it’s enough to get out of the door in the morning and sit at the office until they clock out.

Unfortunately, it’s not enough if you waste your time during the day. Some of the most common time stealers are Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. In other words, take a look at how much time you spend on social media every day. You’ll probably be able to tell if you have a problem.

Or maybe you plan on working on your personal projects at night or during the weekend (probably both if you’re an aspiring entrepreneur), but you end up on Netflix or only have fun with your friends and family.

If you re-examine your life, you’ll find out what you do right and wrong, and how you can make a better daily and weekly plan for yourself.

It’s not about neglecting people or only being able to do one thing. It’s about understanding yourself and your habits better.

2. You’ve Lost Touch with Yourself

People do different things to feel good about themselves. For some, it means going to the gym and working out.

A study made by Ceren Doğan from the Department of Psychosocial Studies, Birkbeck College, University of London shows a connection between going to the gym and people feeling good about themselves in more than one way:^[1]

“Overall, it is argued that for many participants gym exercise is more than physical training; it is also training for life. Based on a thematic analysis of 32 semi-structured interviews it is argued that gym workout is a means to create better versions of the self on mainly three levels.

First, gym participants perceive themselves to be efficient and productive in general. Second, gym training is believed to increase the control they have over their lives. Third, gym members associate their gym workout with amplified emotional resilience, believing that fitness workout makes them not only fitter in a physical sense but also fitter and better equipped in a psychological sense. “

In this case, the gym is simply an example. The point is that we all have something we do that makes us feel good and if we neglect it, then we can lose touch with ourselves and how we feel.

If you suddenly stop doing whatever you do to feel good, or it falls down on your list of priorities, then it might sneak up on you later.

3. You Put Too Much Pressure on Yourself

While it’s good to create a plan and be ambitious, it can also backfire if you put too much pressure on yourself.

A clear goal helps you move forward in the right direction. But if you put too much pressure on yourself to achieve it, you’ll slowly feel the drive disappear day by day.

Or maybe you have taken on too much weight on your shoulder at work and at home at the same time.

If you need to focus on an important project at work, talk to your family and let them know that you need to focus on that for the next few months, but make it clear that it won’t be forever.

If it’s the other way around, then don’t take on more than you can at work. Every work situation is different, but if it’s possible for you to not take an extra shift, work late all the time, or place yourself on a difficult project, then do it, and focus on your family for a while.

4. You Don’t Finish Things

Many people have ideas. Some of them are great. Some of them are not. But it’s often not about the idea itself. If you set out to do something, but don’t finish it, then it doesn’t come without a cost.

In your mind, it might just be the idea that never goes any further. In reality, it can be about so much more than you not finishing a project.

Humans are creatures of habit. If you decide to do something and then don’t manage to finish it a couple of times—it slowly turns into a habit — a bad habit. Once you start to feel like you can’t do anything, then you’ll feel unfulfilled.

The good news is, we’re able to break habits and create new ones. Take back control and finish your projects (big or small).

5. You Don’t Have Social Life

Human beings are social animals, we all need some sort of social life to feel happy and fulfilled.

Even if you prefer your own company in most situations, it doesn’t mean that you don’t need some sort of social life.

Maybe you’re lonely without even knowing it, but you’ve told yourself that you don’t need a partner in life because you’ve been on your own for so many years.

Or maybe you’ve never really had any good friends, so you’ve given up on meeting new people and socialising.

Either way, it’s never too late to change it. It’s true that you don’t necessary need both a partner and a good friend, but you do need someone.

No one is meant to live a completely isolated life. Put yourself out there or reach out to someone you lost touch with.

6. You Lack Purpose

It’s easy to wake up every morning and go to work. Well, maybe not completely easy, but we can all do it. The same way we can go out and smile, but on the inside we might not feel like smiling.

If you lack purpose, then it’s probably not something that will sneak up on you over night. It’s going to take some time for you to realize that this is why you’ve been feeling unfulfilled and unsatisfied.

It’s going to take some time for you to realize it because you can easily live a good life on the outside and still lack purpose. You can have a good job and a great family.

This might make you feel bad about feeling unsatisfied, but you shouldn’t. Purpose is about you and it’s okay to want something that you maybe forgot about along the way.

You can always change direction and find it.

7. You Feel Distant

A lot of people can be present without really being present. If you’ve been feeling distant from your own life, then you get the idea. You can go to work, events and meet friends while your mind is not really there at all.

It can come from something deeper like a lack of purpose, but it might also be as simple as remembering why you do the stuff you do on a daily basis.

Peter H. Diamandis uses a self-talk technique when he feels out of funk:^[2]

“It’s going back to ‘Why do I believe this is important?‘ It’s, ‘Look how far I’ve taken it so far.'”

Use this self-talk to ask yourself the same questions about your life in general. Look at your job, your habits, and your social life etc. Take a good look at your life overall and ask yourself these questions.

This might be a wake-up call or help you find what you once saw and lost sight of.

Final Thoughts

In the end, an unfulfilled life comes down to asking yourself some tough questions and react to what you find out. Find out why you’re not satisfied with and change it.

Featured photo credit: Mark Alexandrovich via unsplash.com