For the last couple of years, I’ve fallen off track when it comes to spirituality, excitement, and feeling connected to myself and others. I’ve forgotten what it’s like to be excited about life and began to wonder: why do I feel so disconnected?
I found that my feeling disconnected from everyone & everything stemmed from my attachment to suffering + feeling like a victim in my own life. Can you relate?
This feeling happened gradually. It was one complaint here, one negative thought there… and 2 years later, I found myself looking in the mirror and not recognising who I was.
Here are some small tips that have helped me get back in the groove of things. If you don’t feel like reading, watch the video below!
i started to feel that something was off
For the last couple of years, I have fallen off the wagon, almost entirely, when it comes to spirituality, manifestation, feeling connected to myself and others, and being in the flow of life & experiencing this magical feeling of being alive.
It’s not like I consciously decided to stop feeling connected to everyone and everything, and I said to myself: “I want to feel disconnected from everyone!” It just happened gradually, day by day, and years later, when I stopped to look at myself & my life, I thought:
“Look at this… How come I ended up here, in this position, feeling so… dead inside?”
I used to meditate daily, keep a gratitude journal, use visualisation as a powerful technique to help me achieve what I want and generally have a positive attitude.
I even have “gratitude” tattooed on my wrist (!!!), yet I’ve been feeling anything but grateful. sigh.
My practices… abandoned
I believe that we are spiritual beings having a human experience. It’s okay if you don’t share my belief – but this is the lens through which I look at life.
Part of my connection to myself, others, and life used to be via practices such as visualisation, meditation, and journaling.
I used to journal about the things I wanted to achieve, writing them down in the present tense. For example, I used to journal, “I live in a beautiful, bright, and spacious 1BR apartment in New York City” when I was manifesting a new apartment there.
Practices like such filled me with energy and reminded me that I’m not alone. This is also why I never felt lonely or disconnected, even if I was alone. I felt connected to life and the Universe.
Therefore, when I abandoned all the practices that brought me so much joy and life, I began to feel this sense of doom and dread. I became more pessimistic, complained, and became more “realistic”.
Bleh, I hate the word realistic.
first step – admit that we’re disconnected
It was heartbreaking to admit that I have become more negative and pessimistic about everything. I don’t consider myself a negative or pessimistic person. However, through my actions, beliefs, and thoughts – it’s who I became for a couple of years.
However, I got tired of feeling so lifeless. I got tired of feeling annoyed and frustrated, disconnected from others, lacking deep connections in my life, and unable to feel excited about anything.
If you’ve been feeling the same way… welcome to the club! The most important thing is admitting that we have lost touch with ourselves and others. And now… we can begin re-building our connection.
how to get (re)connected
So… what can we do to get back in touch with ourselves, others, and life? The 3 practices outlined below have been my stepping stones to get back into the groove of things.
1. Gratitude
This might be pretty obvious, and eeeveryone lately talks about the importance of gratitude, but there’s a reason for this! Gratitude works! Do not underestimate this practice.
You can keep a gratitude journal and write a few things you’re grateful for in the morning/evening, or you can keep this strictly a mental practice.
For example, when you wake up, the first thing that you can do is think of 5 things you’re grateful for. Additionally, you can do this in the evening. As you lay down in bed, getting ready to sleep, think of 5 things you’re grateful for that happened during the day.
Note: These things don’t have to be big! Sure, you can be grateful for your partner or child, but on days that might be a little bit harder… feeling grateful for a nice cup of tea and a walk is more than enough.
Starting a gratitude practice is powerful because it trains our mind to focus on the things that we have, that are good, that are working — instead of the usual complaining about what went wrong or what could be different.
2. visualization
One of the first things I wanted to get back to is visualization. Most importantly – visualize myself in situations and experiences I want to happen. Imagining as if it was happening right at this moment.
Visualization is a powerful practice because it can help us feel the emotions that we would expect to feel when a particular goal, dream, or experience happens.
Why do we want the things that we want? Because we want to experience the feeling of having it, doing it, living it. It’s all about our feelings!
We want to be in a relationship because we want to experience a feeling of love; we want to be successful because we want to feel proud and excited.
Visualization gives us a shortcut to what it is that we want. By visualizing what we want and acting like it’s happening in the present moment, we get to feel those exact emotions. It’s a powerful tool!
Additionally to that, it’s also helpful to write down what it is that we want in the present tense. For example, for the longest time, I used to journal:
“I feel so happy in my job. I love what I do, and I wake up excited each morning. I am full of energy and gratitude. I get to work on projects that are important to me and collaborate with great people.”
Don’t be scared to speak, write, and visualize things into existence. If you feel disconnected from everyone and everything, most likely your thoughts, beliefs, and imagination have been filled with words such as:
“I feel so lonely and detached. Life is so sad and depressing. I have nothing to live for, nothing excites me, and I can’t believe life is this difficult and boring.”
If that’s what you’re thinking 24/7, no wonder you feel how you think.
Thoughts -> Feelings -> Thoughts -> Feelings
Remember, thoughts lead to feelings which lead to more thoughts about the feelings, which as a result, lead to more & stronger feelings.
Confusing much? 😄
If we want to change our feelings, we can’t force ourselves to feel completely differently than our current default. There is too much momentum already going on.
If you’ve been feeling sad and disconnected for 2 years straight, you won’t feel joyful and excited within a few days. It takes time.
What you can do, however, is begin changing the thoughts that you think & the things you hold in your imagination. Your words, thoughts, and the pictures you hold in your mind make you feel a certain way.
The more you think about sad things + see them in your imagination, the more sad you will feel. Therefore, embrace the practice of visualization + writing about what you want and how you want to feel!
Personal growth can make you feel disconnected
For the last couple of years, I’ve been in therapy. It’s been really challenging and intense, and many difficult emotions have come up to the surface for me to face.
I think because this personal growth/therapy work has been so intense, I’ve begun to only focus on the shadow aspects of myself. My bad habits, toxic patterns, painful past, and the challenging emotions that come with it.
I’ve been so focused on exploring the dark aspects of myself that I got a little stuck in this darkness. I’ve forgotten to see all the ways in which I’ve grown, all the progress I’ve made, and the new ways of being I’ve begun implementing.
We can feel sad, empty, and lifeless not only because we’ve disconnected from ourselves – but also because we’ve connected a little too much with ourselves.
We might’ve taken such a close look at ourselves for so long that everything became blurry. One bad habit has become “It’s only bad habits”, and one disappointing experience has turned into “My life is nothing but disappointments”.
3. everything happens for a reason
The final tip I’ve started to implement is to remind myself that everything happens for a reason. This perspective has been beneficial for me to not be so hard on myself and how I’ve been feeling for the last couple of years.
If there’s something that you’re currently struggling with, I want to invite you to expand your perspective and wonder if there is a reason for this.
As they say, we cannot connect the dots looking forward; we can only connect them looking backwards. Even the darkest periods can serve a higher purpose in the bigger picture.
The way you’ve been feeling doesn’t have to be permanent. Perhaps you are going through the dark night of the soul and this feeling of disconnection is what you need in order to get to the next (and better) chapter of your life.
You’re not alone
I just want to remind you that you’re not alone in this. I felt this way for over 2 years, but it wasn’t until I got so tired of feelings this way, that I decided to change something. We truly sometimes need to get fed up with ourselves in order for real transformation to happen.
If you’d like to take a deeper look into your mind & what thought patterns you might have, I invite you to check out my journaling class on self-reflection. The 30 day practice mentioned there could really help you take a closer look into your inner world.