When You’re Ready To Change Your Life, Read This
Brianna Wiest, author of The Pivot Year, on the most critical actions you can take to change your life before 2026 begins.
What if, in the moments you feel most alone, you begin to realize that you are also free?
What if you could see that in these very moments you fear most, you are also completely unburdened from the expectations of others, able to define and redefine yourself, to explore life on your own terms, to hear the sound of your own voice? What if being on your own, in any capacity, is a sign of self-sufficiency and courage? What if you’ve already made it? What if instead of believing your aloneness is a sign you have failed, you realize that it is proof you have accomplished the most daring task of all?
What if, instead of believing that your job is not enough — in compensation, in status, in whatever you’ve chalked your inferiority up to be — you began to realize that no set of tasks could ever define the whole of who you are? What if you began to understand that a job is a means to an end, and doing anything to contribute to your or your family’s well-being and security is important and yet only one facet of success? What if, instead of believing that you must be the best to be good enough, you realized that to have somewhere to wake up and go, something to wake up and do, is a purpose and gift that should never be taken for granted?
What if, instead of believing that you have failed, you began to recognize that failure is just life’s way of moving you in another direction? What if instead of counting up all the times things haven’t worked out precisely the way you imagined they would or should, you considered that perhaps you were being led somewhere better? What if you found awe and reverence in the fact that there is a force so powerful protecting you — perhaps one you cannot even name or see or even believe in — that is refusing to let you have even the things you beg hardest for because there is something else you are so destined for?
What if, instead of thinking that your life was meant to unfold seamlessly, you realized that the courage it takes to keep opening doors, even if they all close, is all part of the process? What if, instead of losing hope in the world and life itself, you allowed your failures to strengthen your faith, making you see that there is a path for you to walk, and a forcefield holding you to it, no matter how hard you may try to get off?
What if, instead of begrudging someone for not being precisely the person you imagined they would be, you realize that the offering of someone’s time is the ultimate sacrifice and the epitome of love? What if you realized that they are under no obligation to be who you think they should be, and the most loving thing you could do would be to set them free of the expectations you hold in your own mind? What if you realized that they don’t have to be just as you imagine in order for you to exchange the love you are meant to share? What if the gift you’re receiving right now is the chance to witness the rawness of someone’s heart, their edges and imperfections? What if the journey is really asking you to love a flawed person, so you might be able to love your own flaws the same way?
What if the life of your dreams is not one where you do all things perfectly for an audience within your own imagination, but one where you have a few things you care about deeply and passionately and spend your life tending to them, releasing into the nothingless all the other cares that did nothing but hold you back from your own love and life?
What if your body appears precisely the way it is meant to, but you are so busy focusing on the flaws that nobody else notices, you’re overlooking the beauty everyone else sees? What if you believe that there’s something wrong with the way you look because you’ve spent an excessive amount of time fantasizing about how light and free perfection would feel? What if all you needed to do was simply look around you — to the people you know, the people you don’t, the people who coexist in the world beside you? What if you truly began to realize that almost nobody exists within that fantasy, and yet so many are still deeply and completely loved, fully alive and happy, walking in their truth and thriving as all they were meant to be?
I’m not saying that there aren’t real problems in your life, only that it’s very hard to actually identify those problems when you’re so busy trying to correct non-issues, so preoccupied with questions that have no answers. You could spend your entire lifetime wondering if you are worthy and enough and beautiful and successful and you will never come up with anything concrete. So you have a choice. You have a choice of how you will build your own perception around what exists.
What if cleansing your mind with hopeful, joyful, positive thoughts is the rebalancing that’s been long overdue, after so many years of existing solely within the most negative interpretations you could come up with?
What if, after an entire lifetime of being sold the idea that the point of your life is to exist as perfectly as possible, you could now open up to the notion that perhaps you are, instead, here to enjoy the ride while you’re still on it?
