25 Ways To Go From Mess To Success

Do you feel like a mess lately?

I know I do sometimes.

When life happens, and it seems like all of the world’s problems fall down on your shoulders, it’s more than easy to succumb.

It’s even easier to lose all of your energy, motivation, and will to do anything for yourself and your life when you feel like a mess.

When this happens, suddenly, nothing really matters.

When you wake up already having a shi**y mood, you could care less about taking care of the tasks, your home, and even yourself.

I mean, who cares about goals, healthy habits, and self-care when they’re simply fed up with everything?

You’re barely making it in and out of work!

But there’s one thing I’ve learned from having these “I’m a mess” moments in the past – the more you wait to change something, the worse it gets.

If you’re overstressed, negative emotions tend to build up until the volcano bursts and you’re left with a mental breakdown (or “just” an anxiety attack).

If you’re overworked and are pushing forward regardless, you’re only a few days away from a burnout (and this one takes forever to recover from).

If you’re eating all of your emotions, just give yourself a few weeks of overeating (or undereating) and soon you’ll have another reason to be sad about.

If you’re neglecting your home, it becomes harder and harder to regain order and cleanliness with each passing day.

If you say “not today” to all of your tasks and assignments, well, you’re essentially preparing yourself for failure.

This is not the way to live your life.

You and I – we know this.

Now, I know that it’s easy to just preach and judge everyone around (“dayum, you a MESS girl!”) – but that’s not what I want to do.

I would never judge anyone who’s having that terrible “I’m a mess” moment because I know how it feels.

Sometimes, it’s actually devastating to realize how negative you or your life has become – and how much energy will it take to sort it all out.

But hey, you know I have a solution for you, don’t you?

When I let things go and can’t even fall asleep because all I’m thinking about is that I’ve messed up BIG TIME… I am usually sad, but calm.

Because I know there are a lot of things that can help me to step up and do something to change the situation.

Even the messiest life can get back to normal with a little bit of effort.

This is why I literally KNOW that you can solve all those issues that are making you feel like a mess.

And even if they’re something you can’t change, I know that you can wait them out and eventually – rise like a phoenix.

Here is the list of things I do whenever I feel like a mess and can’t stand it anymore.

25 Ways To Go From Mess To Success

1. Create a daily routine to set yourself on autopilot.

When you’re overwhelmed with negative emotions, it’s can be pretty hard to motivate yourself to go through the day but having a plan, an actual list of steps removes the hard part of thinking.

It helps you to simply do things on autopilot until you notice that you’ve actually done something, and you start to feel better.

2. Slowly organize your home and your life, step by step.

When you feel like a mess, your surroundings and life are probably messy as well.

Do yourself a favor and stop expecting that you should solve it in a few hours.

Give yourself permission to take things slow, and bring back the order to your surroundings by taking small steps every day.

3. Work on loving yourself and accepting your flaws.

If you feel like a mess, you’re probably used to thinking about yourself in a negative way… But this will just continue to make you feel bad.

Start to accept yourself the way you are, with all your flaws, and only then start working on other changes.

Allow yourself to make those changes not because you hate yourself, but because you love yourself and you want what’s best for you.

4. Make time for emotional self-care.

Life is often full of struggles and you need to learn how to cope in a healthy and caring way.

Allowing negative emotions just to pile up in your head will continue to burden you.

So designate an hour every day to be with yourself, notice how you feel and what you think – sometimes just understanding that you feel sad or mad is enough to feel better. Journaling your thoughts on the paper works wonders here.

5. Work with strict breaks.

Taking proper breaks will prevent burnout and will help you to create a balance in your life.

Sure, there’s a ton of things to fix when you feel like a mess, but if you go non-stop, you will just make things worse and nothing will get done, trust me.

6. Set reminders.

To help yourself manage small tasks (like taking your vitamins, drinking water, paying bills on time), set reminders on your phone.

A single chime can help you more than you imagine and all it takes is to spend a few minutes to create them or add them to your planner.

7. Get rid of bad habits, one by one.

It’s unrealistic to expect that you can cold-turkey quit ALL of your bad habits, at once.

Setting such a goal will only create more tension and it’s best to space things out.

Work on getting rid of one bad habit at a time.

8. Slowly incorporate healthier choices.

It’s the same as with those bad habits – trying to completely change your life from “unhealthy” to “healthy” at once is very overwhelming.

Incorporate small, healthy choices one by one to prevent confusion and maximize your chances of becoming a healthier person.

9. Take care of your looks.

When you look like a mess, you will feel like a mess too.

I’m sorry if this sounds shallow, but it’s true… Taking time to have a little bit of beauty care in the morning and evening will help you to feel better, just like that.

Do not feel guilty for taking time for your looks when your life is a mess!

Looking good can help to improve your mood, which is extremely important for you right now.

10. Make a playlist of inspiring songs.

Go through Youtube or iTunes and find songs that turn your motivation up.

Then, listen to them as often as you can – while you work, while you work out, cook, or go on a walk.

Music is very powerful on human emotions and finding melodies or words that inspire you can be a great help.

11. Spend more time outside.

Nature can heal our soul – not literally, of course, but it is a powerful mood booster.

Again, doing the things you like and enjoy is very important when you feel like a mess, so make use of our beautiful mother nature – it’s always ready to fill your body with those feel-good chemicals.

12. Talk to yourself.

If you feel like a mess, you might want to distract yourself from this feeling by doing things that are unimportant.

Do not hide from yourself.

It’s okay to feel like a mess from time to time, and don’t think that you’re the only one who feels like that.

Don’t turn away, instead – talk to yourself and ask – why did you end up here?

What happened?

Was life particularly stressful lately?

Did you get tired?

Do you feel sad?

It’s ok to get an answer “yes” to these questions.

Knowing the situation as it is helps you to accept it, and look for solutions.

13. Make it a habit to hug yourself every day.

When you feel like a mess, it’s the time when you need to support yourself the most.

Be your own supporter!

Literally, hug yourself every day and tell yourself that you’re doing your best.

Self-support is extremely powerful.

Just try it for a few days and you’ll see how good it feels to actually comfort yourself instead of hating and saying harsh words in your mind.

14. Find a new obsession.

This is quite specific, but some people can use a healthy obsession to skyrocket out of their doom hole.

This could be anything – becoming a health person, a planner girl, expressing yourself through style… Anything!

Try to find something that makes your heart beat faster and use this excitement to turn your life to the brighter side.

15. Decide on what you want to change in 1 year.

That’s as simple as it gets – decide on a few big goals that you would like to achieve in one year and start with the first step towards them.

There’s nothing to lose!

Even if you don’t end up achieving them in 1 ear, at least you’ll know what you want from your life and which direction you should go.

16. Every evening, write down what you’ve done through the day.

This simple habit helps you to evaluate your days to make sure you’re not wasting time, or not spending too much time feeling guilty about the things you didn’t do.

Just do a simple overview – what you did, what was great, what wasn’t.

A few weeks of data can give you a lot of valuable information on how exactly you are spending your days and how you can improve it.

17. Let go of what can’t be changed.

If you’re bothered with something that simply can’t be changed, do yourself a big favor and allow to let it go.

I mean, there’s nothing you can do… So spending time being sad and confused about it won’t change anything.

It’s a hard one, I know, but sometimes it’s exactly what you need to become free again.

18. Stop caring what others think.

Have you been feeling bad because you think that others notice you or your life being a mess?

Well, guess what – let them do what they want to do and simply ignore them.

Your life is yours to live, and you’re the only one who can choose what to do with it.

Plus, it’s not like everyone is perfect – other people have flaws and troubles too, but that’s their problem, isn’t it?

19. Believe that you are capable of more.

When you feel like a mess, it’s easy to think that you’re not able, or not worthy of achieving something great.

That’s a lie!

Believe that you can be so much more than you are right now and that nothing makes you unable to do better.

You can be your own champion, just like successful people do.

It may take time to actually believe this, but once you do, you will become unstoppable.

20. Process negative emotions.

Whenever you find yourself in a situation that gives you negative emotions, do not shy away, do not try to hide.

We must process negative emotions because it’s the only way for them to go away faster.

It’s always okay to feel sad, guilty, mad, ashamed etc.

Negative emotions are a part of every human and trying to remove them from your life completely is impossible.

21. Dress up in the morning.

If you don’t work at the moment, or work from home, taking time to dress nicely in the morning can help you to put yourself in the right mood.

It’s a simple trick that usually works for everyone!

22. Say goodbye to your negative self-talk.

Make a decision to stop judging yourself – no matter what happens.

When you keep repeating negative words about yourself, to yourself, it’s almost impossible to not believe them.

You have to be strategic about it and notice those unhelpful words as soon as they arise – and switch them to something helpful.

It sounds like work, and it is (kind of), but just like you’ve learned to speak negative things, you can learn to say something nice to yourself as well.

23. If you don’t feel ready to change a particular thing, work on something else.

There might be a roadblock on a particular thing in your life – and that’s okay.

Set it aside for a moment and work on something that goes easier.

Eventually, you’ll get stronger and come back to fix the stuck one as well.

24. Remind yourself every day – no one has their sh*t together.

The only thing that separates successful people from those who stay a mess is that the first ones at least do something to change their situation.

And hey – the fact that you’re reading this article is showing that you ARE actually doing something to change your situation – you look for ways to solve your problems and you should encourage yourself to move forward.

25. Minimize your life.

Sometimes, we might feel like a mess because everything is a mess.

Maybe you have too much stuff at your home.

Maybe there are too many tasty snacks in your fridge.

Or maybe there are just too many tasks where you work… Minimize whenever and wherever you can.

Making space allows you to breathe easier and you’ll have more energy to tackle the rest.

I really hope you liked this list! These simple changes can help you to go from mess to success, or at least give you that spark you need to change your life.

Just don’t make it a race.

Take things one step at the time and support yourself.

Normalizing a messy life is not easy, but if you do it with a caring and loving mindset, you’ll get there a lot faster than you think.

And… Don’t feel guilty.

We all slip sometimes and that’s fine.

Those better times are coming – stay patient with yourself, and encourage yourself to do better.

Not because you need to… But because you love deserve it.

I keep repeating this in my articles, but hey – if it’s true, should I stop? 🥰

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Amber & The Team

Co-authors at ShineSheets.com

"We love to research problems, examine studies, analyze solutions, and share with you ideas that make life healthier. You can learn about us and our editorial standards here. Have suggestions or feedback to share? Send us a message!."