Why your life is so dull

When you think about your entire life until this point where you’re reading this article, you tend to narrate a story in your mind; something that goes like this:

First, you were born, then you did some things as a toddler, you grew up through the ups and downs of teenage, and now you’re here – studying, working at your job, or whatever it may be. In the future, however, you plan on doing more things – buying posh cars, probably seeing the world, and saving up enough money to retire happily ever after.

We tend to view our lives in a narrative structure like what’s mentioned above – with a beginning, a middle – probably where you consider yourself to be, and an end – where you’re heading towards. When you think about it, it sort of makes sense, right? By thinking about the past you realise what you did to get where you’re now, and by conceptualizing the future, it helps you to look forward to something – something to plan, and something to work towards. Your mind makes extra sense out of this narrative-like perspective of life because if you don’t like your present situation or you hate life right now, you can place your suffering and disappointments on the hopes of enjoying a better tomorrow.

But...

If you think about what it feels like to actually live life on a day to day basis, you forget that narrative you made up in your head and come up with an entirely different explanation; something that goes like this:

You wake up feeling washed out and lustreless, tripping to the kitchen to get your cup of coffee. You then hop into the shower, winning imaginary arguments as you progressively go bald when the unhealthy warm water drops on your hair. You get dressed to get your breakfast downstairs. After you’re full, you eat more because you have this peculiar addiction to that chocolate cake your sister baked and considered a flop yesterday. You go out to work, school or whatever, only to come back and binge on YouTube and Netflix until you eventually doze off to sleep.

This is what living life feels like to most individuals for the most part. Life is so normal – you do the things you do every day as you stick to your pattern or routine which has developed subconsciously over a period of time. Life isn’t all that motivating, stimulating, mind-blowing or particularly extraordinary. It's just the day to day experience. 

Yes! Your life sucks. I mean, all of your friends’ stories on Instagram and statuses on WhatsApp are all about travelling everywhere, hanging out without you at McDonald’s, going on spectacular escapades and trying out Starbucks kiwi starfruit refreshers, right?

Wrong. It doesn’t work like that.

Why? you ask. Realise that all so saw on social media isn’t really what they’re actually living. It's more like a highlight reel where only the best moments are captured and shared. These highlights begin to intervene in your thought process, and you tend to make your life filled with as many of these “highlights” as possible. The problem reveals itself when you these seemingly awesome and crazy things aren’t happening. A day without such experiences automatically becomes one which your mind considers rubbish. You happen to think that you’re gradually wasting your life away by rarely experiencing those “good times”. 

The truth is, no one’s life is like that – not Shahrukh Khan, not Cristiano Ronaldo, and not that annoying friend who always puts up WhatsApp statuses of him/her living life at their fullest. Sure, they’re involved in a lot of cool stuff than you are, but they still wake up groggy, they do things they don’t want to do, they’re working hard, and they do get frustrated and stressed out. They still use the loo and they still have to eat. Everyone is involved in this day to day monotony. They experience life the same way you do.

A good life is just a series of good days. These “good days” are not just the times when everything went our way and we happened to experience no stress whatsoever. They’re days when we gave life a good shot and did things that make us happy, be it having a deep conversation, developing consistency in the habits that align us with our ambition in life, or eating something memorable.