How Do You Get The Feeling That You Are Alive?

Do it now. Seize the day and tomorrow too. Find comfort in the small gesture of a hug to feel bigger. Try to escape from everything every now and then. Pursue that goal you once thought was lost. Rest. Dream today as if there is no tomorrow… All these things make you feel alive and they are priceless.

Living is not the same as feeling alive. However, this feeling is not always easy to achieve. It means waking up all your nerves. Your senses are completely attuned to the moment. Everything is meaningful and harmonious. It’s hard to honestly feel like you’re living in a world that encourages us to adopt a passive and self-deprecating attitude.

We live in an environment where we constantly feel that something is missing. And this just makes us hungry consumers. We tend to fill our voids with material things. There is always something we long for, a different product, a different job, a better relationship, a trip to an exotic country… We think these things will make us feel fulfilled.

We are trying to fit a square into a circle. The focus is too much on our environment. We want to belong, but we forget that happiness comes from a very specific place. It’s the place that lives just under our skin: ourselves. We have developed a habit of simply ignoring what can really make us feel alive: namely, passion.

Life means getting involved

One of the main things that keeps us from being happy is living passively. We get carried away by our circumstances. We limit ourselves to just ‘existence’, without feeling. Often we get so absorbed in our obligations that life itself becomes an obligation again. We see no hope anywhere and our lives become aimless.

Let’s be clear about one thing: to live means to get involved. It means that you take risks and act even when you are afraid. It means finding not one, but dozens of reasons to get out of bed in the morning. Sometimes, however, we choose the easy way: complacency.

We become compliant and settle for what we already have, even if it doesn’t suit us or bring us happiness. We do this because we think one bird in the hand is better than ten in the air. However, if we opened our hands, we would see that there isn’t even a bird in it, just feathers. There is only a sad glimpse of what once seemed like a promise, but actually was nothing.

It was just a dream. A false sense of security.

You don’t feel like you’re alive by walking a path that others have mapped out for you. And not by always staying in your comfort zones. To experience that vibrancy and happiness that gives meaning to everything, you must have passion.

Stop thinking in conditional terms (if I had, if this were so, if he did that…). Trade in the here and now. Take responsibility for the steps you take now, in your immediate present. Explore your reality and become the architect of your dreams yourself.

This is how you get the feeling that you are alive

Dare to fail. Try again, try ten or twelve more times and yes, that’s how you achieve ultimate success. Take a walk in the middle of the day to bring new ideas to life. Practice a sport. Feel how satisfying it can be to finish something well. How much you can take on an outstretched hand. A moment of loneliness. The company of friends.

Build something with your partner. Find a hobby and something that you enjoy. Listen to the laughter of a child. Close one phase and start a new one, with more passion and more fear, but also more power.

These things make you feel alive. They are things that awaken your soul. They lay the foundation of our being, give meaning to our projects, are the reasons behind our behavior and give us the energy to grow. These are fundamental things that should always be present in our lives, otherwise our psychological fabric will begin to unravel.

And when this happens, it gives way to something very dangerous: an empty feeling and the idea that life has no meaning.

This feeling of emptiness is the opposite of feeling alive. We must therefore be able to combat that feeling of emptiness when it arises. And we can do this by filling every nook and cranny in our minds with meaningful things.

The father of logotherapy and survivor of multiple concentration camps, Viktor Frankl, taught us in his books that our mission as humans is to find purpose. We must take responsibility for ourselves and for humanity as a whole, to feel complete, fulfilled and free.

So…

The things that make us feel alive consist of something priceless: enthusiasm. Each of us must find our own purpose and be brave enough to pursue it and make it our authentic daily passion. As Helen Keller once said, if you want to fly, don’t keep crawling just because others are doing it.