Are you on autopilot?

Ever feel like you’re just coasting through life–whether at work or at home–on autopilot? Feeling generally complacent in terms of your nursing career? Alicia-joy at Transitions in Nursing recently wrote about the dangers of simply breezing through your daily routine without taking the time to reflect. We wanted to share her inspirational thoughts with you below:

Ever worked a shift and felt you were on autopilot? How about a week of shifts that you can barely remember the details. “Same stuff, different day,” right? Do your days, weeks, months, years seem to blend into each other? Maybe you have goals that aren’t being reached? Or places you would like to visit? Or changes in your career and life  you have thought of making? But if you are an auto-pilot, complacently ambling from one day to the next, you get into a zone. And you stay there.

Like your bed on a crispy cold morning…it’s warm, familiar, comfortable…and DANGEROUS. While you remain in that zone, the landscape, scenery, and most importantly TIME, is shifting by. Whether you act or not. So what dreams, goals, desires, change have you thought about making?

What CAN you do?

Understand that the longer you stay in complacency zone, the stickier that zone gets. It becomes real hard to finally DO SOMETHING.

So what can you do today? Without doing anything drastic, decide today to commit to making ‘it’ happen. Everything happens in steps.

Let’s say you want to start exercising and eating healthier. Don’t go overboard instantly with a plan that you won’t be able to keep up. Start with one step and build momentum. What one step can you take today? Go for a walk, substitute a heavy meal with a salad, etc.

Nursing career or specialty change on the brain? You don’t have to go wild and hand in your notice today (I am NOT advocating anything like that). Instead, just start researching alternatives, talking to people, updating your resume. Or at the very least, put it on your calendar to do something.

Once you take a step. Just one step. You are boldly making your way AWAY from the danger zone.

Read more of Alicia-joy’s story over on Transitions in Nursing. And don’t forget to tell us about your experience with living in autopilot and how you got through it in the comments!