Have you ever asked yourself, “Why am I reliving the same situation over and over again in my life?”  

Sometimes it feels that for every stride ahead, something happens that forces you to take a step back again. Oh well, Robert Brault says that an optimist is someone who figures that taking a step backward after taking a step forward is not a disaster; it’s a cha-cha.

So, let’s cha-cha, girlfriend! It might be the best mindset to get out of a monotonous circle. Madisyn Taylor says that maybe you keep making the same choices because you don’t know how to choose otherwise. Rather than moving you forward, your personal paths may propel you in a seemingly never-ending circle where your actions and choices lead you nowhere but to where you’ve already been.

She says that awareness can be the first step to get out of this circle. After all, you can’t make a change unless you’re aware that one needs to be made. Only then can you start understanding why you’re doing what you’re doing. Afterwards, it becomes difficult not to change because you’re no longer asleep to the truth behind your actions.

And that, says Madisyn, is the freedom that comes with awareness. Rather than thinking you’re trapped in a repetitive cycle with no escape, you starts seeing that the choices are always yours to make. Whether you’re aware of them right now or not.

Say you’re not aware that you have choices; that you’ve lost sight of who you are and what you’re worth. Chances are you’ll pursue a counterfeit worth based on the judgement of others. But, if your notion of your worth is not based on others’ expectations, you’ll see your slip-ups as merely another part of the cha-cha – one step forward; one step back.

Next step is to dance as if nobody is watching. Madisyn says that we all take great pains to suppress those eccentricities we ourselves deem odd. You may not even realize that you’re doing it, because you’re unintentionally attuned to the attitudes of the people you see each day. So, who do you surround yourself with, girlfriend?

Dr Jill Bolte Taylor suggests asking yourself: Who responds to me by wanting to fix the problem so that I will stop complaining, worrying, or whimpering? Who can hold the space for my pain and allow me the dignity of my own upset? Who is good at distracting me, and which of these characters do I gravitate toward? The interesting thing is not what the answers say about them, but what it says about you.

Dr Kelly Brogan says that one of the key components of self-ownership is the ability to become aware of the times when you’re stressed out – pause – and then simply get curious. Ask yourself: What story am I telling myself about what I’m experiencing. What might this situation be trying to tell me? This is how you interrupt the unconscious cascade of descension and catch yourself before things spiral out of control.

Sometimes that takes inserting some space, changing your environment or looking at your circumstances from another viewpoint, rather than falling into old patterns. It’s from this reflective place that we have the not-so-obvious opportunity to go a different way and write a new story, Kelly says.

Adam Schomer says that we must have a discontinuity, embrace the unfamiliar and watch how the mind searches for escape routes. Try to create an environment that takes away escape routes and helps you to see the usual patterns of the mind: This might mean going on a pilgrimage, taking a holiday or it could be as simple as stopping social media.

Adams says that we need not fight our own thoughts – perhaps we can simply observe them with indifference. Detachment means not taking circumstances as personal, as ‘yours’. It is to realize that your reactions to situations are patterns, are stories, and are innately not you. Much of it is conditioned. But for many of us the stories we tell ourselves are all we know of ourselves.

Allow your stories to keep changing, girlfriend. You’ll see that the plot was never even that important. The character is. Your story is much like dancing; the moves are ever changing, but the essence remains. As Eckhart Tolle says: Life is the dancer and you are the dance.