We don’t all have the energy, capacity or resources to make transformative changes in our lives, but we can take little steps forward. In February’s Red magazine Bella Evennett-Watts asked a number of different people to suggest small changes that could lead to long-lasting impact. Here goes:
- Become a better listener – by resisting your own urges to give advice or suggestions
- Send “thinking of you” texts to future proof your friendships
- Boost your self-esteem by keeping a positivity journal
- Gift your partner with information to solidify your relationship
- Achieve Fen Shui while working from home by getting the lighting right
- Listen to your own advice to feel happier more often
- Make people listen by writing down your purpose with confidence and clarity
- Help yourself heal from heartbreak by looking forward
- Reduce your impact on the environment by investing in reusables
- Challenge your social awkwardness by being curious
- Stop blaming yourself by remembering you’re not always responsible for others’ behaviour
- Get better at public speaking by smiling
- Improve your relationship with alcohol by taking small breaks from it
- Choose hope over despair to build a better future
- Improve your relationship with the online world by slowly letting go of urgency
- Make a to-do list to improve your work-life balance
- Stop people pleasing by questioning your guilt
- Leave a book for a stranger in a microlibrary, waiting room or coffee shop
- Walk a dog, even if you don’t have one volunteer at the local dog shelter
- Befriend someone by using Age UK’s befriending service and sign up to visit an older person
- Do a two-minute clean up in your neighbourhood
- Become a mentor and make a difference in someone else’s life
- Save lives by giving blood
- Try translating if you speak another language
- Give away your old bike to the Bike Project
- Make someone grieving for a lost pet feel less alone by supporting the Blue Cross Pet Bereavement Support Service
- Get knitting for disadvantaged people
- Be a cheerleader and offer encouragement at the next local marathon
- Make a difference from your phone, check out apps that help spread goodwill
- Share an extra portion with a neighbour or homeless person
- Pass on a loved teddy bear to a children’s home
- Facetime a blind person to help them check out expiry dates or navigate new surroundings
- Search for anything to help plant trees around the world
- Perform a small act of kindness, ideas from the BeKind app
- Buy secondhand furniture to reduce wastage
What other small steps could you take?
Bells, Bakes & Bettering Myself 