Imagine a day when you wake up, have to get to work or even to a family event but you don’t really feel like. What would you do? If you’re like most people, you might make up a reason for not being able to make it. Call in sick. Tell your boss that you have a family event that you forgot about or tell your relatives that you have some urgent work in office. Or sometimes, drag yourself to work or get to the family do and go through it. It surprises me how some people might even be comfortable making up a story and lying instead of just saying; “Hey! I didn’t feel like coming”. “I don’t feel like getting to work today”. “I don’t feel like going to the gym”. Or whatever. Here are a couple of my own musings about the idea of “not feeling like”.

First, it’s alright to tell someone that you don’t feel like doing something. It doesn’t call for justification. People often feel pressurized to ask, “Why?”, “What happened?”, “What’s wrong?”, “Is everything alright?”, etc. It’s alright to say, “Nothing. I just don’t feel like”. You don’t owe anyone an explanation for that.

Second, people or sometimes you yourself are justified in asking, “Why you don’t feel like”. Which is typically what happens. Think about it. If you work for a company in a certain role and if you repeatedly don’t feel like going to work, then it’s important to ask yourself why that’s happening. If every evening you’re feeling down or gloomy maybe there’s something more to it. Our feelings are great thermometers to something more that might be lurking below. Maybe you’re in the wrong job. Maybe something’s not going well in your life and you’re refusing to look at it. Maybe you need to do more physical activity and not just sit at home every evening after work.

Third, keep your larger goal in mind while you still respect your feelings. If you want to complete a college degree to get a better job and that’s a true mark of accomplishment for you, then pay attention to your day to day feelings while focusing on that bigger goal. If there is an occasional day when you don’t feel like going to college, maybe you’re just tired. Let that pass. If there are more than a couple of days that you don’t feel like going to college, maybe there is a big assignment that you’ve been trying to dodge. If you’re never excited to go to college, maybe someone just forced you into an education and that’s not your actual goal. Or maybe you want to get a college degree but you aren’t doing the exact course that you should be doing. A working professional whose goal is to grow his company, sell out and retire young might just feel like working day and night. He doesn’t just feel like but is in fact thrilled to get to work every Monday morning. Now that’s also worth examining. Maybe he’s just meant to be an entrepreneur. So feeling like is as important as not feeling like. They both have useful stories to tell and it’s worth respecting that. Start getting comfortable with your feelings. Particularly with respect to looking at your own feelings and exploring them rather than brushing them under the carpet or running away from them. Dive into your feelings a bit. “I feel really awesome today, I wonder what’s up”. “I feel really heavy and dull every time I eat so much, maybe I should start eating lighter”.

Lastly, extend the same courtesy to others. Just like I mentioned earlier that it’s alright to tell others that you are actually feeling what you’re feeling. Practice respecting someone else’s feelings when they share it with you. If you are the boss or the relative whose event it is and the other person is saying, “I don’t feel like getting to work today”. “I feel like spending time alone today. Not going to a family event”. “No, I’m not sick and I’m not planning to quit, I just don’t feel like getting to work today”. Practice saying something to the effect of, “Oh, alright. See you soon”. This allows the other person to sort out what they are going through without the pressure of denial or justification.

Remember that your feelings are your dashboard of what’s happening inside you and your life situation. Respecting that is a cornerstone of living a good life.