Your alarm goes off. You hit snooze.Your alarm goes off several times and you get up at the last possible minute to make it to work just in time. You drag yourself into the building knowing that today is going to be just as bad as yesterday. You put on a fake smile and push through. You hate your job. You wish you could be anywhere but in that building. Your co-workers are not helpful. Your boss is condescending. This place sucks.

Sound familiar? If so, know that many people live these thoughts over and over again everyday. So many people wake up in the morning and can’t wait to get back home. So many people delay going to bed at night because they know when they open their eyes again it will be time to go back to “that place”. What a miserable existence.

Have you thought about what it would be like to wake up after the alarm goes off the first time? To be excited about going to your job? To love what you do so much that you brainstorm on how great your day is going to be on the drive there? Imagine loving your job so much that it feels like you get to live out your dreams everyday? I know to some that may sound overly optimistic. You may be thinking: No one loves what they do THAT much. Get Real.

It is so possible! We need to truly live instead of just existing. We need to dive deep down into the depths of our souls and figure what makes us thrive, what makes us tick, what makes us feel alive and go after it! It doesn’t have to just be a pipe dream. What can we do to make our wildest dreams our realities?

1. Reflect

Why are you unhappy at your job? Is it not relevant to your degree? Is it because it’s not where you expected yourself to be at this point in your life? Is it boring to you? Is it not what you feel like you want to do for the rest of your life? We as millennials think we should have it all figured out by now. We see people with “better” degrees than ours, what we perceive as “better” jobs, assume they are getting paid “better”, and think that they are living “better” than us.

Throw the word better out! Stop comparing yourself to other people. This is YOUR life. Your timeline may look different from someone else’s, but that doesn’t make it any less and that doesn’t make YOU any less. You have so much life left to live. A co-worker once told me: Never be afraid to reinvent yourself.  That really resonated with me. Who I am right now is not who I always have to be. I am constantly growing and changing and I should make my life reflect that. Do you want to be 80 years old and think, wow I wish I would have…?

2. Revise

So what would bring you that joy that you seek? What would set your soul ablaze? What drives you? It doesn’t just have to be a far off dream. What are you good at? What do you excel in?

Take out a piece of paper. Right now. Write down any and every thing you are interested in. From music, to tv shows, hobbies, EVERYTHING. Write down the issues that you are passionate about. Write down what you enjoyed doing as a child. Leave no stone unturned. Then look at what you have and search for something that sparks with you. You would be surprised where your interests and skills can lead you.

3. Run with It.

You are unhappy, so now what? Will you spend hours online looking for that dream job? Will you create that project? Will you make those connections? What are you willing to sacrifice for it? Sleep, time, money? These are the questions we need to ask ourselves to truly make a breakthrough in our lives. Maybe you will have to go back to school, maybe you will have to move to a new city, maybe you will have to eliminate your comfort zone. If it’s truly what is important to you, stop at nothing to achieve it. Then and only then will you look back at this time in your life and smile. The struggle was all worth it for the happiness that truly chasing your dreams will bring.