At any given moment in our life, there is something holding us back. Either material or mental, to recognize the issue is the first step to change. Someone can one-up-you at any given moment, but self-actualization is coming to the realization that that person went through something different than you, they have not lived the whole life you have, and may not understand that the small hindrances on your life can make up who you are.

1. Your phone won’t hold a charge. You have not gotten a new one in a couple years. Maybe three to be exact. It has been long enough where the lip covering the charging port has been lost and the sides are chipped and worn. You check your bank account but you cannot afford the new Pixel 2, or the Note 8, not even thinking about Apple products. You instead try a new battery, but your phone now will last two hours while not in use. Verizon sends you a refurbished phone, but the sound buttons do not work. Two “new” phones later, and you are back to the issue with your phone not holding a charge, but at least the camera works and the sound buttons are functional on the Galaxy s5. You buy a new charger to carry around with you
2. He comes over and holds you tightly. You are comfortable until he tries to kiss you. You need to tell him to his face that the hole in your face, where he held the gun and pulled the trigger, hurts and no you cannot kiss him and act like everything is okay. There is a hole in your head after all, one that carries a load of decaying leaves to your heart and poisons your veins. He leaves your room, claiming that he is miffed over what happened but he still has not told his friends about you yet.
3. The leaf on the pot, the pot that you spent at least fifteen total hours making, keeps breaking free from the slip, tumbling into the core of the bowl. Though you will be painting the leaves oranges and reds, the typical fires of fall, you need the leaf to stay on the stalk before the seeping white hardens the clay to bisque.
4. It is near one in the morning, but it is early because the night before you did not really sleep but were awake with the sound of a distant highway, blotted by the soundproof snow, the type of askewness that comes when your head is stuffed with a cold. In the mornings, when the wind is blowing and the lake is dotted with white icebergs, your eyes don’t truly open all the way as your brain never truly shut off during the night.
5. The bottles by your bed are dark. Lemon vinaigrette, raspberry vinaigrette, lemon oil. Stains from use when they were tipped ever so slightly so you might pour a dribble into that cat mug before plugging the cap back into the cork hole. The stains are a thick build up, collecting dust on the lines of the excess.
6. You cannot make a table of contents. You know how, and you have even searched once again for clarification that you are doing it right. You have made titles, subtitles, and normal text. You’re gone to “Insert”, “Table of Content”, and even tried out both options. But no matter what you do, you cannot seem to get the table of contents to materialized like you did on a paper in January. You wonder how much harder it might be to do it all by hand.
7. The snow has blown into your room. Makes sense when you leave your windows open. But your fingers had gotten to the point where it makes it hard to turn the pages of that book you swore you would have finished a week ago. Instead of closing the window, you sit there, wind allowing the glittering frozen water to line the lid of your kettle and your window pane. You have a small blanket over your shoulders but it isn’t quite enough to banish the chill in the room.
8. Everything you write on your whiteboard is wiped away within an hour. You are not sure who is doing it, but simple information that you wanted displayed for those interested is gone as if you had never taken the time to write it up. You can still see the ghosting marks of where you had tried to write the helpful hints. The tack board by the whiteboard is haunting alongside it as notes and pins slowly go missing and the vinyl track slumps lower with each tack that goes missing.
9. Empty cups are around your room. You do not throw them away because the garbage bag, which is just a shopping bag, is filled but you have not had the time to bring out the trash yet. There are four cardboard cups, empty with a teabag in each. Maybe it’s a momento, but every time you walk in the room you wonder why have not they blown over from the wind.
10. There’s a hole in the bottom of your shoe. You know it is there because every time there’s precipitation, the bottom of your sock is wet, right by the ball of your foot. It is come to the point where even that spot has worn thin and a hole is emerging. You just bought a new pair of sneakers in the summer and a new pair of heels in February, but you’re afraid of wearing those out too fast so you continue to wear the shoes that your feet fall out of because there’s not much else damage you can do to them. You had asked him what his roommate thought of you. You should have been expecting the answer when he told his truth, saying that you were unattractive and had a pessimistic view on life. You literally stepped right into that puddle with the old shoes thinking that your sock would not get wet.

Whatever the instance or object is in your life that’s holding you back, it’s never too late to make upgrade. Those people you hang out with make your life miserable? Don’t hang with them. Shoes have holes in them? Start wearing your new ones (or don’t step in puddles). Take a deep breath and wait for the leaves to dry on your pot before placing it in the kiln. There’s a solution to every malady, and upgrading can ease your situation.