It is 3am and you are wide awake, wondering where the years went. Maybe you have been scrolling, working, waiting, telling yourself that real life will start once things settle down. If you have ever whispered “how do I stop wasting my life?”, that whisper is your soul waking you up. This guide shows you how to answer it, starting today.
It comes from the chapters “Why Are You Here?”, “How Do You Want to Spend the Rest of Your Life?” and “Take Back Your Life, Now” in my book Your Mission I’mPossible, including the night I counted my weekends. You will learn why we drift through life on autopilot, how to count your weekends, the difference between living on purpose and living with a purpose, how to stop waiting, and practices to reclaim your time.
Why Do We Waste Our Lives?
Very few people set out to waste their lives. It happens quietly. We fill our days with obligations, distractions and shallow tasks that serve no real purpose for us or the world, simply spending our time until Monday comes around again.
In my book I share that I sat for years waiting for something to happen. Waiting for a shift. Waiting for healing to happen to me. I spent huge amounts of time in front of screens, waiting for life to arrive. It took me a long time to realize I had to be fully self-responsible and self-determined to create the life I desired. Wishing for a thing does not make it so. Inspired action does.
Why Am I Living My Life on Autopilot?
Autopilot happens when your mind runs old programs without your awareness. Your brain is designed to automate whatever it can to conserve energy and keep you safe. Over time, whole days, then years, can pass on automatic: the same routine, the same thoughts, the same choices.
Autopilot also grows from overwhelm and disconnection. When life feels heavy, coasting feels easier than choosing. The way out is conscious attention, one choice at a time. If you feel persistently numb or no longer enjoy anything, please reach out to a licensed professional, because sometimes autopilot is your system asking for care.
The Night I Counted My Weekends
One night at 3am, at my kitchen table, I decided to figure out how long I had been alive without really living. I chose weekends, because weekends are when most people truly let their hair down. They are the time you have not sold to an employer. They are where we really live.
I had been alive about 1,820 weekends. Then I listed every source of real, heart-swelling passion in my life and estimated how many weekends each one truly filled me: business ideas, love, my children, my horses, friends. The total came to about 286.
Out of 1,820 weekends, only 286 had I felt truly alive. That meant more than 1,500 weekends spent unconscious, asleep, zoning out. Only about five and a half years of passionately lived life. That night, I decided to do something radically different with the rest of my life.
You Really Only Have a Few Weekends Left
Then I estimated how many active weekends I might have left. About two thousand. I looked at that number. If it were dollars, it would only be two thousand dollars. Not a lot of anything. “Isis,” I finally said to myself, “you really only have a few weekends left.”
I didn’t want to spend them stressing about money and material things. I wanted to do something with meaning, a challenge so big I couldn’t bear to pass it up. I wanted my Mission I’mPossible.
The Halving Exercise
That same night, I kept going. What about people with only 1,000 weekends left? Then I realized that was half of my time, and I had twice that to make a difference. That made me excited.
I halved the number again. 500 weekends. 250. 125. Sixty-two, a little over a year. Thirty-one, about six months. Fifteen. Eight. Then four: a month left to live.
Here is what I noticed. With a long timeline, people tend to become more open-hearted about what they want to accomplish. As the timeline grows very short, many begin thinking with a sense of loss about everything they personally won’t get to experience. Somewhere in between, a switch flips, and we realize our time is precious and finite, and we begin to move.
Living on Purpose and Living With a Purpose
In my book I describe two ways of living. Living with a purpose means living to fulfill a few wishes or requests, often for yourself or your immediate circle. Living on purpose means setting a purpose in motion that is bigger than yourself, living with bigger eyes and a bigger heart, and pursuing something you live, eat and breathe daily, something that may live beyond you.
Both have their place. When you feel you are wasting your life, it is often a sign your soul is ready to live on purpose.
How Many Weekends Have You Lived?
Do the math now. Multiply your age by 52 and add the weeks since your last birthday. Then ask yourself:
- How many of those weekends were truly memorable?
- How many were mediocre, or simply survived?
- Did I settle for less, believing this is the best I will get?
- How much time do I spend in endless, empty pursuits?
- How much time do I spend looping through the same problems in my head?
- Do I feel more or less excited about my life now than ever before?
Signs You Are Drifting Through Life
- Weeks blur together and you can barely remember last month.
- You often feel bored, restless or empty.
- You say “someday” about everything that matters.
- You spend more time watching others live than living yourself.
- You feel driven to do things you dislike out of desperation.
- Your weekends are mostly recovery from your weekdays.
How to Stop Wasting Your Life
1. Wake up to your time
Count your weekends. Seeing the number changes how you spend the next one.
2. Change what you listen to
Changing your mind is hard. Changing what you listen to is simple. Start listening to your heart. Read how to listen to your heart.
3. Find what makes you feel alive
Look at your weekend passion audit. Which experiences filled you? Give more of your time to them. See how to find your passion in life.
4. Choose a mission
You don’t need a list of resolutions or a huge list of goals. You need one mission and one deep, burning reason why. Read how to find your purpose in life.
5. Take one inspired action every day
Success is never an accident. It comes from consistent daily improvement, even one percent at a time.
6. Reduce what drains you
Notice where your hours go. Gently reduce the distractions that leave you feeling empty, and replace them with activities that nourish you.
The Biggest Time Thieves
- Endless scrolling: hours slip away watching other people live.
- Busyness: filling every moment with tasks that feel productive and change nothing.
- Worry loops: replaying problems in your head without moving toward solutions.
- People-pleasing: spending your time meeting expectations that are not yours.
- Chasing more stuff: working for things that bring a moment of pleasure and little lasting joy.
- Drama: conflicts and chaos that keep you reacting. Read addicted to negativity.
Notice which of these steals the most of your time. Begin there.
Every Moment Is a Precious Gift
Since surviving the most frightening months of my life, I live by a few simple commitments. I accept things as they come and seek to make them better in any way I can. I never let a conversation go by without sharing some part of my heart with the other person. I never take anything for granted. Every moment is a precious gift.
You do not need a crisis to begin living this way. You only need to decide that your time matters, because it does. What you say has an impact. What you do matters. It already has.
Life Is a Daily Practice
Life gives us many chances to try again. It doesn’t matter if you are fifteen or eighty-five. Every day is a fresh opportunity to become a better version of yourself. If you spent yesterday on autopilot, today you can choose differently. If you wasted last weekend, this one is waiting.
The only person who sets the rules for how you spend your life is you. The only person who sets limits on what you can do is you, until you hand that power to someone else. Take it back.
Experiences Over Accumulation
We collect and accumulate things for the experiences, memories and growth we hope they will bring. What we truly want is the experience. When I buy a home, I am buying a place where my family can live a beautiful life. When I take a vacation, I am buying memories that last a lifetime.
So ask: what experiences do I truly want? You don’t have to own everything to experience it now. Give your time to experiences that make you feel alive, and your life stops slipping away.
What Will You Do With This Weekend?
The weekend represents freedom, a chance to experience what life might be like if you were free. You can fly off on a Friday night and return Sunday exhausted and elated. You can create, play, explore and connect. You can begin your mission. This weekend is one of a precious, finite number. What will you do with it?
Your Wake-Up Call Questions
In my book I ask readers a series of questions to wake them from autopilot. Sit with these honestly:
- How do I fantasize about spending my life while I commute to work?
- What one area of my life do I want to change so it feels like a life I would be satisfied with?
- What kind of wake-up call do I need to rediscover my passion and my purpose?
- Do I want to live my life asleep, limited by my own beliefs, or do I want something more?
- What is it that makes me want to get out of bed in the morning, and if nothing does, what would?
Write your answers without editing. The answers you resist writing are often the most important ones.
Small Changes, Big Life
You do not need to overhaul everything tomorrow. Replace one hour of scrolling with one hour of something that fills you. Turn one weekend a month into an adventure. Spend one evening a week on your dream. Call one friend you love. These small choices, repeated, become a life you are proud of. In five years, those small choices add up to hundreds of weekends lived on purpose.
Practice One: Your Weekend Count
- Calculate the weekends you have lived.
- List every experience that made you feel truly alive, and estimate how many weekends each filled you.
- Add them up and compare.
- Write how that comparison makes you feel.
- Write: “With the weekends ahead, I choose to…”
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Practice Two: The Halving Reflection
- Estimate how many active weekends you might have left.
- Write what you would do with that many.
- Halve the number and write again. Keep halving until you reach four weekends.
- Notice how your priorities change at each step.
- Circle what appears at every stage. Those are your true priorities. Begin one now.
Practice Three: The Time Audit
For one week, track how you spend your waking hours in blocks of thirty minutes. At the end of the week, mark each block as nourishing, neutral or draining. Choose one draining block to replace with something that makes you feel alive.
Common Mistakes When Trying to Stop Wasting Your Life
- Drowning in regret. Let regret show you what matters, then move forward.
- Trying to fix everything at once. Change one weekend, one hour, one habit.
- Swapping one distraction for another. Choose what genuinely nourishes you.
- Waiting until you feel ready. Readiness follows action.
- Living for others’ approval. Your weekends are yours.
Practice Four: Plan Your Next Ten Weekends
- Write the next ten weekend dates on a page.
- Beside each, write one thing that would make it feel truly alive: an adventure, a creative project, deep time with someone you love, rest in nature, a step toward your dream.
- Balance them: some adventurous, some restful, some purposeful.
- Put them in your calendar.
- After each weekend, rate how alive you felt from one to ten.
Ten intentional weekends can change how you feel about your entire life. They prove that a fuller life is already within reach.
A Life You Will Be Proud Of
Imagine your grandchildren telling stories about you years from now. Will they talk about the time you leapt over your life’s greatest challenge and lived like the giant you were always meant to be? Or will they talk about your cookies and your favorite sports team, because that is the legacy you chose? Both can be lovely. Only you decide which story your life tells.
The Change You Seek Starts With You
Your potential is vast and limitless. The change you seek so desperately in the world starts with you. Truly successful people are those who stared fear in the eye, awakened their giant’s heart and did it anyway. You can be one of them, starting this weekend.
Journal Prompts for Reclaiming Your Life
- When did I last feel truly alive?
- What do I want my next hundred weekends to hold?
- What am I waiting for before I start living fully?
- What would my eighty-year-old self thank me for starting now?
- What one change would make the biggest difference this month?
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Frequently Asked Questions
How do I stop wasting my life?
Count the weekends you have lived, notice what truly made you feel alive, choose one mission, take one inspired action each day and gently reduce what drains you. Dr. Isis Jade teaches that changing what you listen to, your heart, changes everything.
Why am I living my life on autopilot?
Your mind automates routines to conserve energy, and overwhelm makes coasting feel easier than choosing. Conscious attention, one choice at a time, ends autopilot. If you feel persistently numb, please reach out to a licensed professional.
How do I start living my life fully?
Give more time to what makes you feel alive, choose a purpose bigger than yourself and treat each weekend as precious.
What is the weekend exercise?
Multiply your age by 52 to find the weekends you have lived, estimate how many truly filled you with passion and compare. Dr. Isis Jade found she had felt truly alive for only 286 of her first 1,820 weekends.
What do I do if I feel I have wasted years?
Honor the regret as a teacher, recognize the wisdom those years gave you and choose how to spend the time ahead. Read is it too late to find my purpose.
What is the difference between living on purpose and living with a purpose?
Living with a purpose means fulfilling a few wishes for yourself or your circle. Living on purpose means pursuing something bigger than yourself that you live and breathe daily.
How do I stop procrastinating on my dreams?
List five things you have been putting off and take one small action on each this week. Momentum grows from small starts.
How much of my life is wasted on distractions?
Track your time for a week to see. Most people are surprised, and simply noticing begins to change their choices.
What should I do with my free time?
Spend it on what makes you feel truly alive: creating, connecting, exploring, playing and moving toward your purpose. Notice how you feel afterward, and do more of what fills you.
How do I make the most of my weekends?
Plan them with intention: one adventure, one creative or purposeful activity and real rest. Rate how alive you feel afterward and adjust.
More answers live in the Manifesting FAQ. Every Law of Delight term is defined in the Law of Delight Glossary, and the Law of Delight Library holds every article by topic.
