Does the routine of daily living feel recently more like a torture than a familiar ritual? Do you find yourself going through the motions day in and day out as you go to work, come home, have dinner with your family and go to sleep before you wake up to the same thing all over again? Do you feel like Phil Conors in "Groundhog Day", faced with the same old thing every morning, day after day after day? The same spouse, the same job, the same look, the same...whatever? Do you sometimes feel like you are in a coma like Lester Burnham in “American Beauty”? Or perhaps, are you so bored with your marriage that you speak to the walls, like Shirley in “Shirley Valentine”? Does your work feel so unmotivating that you daydream about having a wild adventure with a celebrity, like Justine Last in “The Good Girl”?

If you answer yes to any of the above questions, then you are in a rut. In other words, you’ve fallen into a life pattern that no longer gives you meaning, purpose or fulfillment. Day in and day out, you repeat a routine out of habit, again and again and again, secretly wishing it would change and hoping that it would magically disappear or go away.

The truth is that it’s not the rut that is in your life. It's you who is in the rut. So, instead of wishing that the rut will go away, it’s time you got out of the rut. If you need inspiration, watch the movies I recommend here. Watch how the central characters transformed their lives and follow their examples. You have only one life to live. Make sure you live it fully.

How to Get out of “The Marriage Rut”

Watch: “Shirley Valentine” and “Shall We Dance?” and put to practice these lessons:

1. Stop expecting your spouse to change at your rate—take responsibility for your own change.

2. Find a healthy interest and pursue it. It will make you feel 100% better.

3. Don’t blame yourself--or your spouse--if he/she doesn't want to follow your path of change. Love him/her anyway. Remember what you have accomplished together all these years.

4. Pursuing a healthy interest will give you joy and self-confidence. Your mate will notice and feel attracted to you all over again.

How to Get out of “The Work Rut”

Watch: “Working Girl”, “Office Space”, “Educating Rita”, “9 to 5”, “Norma Ray”, “Beauty Shop”, and put to practice these lessons:

1. Stop expecting your work to give you meaning and become exciting for you--it's your responsibility to create meaning in your job.

2. Find a new work-related interest and educate yourself on it: take a class, learn a new skill, study something that will improve your chances for a promotion.

3. Become an expert in something: write a book, create a training manual, design a course, come up with an idea for a new project.

4. Start a part-time business that interests you.

5. Take a night course.

6. Network with people who love their jobs and ask one to be your mentor.

7. Volunteer for a worthy cause.

How to Get out of “The Family Rut”

Watch: “American Beauty”, “A Good Girl”, “The Secret Lives of Dentists”, “The Ice Storm”, “Life as A House”. Notice the main characters’ efforts to break out of a family rut—their mistakes can teach you valuable lessons. For inspiration, watch “Mrs. Doubtfire”--learn how a desperate dad saves his relationship with his kids after his divorce from their mother.

Put to practice these lessons:

1. If you want your family life to stop being monotonous, you have to model change to your family.

2. Find a new, healthy hobby.

Maria Grace, Ph.D., is an expert at teaching people how to learn lessons from popular movies to find the job, home, relationship, and healthy body and mind they want. She is a Fulbright scholar, licensed psychotherapist, sought-after public speaker and coach, and the author of “Reel Fulfillment: A 12-Step Plan for Transforming Your Life through Movies” (McGraw-Hill, 2005). “Reel Fulfillment” was praised by Publisher’s Weekly as one of the top “self help books out of the self-help box” for 2005-2006.
For more information visit http://www.mariagrace.com and http://www.reelfulfillment.com