When you decide to make a big positive change in your life, it’s often best to go back to basics first.
Whether you are starting a new project or trying to “create a breakthrough ” in your current business, job or role- part of being authentically happy is to understand your own psyche and dig a little deeper than you usually do to find your true purpose.
In the second part of our nine part series: “What’s Your Secret to Success?” we unpack the “second power” that our inspired people seem to have...
Acquiring specific self-knowledge, resulting in understanding your BIG purpose in life
How well do you really know yourself? Sounds simple right? Well it is actually, but we often forget, our life circumstances change and our dreams evolve.
At a Glance:
Here are a few exercises you can do to get a little closer to being authentically happy and inspired. They are simple, but effective and have literally created champions and achievers all over the world. Pick and choose the ones that are relevant to you or go the whole hog and ring the changes !
· Do a personal swot
· Interests audit - Discover (or re-discover) your passions
· Abilities & accomplishments audit
· Analyse what you do in 24 hours consistently
· Beliefs audit
· Values audit
· Discover your purpose- interview yourself at your peak
· Set some goals that are congruent these things.
Being aware of who you are, what beliefs you hold, and how you invest
your time and how others see you, is a classic trait of the typical inspired person.
In our “inspired people” interview series, while they don’t have all the answers, our goalgetters tend to know early on- what kind of things they can be good at, what they should avoid at all costs- and what tasks they need to outsource.
People who create action in their life generally have a higher degree of self-knowledge than others. This can lead to greater self confidence. They are in tune with their minds and bodies. They know their own strengths and weaknesses. What’s more, they are constantly looking to improve their abilities - build on their strengths and eradicate or minimise their weaknesses.
Just like a company adopts the SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats analysis) so you can too, for your personal strategy.
Just Google the words SWOT ANALYSIS and you will see hundreds of templates that you can use , both personal and business.
This may sound basic- but many people assume they are good at things (and they aren’t) or assume that they can’t do something, when actually –they can. Be a little more scientific in your approach.
Interests Audit - Discover your Passions
Write a list of things you LOVE doing? If you had the free time and the resources right now what would you prefer to be doing? What makes “time fly?” What helps you get into flow state. This is all about what you are passionate about - what you love doing.
Right, what is holding you back from doing more of what you enjoy? What are you prepared to sacrifice to make it happen?. Break it down.
Once you have identified these things. Create a plan – a personal strategy to do more of this. Have you considered signing up for some night classes - test out what you really enjoy.
Abilities & Accomplishments Audit
If you want to turn your passion into an income and do more of what you love, it is useless choosing something that you do not have a talent for.
You need to choose something that you have a natural ability at, or a talent that you could nurture into something that would be of value to others around you to create a sustainable advantage and create an earnings stream.
Your natural ability, plus your passion or interest in it will create opportunities for you.
Acknowledging your achievements is important in this process. Make sure you look back at recent achievements that will back up the direction that you are going in.
Time on Your Side
Take the 24 hours that you have every single day and analyse how you spend
(or invest) your time.
All of the inspired people that we have interviewed have the same number of hours that we have in a day.
Look at how much time you spend doing the basics (like sleeping, eating and grooming), then look at the time you spend at work or in your current business including lunch, then look at your chores time (dishes, children, cooking, partner, housework etc).
Finally look at what you do with the rest of your time - recreation time.
Do a simple pie chart of percentage time in each area. And put it aside and think about it. Watch your habits and patterns for a week or so and identify which are limiting habits and which will get you closer to your core passions.
We all have the same time available to us - what do you have to show for it? You may need to make some changes in this pattern or in some of your habits to accommodate the move towards your core purpose in life. To do this you may need to get rid of distractions. You may need to increase your energy levels and look at your diet. You may need to put a little more discipline in your life. You may need to find more time to relax and be creative and strategic, or if you are lucky you may need to do nothing.
Beliefs Audit
Do you have specific beliefs that hold you back or are a source of
competitive advantage?
+ I am tall and so have distinct advantages over others
- I will never be good at relationships
+ I have a small business and so I can be nimble
Certain beliefs we hold that have been formed arbitrarily through particular
circumstances in our childhood and through to now, really have no real basis
for their existence.
You may find that auditing some of these beliefs will help you identify opportunities to break the cycle of negative, false beliefs. Think how you have always thought and you will get what you have always got.
If you believe money is evil and that only the rich get richer and that
management (or your clients) don’t respect you; these are limiting beliefs and will
prevent you from moving forward.
Just like if you believe that you only attract losers in relationships or that you will never be at your goal weight – these beliefs will become reality.
Write your full list of beliefs – positive and negative and see if you see any
patterns. Look for mentors around you who can help you overcome your
limiting beliefs.
Values Audit
The Collins Dictionary describes the values of a person or a group as
“principles and beliefs that they think are important”.
List the important values in your life. Is your definition of success having lots of
money? Or would you need to have a combination of successes in order to
feel happy and self-actualised.
Do you value your physical health over everything else? Do you prefer to spend time alone or with family and friends? Is the after work drinks club vital to achieving your goals. Is church and living a full spiritual life what drives you? Where does your partner fit in?
Is finding a soul mate important in your life? If you had children where would
they fit in? Do you live to party? Does engaging in wild death defying stunts
light your fire?
Knowing the answers to these questions helps reduce your stress in daily life.
How does it do this? Every day we are asked to do things that are either
congruent with our values, or at odds with them. Knowing and living
according to your own set of values will set you on the right path to
happiness.
Knowing what you value helps you to answer those out of the blue questions from your boss, your colleagues, your friends or family on “just doing this or that with or for them”. Learning to say no to the wrong things (things that don’t suit your values) and yes to those that are congruent with your values will reduce your overall stress and increase your happiness.
Write down the list of things that are not negotiable in your life in order to feel happy.
Discover Your Purpose
Do you have the big picture in your life? Is your life’s work moving you
towards some meaningful contribution? Or do you move from day to day
having mini-goals (or no goals) that end up reducing your overall energy and
motivation? Are you living someone else’s dream?
If you take the time to discover what drives you, you will find that life takes on a different flavour. Once identified, you can move each day, closer and closer to achieving your life’s purpose.
Fifteen to twenty minutes invested on making things happen, getting closer to your BIG dream, shows big rewards after even a few weeks and months. After a few years you will be amazed at the progress that you will have made. Compare this focus to undirected activities working on “floating goals” and you will be happy you chose to follow your dream and create action – every single day – towards your powerful purpose.
Your powerful dream will keep you motivated when things don’t go your way.
To get you a little closer to understanding your own values and how they
contribute to finding your big powerful dream, do the following exercise:
Interview Yourself At Your Peak!
Fast-forward to the peak of your life - you are feeling accomplished. You
have arrived where you want to be! A journalist for the NZ Herald, (or your favourite business mag -whatever you like) is interviewing you in 30 minutes time.
Picture yourself at the very peak of your life. Imagine, you have achieved
who you want to be – what you will look like, who you are, what is important
to you? Picture what you are doing from when you wake up in the morning
to when you go to bed.
Think yourself through a whole week of your life at your peak - every detail - how you feel, what your walk-in cupboard looks like, who your friends are, the expressions on everyone’s faces. Remember that you can be who you really want to be – not constrained by anything that constrains you now. Be very imaginative and live to the height of your fantasy. What are your achievements (remember you can dream these up) – don’t worry about being realistic.
What are people around you saying? How do they describe you and your contribution to society?
Now write this down.
After you have written this down look for clues as to what you should be
focussing on now to be where you want to be in your wildest fantasies.
Start today to create daily action in getting closer to your fantasy you!
Based on this you could write your own personal mission statement, just like
the Fortune 500 companies. This way you would be able to evaluate your
behaviour according to your own standards and not other people’s (your
boss, colleagues etc).
If you live according to your defined purpose, you will feel that you are
building on something every single day – motivating yourself to achieve daily
tasks and activities necessary for achieving your bigger goals.
Set Some Goals
Write down 9 goals you would liked to have achieved 12 months from now
· Start with “I am…”
· Make it a stretch goal, but possible and measureable…”
· State them in the present tense.
1. _____________________________________________________________
2. _____________________________________________________________
3. _____________________________________________________________
4. _____________________________________________________________
5. _____________________________________________________________
6. _____________________________________________________________
7. ______________________________________________________________
8. _______________________________________________________________
9. ______________________________________________________________
Now rank the above in order of importance?
Now start a list of more dreams and goals that you would like to have
achieved, 2 years, 5 years, 10 years and your lifetime goals?
1._______________________________________________________________
2._______________________________________________________________
3._______________________________________________________________
4._______________________________________________________________
5._______________________________________________________________
6._______________________________________________________________
7._______________________________________________________________
8._______________________________________________________________
9._______________________________________________________________