Lifestyle Originates from Personal Mission
The title suggests that our job sometimes robs us of our lifestyle. This approach appears to be putting the cart before the horse. The question here, at least to me, is to look at who we are to determine the role of our job in our life. Here are three suggestions to help us determine the importance of our job as it relates to our life:
1) Write an essay that looks at the gap between where you want to be and where you presently are. This gap is the desired lifestyle you desire. How much it relates to your life is an individual matter.
2) In the best seller ( which I recommend for all who wish to attain success) the Seven Habits of Effective People by Stephen Covey includes "Starting With the End In Mind" as one of the seven habits successful people demonstrate. The first suggestion begins to address the challenge but Covey's idea takes it deeper and I feel more meaningful. Covey suggests we write a Personal Mission Statement. Similar to a corporate mission statement, it represents a paragraph or two about the purpose and meaning, What is the purpose and meaning of your life? These are not tangible goals but a guiding force about how you will live your life moment by moment. As a former seminar leader who taught this subject, here are three ways to explore your Mission.
- Ask a friend of yours to deliver the eulogy at your funeral. What do you want this person to be saying about how you lived your life? What was your lifestyle? Please keep in mind that our gravestone will list our date of birth, a dash and the year of death. It's about the dash.
- You are a successful person. A writer approaches you and wants to write a biography of your life. What do you want the world to know about your success that is a result of your lifestyle
- You visit a doctor and who informs you that you have contracted a mysterious illness that will begin to debilitate you in three years. What will your lifestyle be before your deterioration?
3) If a Mission Statement doesn't work, do a forced distribution of your values. List 6-12 of your values (family, money, achievement, religion, power, creativity etc ) separating equally between not very important, important and critically important. What is the most important value in your life? Here is where a lifestyle of meaning lies.
Hopefully, one of these three suggestions will serve as a way to discover the life you want and the the role your job plays in it!
