Here’s a tool to help you visualise the process of getting clear on your goals and to take action towards the kind of life you want. I walked through this Goals framework last week at a special event for lawyers. I spoke about how to thrive as lawyers and human beings by clarifying your goals in the fundamental aspects of your life, aligned to your life purpose and values, so that you can take charge of the kind of life you want to have. While this special event was for lawyers, these are universal human desires. So try this on and see what comes up for you :
1. Start with unpacking your Life Purpose & Values. When it comes to fulfilment, there’s no shortcut for step 1.
For your values, make a list of the things and qualities which you know to be most important to you (to you – not what others expect of you). Keep going until you have at least 15 values on your list. Then the fun part – pick your top 10, and rank them. This exercise helps you distinguish what’s truly important to you, why, and in what priority. It’s important to get clear on your values because otherwise you risk forgetting what’s most important to you in the choices you make.
Your Life purpose will be harder to discern on your own since it’s such an inherent part of you. Work with a Coach or someone else skilled in this fulfilling art of helping you discover your purpose – that which is your unique contribution, your impact, the difference you make to others and the world.
2. Now think about how satisfied you are in these 5 broad aspects of your life – physical, financial, intellectual, emotional, and your core of purpose and values. Make it concrete – rate your level of satisfaction as honestly as possible, with 10 being “very satisfied”.
3. Having gotten clear on your status quo, ask yourself where you are ready to make some changes.
4. Then set your goals for change in one or more of your 5 life aspects (the stars in the tool are your goal prompts) – what will you be, what will you do, and how does that align with your core purpose and values (alignment is the key to fulfillment – to feeling that you are thriving, not just surviving).
5. And be accountable to yourself – set a time frame for when you will accomplish your goals, and check in with yourself then. There is as much learning in having done what you set out to do, as in not having done so.
6. Keep going.
This Goals framework is a good start for getting clear on your goals. In addition to clarity, you’ll have to move into action and that needs commitment, consistency and courage. Throughout, you get to choose how you want to be, what you will do, how you will respond to circumstances, to keep moving towards what’s most important to you. It’s worth it. To paraphrase Viktor Frankl : “… in our choice of response lies our growth, and our freedom. “
Email me at susan.desilva@thesilvacoach.com for a free, no-obligation 30 minute consultation if you’d like to learn more about this framework or for sample coaching.