I challenged you last post to complete the assignment of asking yourself the 11 questions to help you discover your purpose. Of those questions you should be able to now state what your strengths are, what your weaknesses are, and ultimately what you see yourself doing. Now, the whole purpose of this is to help you find your purpose. I want to share with you some of the things I learned about myself during this process:
1) It is extremely difficult to look at yourself and admit to your strengths. Weaknesses are so much easier for a person to admit to and discover, but there is a lot of power that comes from finding, admitting, and writing down your strengths! I love looking at mine and reminding myself that I am indeed good at something!
2) I am a lot more prone to negative thinking than I ever thought I was. But I haven't always been this way! I used to be Mr. Happy-Go-Lucky, but that is not that case anymore. I really had to dig deep and find out what was causing that for me.
3) I discovered that I want to be a farmer! What craziness is that? The more I thought about it the more it made sense to me. When I was a kid, my family would go spend the entire summer up at my grandparents farm. That is where I learned my most valuable lessons about work and relationships. Now I am not talking full blown dairy farmer, but just to own a good plot of land where I can do with it what I will. It is something that I had forgotten that I love but something I have always wanted to do.
So what? What does completing those questions do for me? It has given me something to shoot for. It has given me a purpose. It has given me a goal that I can't get out of my head and I am willing to do about anything to achieve that dream now.
Obviously I can't just snap my fingers and make that happen for me. But it has given me a clear vision...I can see with 20/20 vision what I want to BECOME. I could see what paths I needed to start taking in order to get there. But it needed to be broken down bit by bit.
Now I will admit, I am the WORST at setting and achieving goals, at least I used to be. My goals always seemed so daunting and unachievable. I discovered that it was because when I set annual goals, they do seem to be soooo daunting because they take a year to achieve! My good friend John Marshall helped me create a vision board. Some people use whiteboards, or other items. My wife and I chose to use post its like in the picture below. We put it on our bedroom wall and take 5 minutes to look at it every single day. What this does is help us break down all of our goals into achievable steps. With each goal that is accomplished I take it down, write it in a "goal journal" and put up my next goal. This has truly helped be look and tangibly see what it is that I am achieving! So often when we set goals, we forget about the progress that has been made already and get discouraged to keep going. That is why the Vision Board and Goal Journal have been so great for me. I have been able to look back and see how much I have accomplished.
For example, I have a goal to spend 30 minutes a day strengthening myself spiritually. To set the goal for the year is so overwhelming, that's 365 days! So I broke it down, I started with doing it everyday for 1 week. After I accomplished that I said every day for 2 weeks straight, etc. Have I missed a day or two? Yes, but I restart after I miss those days. Does that mean I won't accomplish my year goal? Yes, but I am doing more now than I would have without my vision board.
So that is challenge #3! Create your own vision board. Put it where you will see it a lot. Then get to work! You will be amazed at how good it feels to accomplish the little goals first, and how great it feels to accomplish the bigger goals when you get there.
I have also created a new mantra for myself, "Elevate yourself so that you can lift others." I hope that you feel the same passion about this as I do. You cannot lift others from lower ground, so let's get out there and so some good!
2) I am a lot more prone to negative thinking than I ever thought I was. But I haven't always been this way! I used to be Mr. Happy-Go-Lucky, but that is not that case anymore. I really had to dig deep and find out what was causing that for me.
3) I discovered that I want to be a farmer! What craziness is that? The more I thought about it the more it made sense to me. When I was a kid, my family would go spend the entire summer up at my grandparents farm. That is where I learned my most valuable lessons about work and relationships. Now I am not talking full blown dairy farmer, but just to own a good plot of land where I can do with it what I will. It is something that I had forgotten that I love but something I have always wanted to do.
So what? What does completing those questions do for me? It has given me something to shoot for. It has given me a purpose. It has given me a goal that I can't get out of my head and I am willing to do about anything to achieve that dream now.
Obviously I can't just snap my fingers and make that happen for me. But it has given me a clear vision...I can see with 20/20 vision what I want to BECOME. I could see what paths I needed to start taking in order to get there. But it needed to be broken down bit by bit.
Now I will admit, I am the WORST at setting and achieving goals, at least I used to be. My goals always seemed so daunting and unachievable. I discovered that it was because when I set annual goals, they do seem to be soooo daunting because they take a year to achieve! My good friend John Marshall helped me create a vision board. Some people use whiteboards, or other items. My wife and I chose to use post its like in the picture below. We put it on our bedroom wall and take 5 minutes to look at it every single day. What this does is help us break down all of our goals into achievable steps. With each goal that is accomplished I take it down, write it in a "goal journal" and put up my next goal. This has truly helped be look and tangibly see what it is that I am achieving! So often when we set goals, we forget about the progress that has been made already and get discouraged to keep going. That is why the Vision Board and Goal Journal have been so great for me. I have been able to look back and see how much I have accomplished.
For example, I have a goal to spend 30 minutes a day strengthening myself spiritually. To set the goal for the year is so overwhelming, that's 365 days! So I broke it down, I started with doing it everyday for 1 week. After I accomplished that I said every day for 2 weeks straight, etc. Have I missed a day or two? Yes, but I restart after I miss those days. Does that mean I won't accomplish my year goal? Yes, but I am doing more now than I would have without my vision board.
So that is challenge #3! Create your own vision board. Put it where you will see it a lot. Then get to work! You will be amazed at how good it feels to accomplish the little goals first, and how great it feels to accomplish the bigger goals when you get there.
I have also created a new mantra for myself, "Elevate yourself so that you can lift others." I hope that you feel the same passion about this as I do. You cannot lift others from lower ground, so let's get out there and so some good!
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