Life and Work by Design Blog

Whew - I think the facelift is complete now.  You know how when you decide to paint the dining room, that leads to painting the hallway which leads to new floors which leads to….. ?  Well  along with re-writing some of my web-site pages to reflect my new workshop for the Over 50 crowd, my friend Diana suggested a logo facelift so with the help of David Waselle, Life and Work by Design now has a clean, fresh new look!    And as always, KC at Website Solutions managed to make it all work together.   Thanks all!  I hope everyone likes the final result.

In addition, my monthly newsletter has been re-named Living My Way.   I am very interested in helping my clients manage all the parts of their lives and have wanted to write more about how my generation is going to “live” in the next 20 years or so whether they “work” or not.   So you will notice some subtle changes in my blog posts and newsletter articles.

My original Dreamer’s Dialogue, based on the ChangingCourse.com curriculum, is still available for those who want to find their passion to fuel their next career.  And Valerie has just announced a new self-study program that I’ll tell you more about tomorrow.

My new workshop is called, Don’t Retire; Re-Inspire! and there are 2 hour introductory seminars being offered in the Philadelphia area in April.  In addition, I am putting the finishing touches on a full day weekend workshop that will explain strategies and teach processes for balancing the life choices that make up your active retirement.  This is based on the Too Young to Retire book by Howard and Marika Stone.

I’d love to take this one on the road, so watch for more information and gather a group of at least 10 people so I can bring it to your town.

Please go visit the website home page to read about the new programs and check the Services page for the seminar schedule.

And now, since I finished one day ahead of schedule,  I’m going to give my eyes, my fingers and my computer a rest for the evening and go have dinner with a tall, good-looking guy who is the best thing that’s happened to me in a long time!

In the last post I talked about the importance of having a Personal Mission Statement (or even a series of them) that express the goal(s) you would like to achieve in the next year or so, and the values you want to maintain to get there.

Another important exercise is to develop the Big Picture or a Vision Statement that expresses what you want your life to look like over the next 5 – 10 years.

Vision statements are longer and paint a large picture of the life you desire using lots of detail, adjectives and emotion to express your hopes and dreams.

You know how some TV sets have a smaller window where you can actually watch one show on the main screen and keep an eye on another in a smaller screen?  (If you live with a sports fan, you know this feature well!)   Laurie Beth Jones, author of The Path,  uses that as an example of how to look at the picture of WCI (What Currently Is) and at WCB (What Can Be) at the same time.

You can’t change your current life or work overnight but you can begin to focus your attention on a distant picture to help you pick and choose the path to get there.

So what does your vision look like?  There’s an article about the five W’s called The Possibilities are Endless on my website where I suggest some of the choices you can consider.
•    WHERE would you live?
•    WHAT would you be doing?
•    WHO would you be doing it with?
•    WHEN would you do it?
•    WHY do you want to do it?

Write your Vision Statement as if it is already happening. Here’s some of mine:
I live at least part of the year at the beach or near a body of water and travel frequently; I write books and do some public speaking to earn an income, and spend some time each day reading, playing the piano and doing art projects; I have a significant other person in my life and visit with my family often; I only work about 4 hours a day to leave time for volunteering and community involvement. I feel good that I am demonstrating to my children and grandchildren how to live a balanced life.

I’m not there yet, but I know where I’m headed.   Just like the Mission Statement, my Big Picture or Vision Statement gives me guideposts to use when making daily choices about how I spend my time, energy and money.

So, what’s your vision?   Most of you have at least heard about The Secret or The Law of Attraction.   These are the two most recent iterations of an ages old philosophy that says  “what you focus on will grow, what you ignore will whither.”

If you focus on a vision of the best life you can imagine you will find opportunities suddenly popping up. The key is paying attention so you don’t miss them.

If you sometimes feel like you are just moving from day to day without a plan, writing a personal mission statement can help you clarify what you want to accomplish and how you want to do it.

According to the dictionary, a mission statement is “a formal statement of the aims and values of a company, organization or individual. “  Thoughtfully done it provides a framework or template against which you can weigh all your decisions and actions.  It becomes a roadmap for your trip through the next year.

They are generally only 1 – 3 sentences and state goals you would like to achieve in the near future.
The goal may be personal or work related. The statement should be positive and  include behaviors, character traits and values that you consider important and want to work on further.

Here are some examples:

“To be healthy, fit and energetic so that I can enjoy life to the fullest and have the energy to pursue all my goals. I will do this by exercising regularly, following a nutritious diet and eliminating negative habits that are impacting my health.”

I will treasure time spent with my family and friends above everything else by putting aside time for them no matter how busy my schedule may become.

I will use my optimism, nurturing skills and organizational abilities to help others create more intentional lives as a way to earn a living.  And I will work at finding time to develop a romantic relationship.

These examples come from www.timethoughts.com  - a site that offers guidelines and lots of information on writing mission statements.

Think about a vacation – you can’t figure out how to get there if you don’t know where you want to end up or the type of transportation you want to use.  Working on your statement is a valuable exercise for creating the ideal life you dream of.

Once you have a mission statement, you can begin to decide on the action steps you will take to fulfill your mission.

Go to Google and type in personal mission statement to find a variety of sites that offer guidelines, lists of values, traits and actions, and templates to help you get started.

In the next post I’ll discuss another technique called a Vision Statement.