Often, even when we don’t know how we’re going to get there or what else is going to happen along the way, we have some notion of what we want our “life’s work” to be. This might be something we’ve imagined doing since childhood, or something we’ve more recently come to care about deeply.
Imagine being in a spacious conversation where someone—perhaps a trusted friend—asks you:
What do you want your “life’s work” to be?
How would you respond? Jot down a few sentences of what you might say in response to this friend. This isn’t a final answer, for all time, just what comes to mind for you in the moment.
Go do this now, then come back and scroll down to read the rest of this exercise when you’ve written a few sentences.
(…don’t read on until you’ve jotted down your response!)
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(ready?)
The second step of this exercise is to designate what you wrote about your “life’s work” as your life vision, and to put this someplace special—a notebook, a colorful sheet of paper on your desk, or wherever else you will see it and feel inspired by it it.
(Remember that you can revise this vision over time—what matters now is not having a perfect vision, but simply something that feels attractive and exciting!)
The last step of this exercise is to think about the possibility that this life’s work could be meaningfully accomplished / actualized / feel aligned in the next 10-20 years. Ask yourself:
• What might the progression of this look in the coming year, in the next 5 years, in the next 10 years?
• What intermediate intentions / goals can move me towards this vision, in the coming year?
• What will best support me on this journey as I move forward?
We’ll go into these in more depth, in the last part of this module about “Choosing and Prioritizing” and even more in the second module on Planning. For now, just see if anything comes to mind right off the bat!