Amazing Life Planner: Part 2

In the pre­vi­ous post in the Liv­ing an Amaz­ing Life series, I shared with you the first three steps to cre­at­ing an amaz­ing life plan.

There’s still work to be done, so here are the next three…

4. Get advice from Young You, Old You, and Game-Over You

12-Year-Old Wis­dom: Imag­ine describ­ing your life so far to a 12-year old ver­sion of your­self. What changes would that child want you to make right now? Fill out the 2^nd row on the Amaz­ing Life Grid.

82-Year-Old Wis­dom: Imag­ine describ­ing your life so far to an 82-year old ver­sion of your­self. What changes would that 82-year old want you to make right now? Fill out the 3^rd row on the Amaz­ing Life Grid.

Game-Over Wis­dom: Noth­ing is quite as clar­i­fy­ing as mor­tal­i­ty. If you knew this is your last year on this great plan­et, how you spend your days? What would you stop doing? Fill out the 4^th row on the Amaz­ing Life Grid.

5. Put it all togeth­er: Your Amaz­ing Life Plan Ner

Take what you’ve learned from the pre­vi­ous exer­cis­es. What themes or pat­terns do you notice?

Action

Based on what you learned from the pre­vi­ous exer­cis­es, fill out the Amaz­ing Life Plan. Choose your top three ​“achieve­ment” and top three ​“enjoy­ment” goals for the next 12 months.

Tip: Start with the ​‘Self’ category.

AMAZ­ING LIFE PLANNER

6. Build a bet­ter plan, and plan ahead – well ahead

An amaz­ing life takes com­mit­ment and orga­ni­za­tion. You will only have a great life if you sched­ule things that make it great and stick to those commitments.

This is why my wife and I start each year know­ing where we’ll take our vaca­tions. We make our book­ings for the com­ing year in Decem­ber, if not ear­li­er. What­ev­er your favourite activ­i­ties are, start plan­ning them. Book the con­certs, brunch­es and din­ner par­ties. Com­mit to your date nights. Sched­ule your vol­un­teer time.

Of course, if you’re the rare per­son who can be spon­ta­neous with all your per­son­al activ­i­ties and run a boom­ing busi­ness, my hat is off to you. But most of us need sound plan­ning to make it happen.

Tip: Use birth­days and hol­i­days to your advan­tage. These are great trig­gers for sched­ul­ing spe­cial events and get-togethers.

Action

What key things do you need to sched­ule for the com­ing 12 to 18 months?

Tip: Think of your life as a mas­sive R&D project. Keep exper­i­ment­ing, notice what works and what doesn’t, and adjust as you go. An amaz­ing life is an evolv­ing life.

Remem­ber: If you want a sense of sat­is­fac­tion, you need to plan for enjoy­ment and ful­fill­ment—aka ​‘heart suc­cess’. This requires defin­ing how you want to feel about your­self, and your life, when you wake up every day.

Every­one has their own def­i­n­i­tion of heart suc­cess. You may want to feel ener­gized, influ­en­tial and con­nect­ed to peo­ple you love. You may want to feel like you are mak­ing a pro­found dif­fer­ence in the world, and evolv­ing as a human being.

How­ev­er you define it, you need to sort out what heart suc­cess is to you so it can be part of your game plan.

If you play your cards right, you’ll be able to look back, decades from now, with zero regrets.

This is the true test of an amaz­ing life.

Let me know how you get on.

This is the last of four arti­cles in the Liv­ing an Amaz­ing Life series. Oth­er posts include:

• Are You Liv­ing an Amaz­ing Life?
• Suc­cess: Achieve­ment vs. Fulfillment
• Cre­at­ing an Amaz­ing Life Plan: Part 1