Live your ideal life daily, in three steps.
Most people can tell you what they want in ten years. Few can tell you what they're doing about it today. These three steps connect the two.
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The 3 steps
1.Picture your ideal life
- Describe your ideal life in detail. How do you feel? Who's there? What absolutely isn't?
- What would you do on an ordinary Tuesday?
- What experiences would bring you deep meaning and joy?
Why: Writing about your ideal future and your values is the first step of life crafting, an approach to finding purpose described by Schippers and Ziegler (2019).
2.Pick your goals and values
- Which values and goals get you to that life? Who already lives something like it?
- Write the one most important goal, with a deadline.
- Name the value it serves.
Why: Specific, hard goals beat "do your best" in decades of research (Locke and Latham, 2002).
3.Do today's meaningful tasks
- List one to five things for today, most important first.
- Link each one to a goal or a value.
- Give each a time: "At 7 a.m., I'll…"
Why: Deciding when and where you'll do something had a medium-to-large effect on reaching goals, across 94 studies (Gollwitzer and Sheeran, 2006).
A study finding a benefit in the people it tested is not a promise of that result for you. All the sources.
Fix one thing, or fix all of it
This guide is the starter version of one part of your health. If one thing is the problem, the 12-week Find Your Purpose or Master Any Skill Program trains it properly. If it's never just one thing, All-Access puts every Program and practice into one routine that fits your day.
Sources
Schippers & Ziegler (2019). Life crafting as a way to find purpose and meaning in life.
Cohen & Sherman (2014). The psychology of change: Self-affirmation and social psychological intervention.
Boyatzis & Akrivou (2006). The ideal self as the driver of intentional change.
Locke & Latham (2002). Building a practically useful theory of goal setting and task motivation.
Harkin, Webb, Chang, Prestwich, Conner, Kellar, Benn, Sheeran (2016). Does monitoring goal progress promote goal attainment? A meta-analysis.
Uphoff, Ekers, Robertson et al. (2020). Behavioural activation therapy for depression in adults.
Gollwitzer (1999). Implementation intentions: Strong effects of simple plans.
Gollwitzer & Sheeran (2006). Implementation intentions and goal achievement: A meta-analysis of effects and processes.