Are you Where You Want to Be?

You will spend more than half of your waking life working.  Just the thought of that is enough to drive some of us over the edge.  Just think about that...HALF OF THE TIME YOU ARE AWAKE WILL BE SPENT WORKING!!!  Close your eyes.  Yes, that's right.  I want you to close your eyes.  Imagine yourself 20 years in the future.  Are you smiling or cringing? 

If you're smiling, then odds are you're doing something you love and your job doesn't feel like work to you.  On the other hand, if you're cringing, then you're one of the millions of people living what Henry David Thoreau called a "life of quiet desperation."  Is there a song in you that you're dying to let out?  Perhaps you've had an idea that has been nagging at you for years...decades even?

I can relate to those feelings because I was one of those people.  I was toiling away in an environment that neither fed my soul nor enriched my life.  I didn't know what I wanted to do, but I knew I didn't want to do THIS anymore.  Sound familiar?  I was trapped and silently screaming where no one could hear me.  Desperately wanting out, but not knowing where to start or where to turn.  I spent my day solving problems for other people, but was impotent in solving my own.  That's when it hit me.

I would approach my life the way I approached my work: methodically and deliberately. 

First, I drew a straight line in a blank piece of paper.  At the far left, I wrote the words "Where I Am."  At the far right, I wrote, "Where I Want to Be."  I placed hash marks at various places on the straight line to represent milestones.  I gave each milestone a name.  For example, the first hash tag read 5 years from now.  The second hash tag read 10 years from now and so on.  By the time I reached the “Where I Want to Be” point, I found myself projecting up to 20 years in future.  As Christian I understand the old adage of men planning while God laughs, but what could it hurt, I thought?

Second, I took each five-year block and broke it down into each individual year on a separate piece of paper.  That’s when the REAL work began.  At that point, I was taking each year and examining in terms of months, weeks and finally days.  This process is called decomposition.  During this process, you take a large task and decompose it into smaller tasks.  Seeing my life on paper astonished me.  I couldn’t believe how many steps were involved in the most mundane tasks (i.e. cleaning the house, creating a workout regimen or balancing my household budget).  I swallowed hard and remembered the timeless story of Strauss the Mouse.  In this story, a tiny mouse bests an enormous elephant and determines to eat him.  The story asks, “How do you eat an elephant,” and the mouse decides the only way to do it is “one bite at a time.” 

Third, I took my decomposed tasks and began listing the steps necessary to achieve each weekly goal.  I kept a journal of each day, listing my goal at the top of each page to keep my vision in front of me.  By chronicling my journey in a journal, I was able to be accountable for each day, making sure I didn’t waste my time or become sidetracked.   As the days passed, my confidence grew exponentially as I was able to check more and more items off my list.  With each checkmark I was growing ever closer to my ultimate goal of living a fruitful life.  Eventually, I reached the first five-year hash tag.  I celebrated that day by buying new living room furniture.

Finally, I reached another five-year hash tag and then another.  Although I have several more hash tags to go, somewhere along the way God blessed me to finally be living the life I want to live and I am enjoying every minute of it.

So I ask you, dear reader, ARE YOU WHERE YOU WANT TO BE?