By Guest Blogger on March 18, 2010

Five Tips: How to Start Designing Your Life

By Johanna Sawalha

What if you could have your life look the way you want it to…? No, exactly the way you want it to: not just the things you have, but right down to the way that you are. What if we all thought this way?

As a new and first time mom, I have had plenty to learn in the past few months as well as plenty for which to give thanks. This “designing your life” business is what I have had the privilege to teach over the past two decades. If I didn’t know what I have learned about designing my life, I would most likely… yell at my husband for not helping enough, quietly grumble to myself instead of chatting with him and my newborn, work in an office like my mother did and rob Peter to pay Paul on a regular basis. These are all my default ways of being and doing, to which I would readily revert had I not the tools to act differently.

If you had suggested this idea to me years ago, I probably would have bitten your head off! Humility did not come with my package, no matter how wacky of a design I had given my life. I would probably also not feel right about having a nanny if I were home, like it would be too lavish and luxurious or something. However, now that is how I have intentionally designed it. I designed things the way I wanted, which means I work (from home) on my passion of having people achieve their dreams; and I have a nanny when necessary! I want it all, and I want the same for everyone. Still, I have just used one example of work/life balance. There are many more ways to design your life!

We believe the more you address each and every area of your life, the happier you become. To be deeply happy is to have each area of your life make you proud. We have found there is often a lack of deliberate design in most people’s lives. Generally, people find a way to adapt to any situation or circumstance, and become stuck in their explanations and excuses for why their life is the way it is. Over time, we start to believe our own explanations, and it becomes more and more difficult to believe something else is possible since we are so accustomed to the status quo. Piece by piece, you can actually design your life and address your fears, thoughts, and deepest beliefs. It takes some thinking, creating, inventing and dreaming. Still, just to consider designing your life can move you to action and lead you toward the life of your ideals, once and for all.

Five Ways to Start Designing Your Life Today:

1. Dream of how you want it to be.
Dreaming is an active practice that should be separated from your strategies and action plans in life. Mostly people don’t make this separation, and they think that everything they dream about requires being put into practice. Not so. The practice of dreaming in and of itself sustains your vision for your life and should happen daily.

2. Track your excuses.
“Because, because, because…!” Can you hear your excuses talking to you? If you don’t, they probably pass you right by like they do most of us. Practice hearing and tracking your excuses, and better yet, refute them. They are telling you to blow off the things that in the end will make you happy and proud; instead, do the exact opposite!

3. Account for what you are doing.
Believe it or not, much of your ability to be accountable has everything to do with time management. The more you address how you spend your time, the more accountable you can become. Declare what you are going to do today. At the end of the day, account for whether it was accomplished or not. Stay away from judging “done” as “good” and “undone” as “bad.” You are simply accounting for it, which leaves you with the clarity to figure out what is missing in your planning and do better next time.

4. Purge your disappointments.
To “purge” something is to write out what is bothering, upsetting, or worrying you. Doing this will make it easier to distinguish between your personal bogeymen and the real issues to tackle and actions to take.

5. Communicate your grumblings.
Most people do not voice their gripes because they are afraid of how it might sound, and they end up not saying anything at all. Make a list of the things you are not saying. We never get artful at communicating because we don’t practice! Voicing your grumblings solves half the problem itself; thereby fixing the situation and leaving you happy and satisfied.

Johanna Sawalha has been in the personal development field for the past two decades and just recently stepped down from the Senior Vice President position at The Handel Group to care for her newborn son. She is still an executive coach and spokesperson for HG – coaches for MIT, Stanford U,  and Conde Nast.

If you liked this post, click LIKE below!

     
 

7 Comments