Map Out Your Life
Success is more than economic gains, titles, and
degrees. Planning for success is about
mapping out all the aspects of your life.
Similar to a map, you need to define the following details: origin,
destination, vehicle, backpack, landmarks, and route.
Origin: Who are
you?
A map has a starting point. Your origin is who you are right now. Most people when asked to introduce
themselves would say, “Hi, I’m Rick O’Shea and I am a 17-year old, senior
highschool student.” It does not tell you about who Rick is; it only tells you
his present preoccupation.
To gain insights about yourself,
you need to look closely at your beliefs, values, and principles aside from
your economic, professional, cultural, and civil status. Moreover, you can also reflect on your
experiences to give you insights on your good and not-so-good traits, skills,
knowledge, strengths, and weaknesses.
Upon introspection, Rick realized
that he was highly motivated, generous, service-oriented, but impatient. His
inclination was in the biological-medical field. Furthermore, he believed that life must serve a purpose, and that
wars were destructive to human dignity.
Destination: A vision of who you
want to be
“Who do want to be?” this is your
vision. Now it is important that you
know yourself so that you would have a clearer idea of who you want to be; and
the things you want to change whether they are attitudes, habits, or points of
view. If you hardly know yourself, then
your vision and targets for the future would also be unclear. Your destination should cover all the
aspects of your being: the physical, emotional, intellectual, and
spiritual. Continuing Rick’s story,
after he defined his beliefs, values, and principles in life, he decided that
he wanted to have a life dedicated in serving his fellowmen.
Vehicle: Your Mission
A vehicle is the
means by which
you can reach your destination. To a
great extent, your mission would depend on what you know about
yourself. Based on Rick’s self-assessment, he decided
that he was suited to become a doctor, and that he wanted to become
one. His chosen vocation was a medical
doctor. Describing his vision-mission
fully: it was to live a life dedicated to serving his fellowmen as a
doctor in
areas of conflict.
Travel Bag: Your knowledge,
skills, and attitude
Food, drinks, medicines, and
other travelling necessities are contained in a bag. Applying this concept to your life map, you also bring with you
certain knowledge, skills, and attitudes.
These determine your competence and help you in attaining your
vision. Given such, there is a need for
you to assess what knowledge, skills, and attitudes you have at present and
what you need to gain along the way.
This two-fold assessment will give you insights on your landmarks or
measures of success. Rick realized that
he needed to gain professional knowledge and skills on medicine so that he
could become a doctor. He knew that he
was a bit impatient with people so he realized that this was something he
wanted to change.
Landmarks and Route: S.M.A.R.T.
objectives
Landmarks confirm if you are on
the right track while the route determines the travel time. Thus, in planning out your life, you also
need to have landmarks and a route.
These landmarks are your measures of success. These measures must be specific, measurable, attainable,
realistic, and time bound. Thus you
cannot set two major landmarks such as earning a master’s degree and a
doctorate degree within a period of three years, since the minimum number of
years to complete a master’s degree is two years.
Going back to Rick as an example,
he identified the following landmarks in his life map: completing a bachelor’s
degree in biology by the age of 21; completing medicine by the age of 27;
earning his specialization in infectious diseases by the age of 30; getting
deployed in local public hospitals of their town by the age of 32; and serving
as doctor in war-torn areas by the age of 35.
Anticipate Turns, Detours, and
Potholes
The purpose of your life map is
to minimize hasty and spur-of-the-moment decisions that can make you lose your
way. But oftentimes our plans are
modified along the way due to some inconveniences, delays, and other situations
beyond our control. Like in any path,
there are turns, detours, and potholes thus; we must anticipate them and adjust
accordingly.
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Author - Steph White
www.Riquochet.co.uk
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