Life Mission Statement

Do you ever look at your schedule and feel overwhelmed? Do you think that you are too busy? Do you ever wonder to yourself, "What's the purpose of any of this? Does anything I'm doing matter?"

I've been thinking that a lot lately. Our fall schedule is filling up, and either Zac or I have something going on every weeknight. Yuck! I feel tired just thinking about that! How did I get here (again) and what can I do about it?

Talking with a friend lately, we began to discuss this very topic. Our lives are moving forward so quickly, and what do we have to show for ourselves? We thought by this point in life we would have saved the world - well, at least made some progress toward that. :)

She and I are very similar in that we have many things that we are passionate about such as helping to solve world hunger, increasing global awareness, standing up for those who do not have a voice, caring for the environment, etc. We contribute casually with our time to each of these causes, but are not making a large impact in any of those areas.

We realized we get caught up a lot in doing the things that don't matter, the things that are just "fluff" in life. We lamented how we wished we had something to direct our choices, something that we could always go back to check and make sure we were on the right track to accomplish our life goals.

That morning our quest for a life mission statement was born.

I am excited about this opportunity to get to know myself more and figure out where my true passions are and what I can do with them. I am excited to have a few concrete things listed that I want my life to be about so that when fantastic opportunities arise, I can go back to the mission statement and decide if that particular opportunity fits in or not.

Yes, I will still participate in the fluff of life, but I will be able to see where its purpose is too. I am a person with too many passions and interests, and I need to identify a few so that I can make a greater impact.

I would love to share with you a few of my ideas, but I don't want to point you in any particular direction if you are going to make a mission statement for yourself! I'll outline the process I did for making my first draft, then share with you some of my keepers next week.

First I sat down and wrote down any passions or ideas came to mind. I even wrote down the ones I felt obligated to write down, the ones that I felt should be on someone's mission statement or list of life goals.

After I wrote down each one, I dreamed about how I could make that possible, or what activities in my life contribute to accomplishing that item. I made short paragraphs for each. I also monitored myself as I did this to see which ones I was excited about and which were the ones where creativity really seemed to flow. I put little stars beside those. I think those ones are where my passions really are.

I plan to limit mine to 3-5 things, but it's tough! There are so many wonderful things to do in life; however, it's important to narrow down the focus to make a better impact.

Good luck with your life mission statement! I can't wait to hear what's on your list!