Still Working On It
For those of you who have been following along on my On-Purpose Person steps, this update is for you! If you’re clueless as to what I’m referring to, head back and read my blog titled “Funneling” from April 15.
I’ve begun working on several different books simultaneously so there’s a bit of a slow-up on my On-Purpose journey. Go figure! That being said, I’ve finally finished my Want lists! The next step, which I’ve now already done, is to create “tournaments” out of the want lists as further detailed below.
Kevin McCarthy, the author of The On-Purpose Person, likens them to sports playoffs. He asks that you go down your Want list and number from top to bottom. Then, create a playoff sheet or draw sheet from number one through whatever number you end on. For example, if you created your Want list correctly, you didn’t list from top to bottom, but listed from top, then bottom, then just under the top, then just over the bottom and so on. NOW you’ve numbered your items from top to bottom and you’re putting the FIRST want you thought of next to the THIRD want you thought of and so on. See the playoff sheet template below and feel free to use it for your own “playoffs”.
Blank tournament/playoff sheet
Sounds obvious, but the next step is working through the playoff sheet. Decide which of the two wants is of higher importance to you and then advance it to the next round. Continue on until you have the last, but most important “want”. McCarthy reminds us to avoid thinking of this as eliminating wants that we just created, but instead to think of it as advancing and narrowing down the most important of those wants. We cannot have it all and this helps us narrow the focus.
Once you’ve found your number one main focus for each of the eight (8) want lists, then you do a tournament or playoff for those 8 things. Mine ended up looking like this:
-Financial/Material: make more money & have job security
-Vocational/Career/Work: make my own schedule & work with like-minded people
-Social/Community: travel to more plus size events
-Family: spend more time with family
-Physical/Health/Recreation: make more time for joyful body movement and dance in nature
-Mental/Intellectual/Emotional: get back in therapy as needed and find new HAES doctors
-Spiritual: attend more things with live music and practice meditating more often
-Other: make the space around me more minimalist
This might make you uncomfortable or feel some kind of way. It was a struggle for me, which is why it took me a month to get around to finishing it. I kept going back and forth with thinking I already knew what was important to me versus really wanting to keep other things at the top of the tournament. In the end, I ended up with what feels the most right for me right now. Turns out, my current priority out of all these things, whether I want to admit it or not, is making my own work schedule (in and out of my 9-5 job) and working with like-minded people. Coincidentally, when I focus on making this a priority, I see how it actually enables some of the other things I’ve prioritized.
Okay. Enough about me. I want to give you some time to do your own playoffs/tournaments and narrow yours down to your top 8 and then your top 1.
The next step will be working on S.M.A.R.T. applications and I can’t wait to get into that with you! Let me know in the comments below if you’re working through this with me or if you’ve picked it up on your own!