“If you had to describe yourself using just one word, what would it be?”

Everyone answered more quickly than me. I take questions like that pretty seriously, and found myself irrationally afraid of answering incorrectly. The closest I came to was “connected” because it has many meanings I think apply to me (though my second choice of “geek” would have been fairly accurate as well).

That question, and the process I went through to get to an answer, got me thinking on another path. Maybe the appropriate follow-up question would be:

“If you could choose one word to be described as by everyone who knows you, what would it be?”

What do you aspire to be remembered as, as opposed to what you believe you would be remembered as today. How would you like to be able to most accurately describe yourself? In one sense this is harder than the first question, because it’s more theoretical and less concrete than the question asked of me by my friend on that trail in the woods. But in another sense, it is easier in its lack of need to be based on the reality of now. It is an opportunity to create a new, somewhat different shade of you.

As alluded to in a recent post, I have been working on focusing my life through a simple, specific set of goals or, if you will, mission statements. Between last night and this morning, I came closer than ever to figuring out what one of the big mission statements ought to be. It came partially out of conversation with a friend last night (in a bar this time rather than in a forest) and partially while walking this morning along a canal with my wife. This new mission statement is:

“To inspire myself and others through my actions. To be outstanding in the pursuit of my goals. To be generous in my respect for and trust in others, so that others may come to trust and respect my generosity.”

To be remembered, in one word, as “Inspiring”. That’s my dream.

What’s yours?

I have noticed life beginning to nudge me in another direction lately. Not to move completely away from my JoAT style, but to rebalance and refocus. The balance point is difficult to pinpoint for me. On one side of it, I’m too focused on too few things, and some things I’m responsible fall through the cracks. That can be remedied either by reducing the level of focus on what I am paying attention to, or by removing some of the things I’ve taken ownership of without necessarily having need to. The other side of the balance is where I feel I am now, spread so thin that I can’t afford to focus on anything too much because there’s too much that needs my attention. In fact, there is so much demanding my attention right now, it’s nearly impossible to focus on anything but the essentials for very long at all. (Look at how long it has been since my last blog post here, for example.)

Brad Bollenbach recently wrote about keeping things simple. Provided within that writing is the following list of questions, which I have decided is a good starting point for figuring out how to find my focal balance again.

• What’s my goal?
• How will I know when I’ve achieved it?
• How am I measuring my progress?
• How well is my current approach working?

A clear example of something I can apply these questions to is the work I’ve been doing on my book. My goal is to write a book anyone can use to figure out what their passions are in life, how to spend more time doing things that strengthen the things they are passionate about, and why you’d want to spend more time doing that. (That’s probably too long of a mission statement, but it’s where I am right now). I’ll know I’ve achieved it when the final manuscript is sitting in my hands and the hands of my publisher. So far so good. But… I’m really not measuring my progress. I don’t even have a loose, qualitative way to express my progress on it. So that’s a huge question mark, and something easily indicative of a lack of focus on the project. My current approach is so-so. I’m collecting lots of information, and the concept is getting more and more refined, but I need to get a lot more organized about the project.

I’m going to work through this more over the weekend and report back in a blog post update.

• Write a huge number of posts
• Have the content of the posts be meaningful
• Establish the three new blogs I had in mind to begin - Heartprint, Internal Innovation, and Resolution Revolution
• Write at least one new post on each of my eleven blogs
• Introduce my group writing contest
• Have fun
• Learn about myself
• Help others

I accomplished all but the first and fifth ones, and I am working on getting that fifth one tackled before evening’s end. 

I also got a lot of things done in the last 31 hours that I had no idea I would accomplish. I sort of planned on just writing, but life got in the way in interesting ways. Besides writing, I

• cleaned the bathrooms
• did five loads of laundry
• made the beds
• vacuumed
• joined a gym (and was not particularly upset by most of my measurements)
• had dinner with my wife’s parents and aunt
• filled a swimming pool
• slept a reasonable amount of time

So the answer to “was the day particularly successful” is a resounding “yes”! no one contributed any money to Make a Difference, but I think I didn’t market that well either. I’ll give that more thought - would sure like to get some donations flowing their way.

Anyway, tomorrow will be time for doing chores around the house and out and about. But chances are, I’ll get a few blog posts in too. And I’ll be quite happy with it, I suspect.

Reading through this list of forty additional tips, I’m seeing a few that could come in handy in the future, like…

Buy something from a local store. Want to blend in? Try making a purchase from a local grocery store. The local bag will make you look more like a native and is much less likely to be stolen than an expensive purse or day pack.

Split up cash and credit cards. When traveling, alone or otherwise, it’s always a good idea to keep at least some of your money and credit cards separate. This way, if you do lose one set you’ll have another to fall back on and your trip won’t be disrupted as heavily.

Keep your hotel’s phone number and address on you. You don’t want to end up stranded in a foreign country with no way to get back to your hotel. Keep your hotel’s business card with you so you can show it to the cab driver if you don’t speak the language and have the number handy so you can call if you need to.