Worksheet: What’s my next move

This can be a particularly difficult and distracting question because it’s actually four questions in one.

1. What should I do with the majority of my time?
   
   
2. What is ultimately worth investing most of my time in? e.g. social change, family life, self-awareness, financial security, personal legacy
   
   
3. What do I want to do with my time?
   
   
4. What will make me happy/content/satisfied in the long-term?

How long is this going to take?
This normally takes around four to six hours and a minimum of two days.

Day one
2- 3 hours, spent answering questions and discovering the real you. This is always followed by a good night’s sleep, as it is a lot for your brain to think about.

Day two
3 hours, spent distilling/reducing all of your answers into a TRU statement (what is true of what you do, why is it relevant to your audience, why is that different)

How does it work?

I look at three areas of your lifestyle or career:

1. You
2. Other people
3. The difference

You

What is real about you. By this we mean what are your personality traits and principles that will affect everything you do.

Others

We call it an audience because, in this section, we examine how you act in front of other people, how they act in front of you, and the type of people/audiences your like or dislike.

Difference

The fine balance of life is being similar enough to people that you are welcomed into their community (workplace, sports team, friendship group) but also to be different enough so you have a unique value i.e. you bring something to the table.

What’s the outcome?

By combining all three lists (true to you, relevant to your audience, unique in that space) you’ll produce a personal statement that will make it easy to find the right opportunities for you and clear when you’re wasting time on those that aren’t right.

A reminder of the rules.

As with all these sessions there are three rules. Following these rules will help you to find the right answer to this difficult and distracting question. You are not obliged to follow them but, if you don’t, you’re likely to come up with a ‘false answer’ which you’ll find doesn’t help with the distraction.

Rule 1. Be honest
This means be completely honest. Don’t worry about what you think you should say or what other people might judge you for saying. The answers you give are confidential, so you won’t be judged for what you say. It’s important because saying what you think you should care about versus what you really care about might lead you to spend your life never really being happy.

For example, if you say you really care about social change, when you really care about being rich, you could end up thinking you want to work for a charity, where it’s very unlikely you’ll be rich.

Rule 2. Don’t use the word should.
Should is the word we use to describe things that, we believe, other people think and not necessarily what we need or want. However, what we think we should do is often a good indicator of what we don’t want to do.

For example, “I should really have a job that is something to do with my degree” translates to “I don’t want to have wasted three years of my life” or “I don’t want to disappoint my parents”.

Rule 3. Use Tier 3 language.
Tier 1 language, short ambiguous answers, are easier to use because, by being less explicit and using words that are open to interpretation, there is less chance that someone else will immediately see something they disagree with and therefore challenge what you’re saying. However, it also means people often ‘agree’ because they don’t realise/admit that they have different interpretations of the answer which only reveal themselves later on; often when it’s too late.

Tier 2 language is the language of frustration. Often it’s “I don’t know” but sometimes it can be angry, frustrated or upset. This is because it is hard to be explicit, as you are making your self more vulnerable to challenge or judgement from other people.

Tier 3 language is honest, open and explicit. It describes your opinions and thoughts in detail. This means you are open to being challenged by others. Remember, people will always challenge opinions and ideas they disagree with, it is better to face these head on than ignore them, hoping they will never come

The Questions

YOU

1. What are you good at?
   
   
2. What have you been recognised for?
   
   
3. What could you be the best in the world at?
   
   
4. What skills or training do you have?
   
   
5. What’s an ideal birthday present for you?
   
   
6. What’s a terrible birthday present?
   
   
7. What situations or people’s qualities do you find unbearable?
   
   
8. What negative quality of yours affects you most?
   
   
9. What’s your most valuable skill?
   
   
10. What do you want to be known for?

OTHERS

1. Who do you like working for?
   
   
2. Who do you like working with?
   
   
3. Who would you like to work for you?
   
   
4. Who don’t you want to work with?

THE DIFFERENCE

1. What makes you different from your family?
   
   
2. What makes you different from your friends?
   
   
3. What makes you different from the average person?
   
   
4. What makes you different from your competitors?
   
   
5. What makes you different from your colleagues?
   
   
6. Next Steps
   
   

Distillation

If you’re working with me, I’ll combine day one’s words into a personal statement that says what you do, why you’re good at it, who should care and why they should care.

If you’re doing this on your own, then now is the time to summarise your answers. More recently I think AI would do a reasonable objective job if you used this prompt: 

Based on my answers to these questions (as follows) create a 300 word personal statement that says that says what I do, why I’m good at it, who should care and why they should care.