Chances are if you are reading this, you have, at the least, a small interest in changing your life. The reason (or reasons) you want to do this could be a number of things. Regardless of what the reason is, changing your life- or redesigning your life- all begins with the realization you have to change some aspect of your life for the better.
I recently reached this point myself. I wasn’t entirely happy with the direction my life was going. There were areas of my life I knew I had to change in order to have the life I truly want. This is a good place to be at because this is when you are most likely to initiate change.
Step One: Writing Down What Needs To Change and Why
Like I mentioned earlier, redesigning your life begins with realizing you must make a change in your life. So where do you go from here? Just like with setting goals, you have to write down what it is you want to change in order to make it “real”. You may think it is “real” because you know it in your head and in your heart. That is true to a certain degree but believe me, it does become even more real and concrete when you have it wrote down on a piece of paper.
I would suggest you use a separate piece of paper to write down each individual change you want to make. And when you write these down, write them down in the form of a specific, empowering statement. A good example would be: I want to lose 20 pounds in four months. I used a notebook when I did this which made it easier to keep things organized and in one place. After you write down each change as a statement, under each statement you will write down the reasons (or the whys) you need to make this change. These reasons are the true motivators- not the change itself. Sure, losing 20 pounds is great but the reasons why (“I’ll be healthier”, “I’ll feel better about myself”, or “I’ll feel more attractive”) are the REAL results you are after.
Step Two: Plan of Action
At this point, you should be highly motivated. You have your empowering statements written down along with the reasons why you need to make each change. The next step is formulating a plan to help you make each change a reality.
Obviously, you are going to have different plans for each change you want to make. A plan to change your weight will be much different than a plan to change your financial situation. This is why when you begin developing your change plan, you must start with the end result in mind and work backwards. And when you do this, the end result should have a completion date associated to it.
Using the losing 20 pounds in four months example again, you already have the end result and a date associated with it. Now, you have a beginning date (today) and an end date (four months from now). So what you could do is write down you will lose, at least, five pounds each month. But how will you do this? You could put down you will check into memberships at some local gyms, schedule appointment with your family doctor about your weight loss goals, or research possible diets or meal plans which will help you lose weight, for examples.
I like to refer to these as Action Steps because you are taking steps towards making a change. For each of these Action Steps, you need to give them a completion date. The way I do this is to put down “Must be completed by such-and-such date”. The date should be reasonable but also one which has a sense of urgency to it.
At this point, don’t be concerned about having every possible Action Step written down. Like most of us, you will come up with a new Action Step as you progress towards making your change. When this happens, just add it to your Action Step list and give it a date.
Once you are done brainstorming your initial set of Action Steps, the next step is to number each of them with the most important step being number one and so forth. Don’t sweat over getting this part of the process right. The main goal at this point is to note which steps take precedence over the others.
Step 3: Take Action!
With your plan in place, now is the time to take action! Many life coaches and personal development people say that you should take action at the time a goal is set and I totally agree. It doesn’t have to be an earth-shattering action. It could be something as simple as making a phone call to get information or to get online to look up some information or any number of things. The thing is to take some kind of action in order to set things in order.
But you can’t stop there. Every day you should be making some forward progress towards your change. Taking some action- big or small- every day help builds momentum and also helps you stay on track and motivated to follow through.
Step 4: Review Your Progress
Periodically- say, every week- you should sit down and do an honest assessment of your progress. Now isn’t the time to be easy on yourself. Be truthful and review what has and hasn’t been accomplished. Don’t beat yourself up if you didn’t get to do something which you had scheduled. But don’t excuse yourself either if you didn’t finish an Action Step for some frivolous reason.
During this review process, you may discover an Action Step isn’t working or didn’t give you the results you wanted. When this happens- just change it or replace it with an Action Step which does work.
The main goal of this step is to see what is taking you towards the changes you want, and figuring out what isn’t working and making the necessary changes.
I have used this four step plan in the past and it does work! There’s no magic to it. It is simply figuring out what it is you want to change, writing down why you want to make the change, putting together a plan to make the change happen, and then reviewing your plan to see how your progress is going- and that’s it! There are other factors which come into play to help you along the way which I’ll cover in future articles. But these four steps are the beginning of you redesigning your life. Now it is up to you to take them!
If you enjoyed this article or have any comments about it, please share them in the Comments section below. Thanks!
Photo courtesy of Richard0
