Be specific with your priorities: Set goals

Last week, I wrote about how you can identify what’s truly important to you in your life. Now, let’s get specific, so we can make your vision a reality.

Now that you’ve reflected on the main categories of your life, we’re going to set goals to reflect where you’d like to be regarding each category.

In some of these areas, you may already be living life as you’d like it to be, and in other areas, there may be a mismatch between what you’d like your life to look like and what it currently is. In this exercise, you’ll gain awareness of where you are now and where you’d like to be.

  1. What goals and projects (activities, responsibilities, things you do) do you have in each category?
  2. Do you feel fulfilled by the combination of goals and projects listed here? Does the list feel “complete”?
  3. In an ideal world, would you remove any goals and/or projects from this category, i.e., would you take anything off your list?
  4. In an ideal world, would you add any goals and/or projects to this list? Is there anything that you feel is missing that you’d like to add?

Run through this exercise for each of the 10 priorities categories. You’re finished when each category feels fulfilling to you.

Now, try to take in the 10 categories together. Do they make for a fulfilling, purposeful life? It may be difficult to hold everything you’ve written in mind at the same time, but allow your gut feeling to guide you here. Does your intuition tell you something is missing? Or does this feel like a pretty good life?

What is most important to you? Identify your priorities

One of the biggest stressors in an otherwise fortunate life is to not be living the life you want. It may sound like your life is great, but unless it reflects your idea of what’s important, it may not feel fulfilling to you.

But how can you identify your unique priorities? There are so many things to think about and so many things you find important in life, you may not even know where to start.

In order to make identifying your priorities feel less overwhelming, I invite you to consider the main categories of your life:

  1. Work & Mission
  2. Learning
  3. Finances
  4. Health
  5. Family
  6. Friends
  7. Care
  8. Relaxing & Fun
  9. Spirituality
  10. Purpose & Fulfillment

What is important to you in each category? What would you like to add in (some of) these categories to make them feel more in alignment with how you’d like to live your life?

What responsibilities are you carrying in (some of) these categories that do not feel authentic to you? Are you able to spend less time on those, delegate them to someone else, or simply not do them? What can you remove from your life, so you can have more time and energy for what matters to you?

Note: These 10 main categories of life are loosely based on Brendon Burchard‘s work, but the ones listed here have been adapted by me.