“To accomplish great things, we must not only act, but also dream; not only plan, but also believe.” – Anatole France
Anatole France was a celebrated French author and poet who won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1921. While he had an extensive catalog of work, most people only know him (if they know him at all) by these two simple lines, usually because they read it on a graduation card or a motivational poster, like the one that hung on my bedroom wall.
Growing up, I read this quote hundreds of times in passing, and during the school year I would often stare at the words as I fidgeted at my desk trying to finish my homework. I was a dreamer, and Mr. France seemed to be telling me that although dreaming is great, success will also demand a good plan, the ability to act, and belief in myself and the outcome.
It is sage advice, and if I were to go back in time, I would tell the kid staring at the poster to pay close attention to the word believe, because it’s the most critical part of the message, and the hardest one to master. I’ve always thought that Anatole France felt that way too, which is why he ended with that word.
It All Starts with Our Beliefs
If you ask most people what they believe in, you only get a few sentences in before you start to see inconsistencies, or gaps. Look past the ‘simple’ beliefs that most people hold true (murder and stealing are bad, for instance), and things get murky fast. If you doubt it, just start a discussion about politics, religion or money at the next family gathering and measure how long it takes for folks to start contradicting themselves.
We want to live in a world of absolutes, with clearly marked lines of ‘right’ and ‘wrong’, but people do not think or behave that way. Money is a safe example, where most people hold massive contradictions in their belief system. Have you ever met someone who wants to be rich, but thinks that the wealthy are corrupt, and that greed is ruining the world? How do they design a plan to be rich if they believe that the end result is corruption?
In addition to finances, we create imbalance in a lot of other areas too, such as our health and our relationships. Why don’t we work out more, eat healthier or get more sleep? Because deep down, we either believe that we’ll be alright, or worse, we believe what marketing firms are telling us to believe about their unhealthy products.
Our own belief system is complicated enough, but when you throw the beliefs of family, spouses, and friends into the mix, you end up with a Saturday Night Live Thanksgiving dinner skit (without Adele’s soothing voice). This is one of the main reasons that plans often fail.
Building a plan, for yourself or your relationship, on a confusing belief system is like trying to drive from New York to Los Angeles by driving East. At some point, you are going to have to overcome incredible odds along the way, dramatically alter your course, or end the journey.
Defining Your Beliefs
As with any journey, we want to make sure that we start our balanced life plan headed in the right direction and stay on course. Our beliefs and our persona values will serve as our Compass and our GPS, so it’s very important to get clear on them before we do anything else in the planning process.
The following steps will help you define the most important aspects of your life, and give you greater clarity and consistency in your vision as you head into the planning process.
If you go through this exercise, try to focus on the top 3-5 items that are most important to you. It will be tempting to want to list 10 items for many of these, but the less you choose, the more you really have to think about their priority. This is far from the final list, so for now, have fun, and think of this as a Mad Libs approach to describing yourself.
Step 1: What are your most sacred personal values? Try to choose 3-5 values that describe who you are, or who you want to be. Use some of the examples, or fill in your own answers:
I am … (honest, trustworthy, healthy, loving, faithful, tough, fair, fun, kind, loyal, disciplined, responsible, stable, wise, easy-going, compassionate, strong…)
Step 2: What are your core beliefs? Try to choose 3-5 beliefs that would describe how you feel about the world around you. Use some of these examples, or fill in your own answers:
I believe … (love always wins, good always defeats evil, the world is a beautiful place, people are generally good, humanity is doomed, we are surrounded by opportunity, life is hard and then you die, mean people suck …)
Step 3: Who are the most important people in your life? No limit here, but make a list of the folks in your life that are most important to you.
The most important people in my life are … (children, significant other, parents, grandparents, friends, co-workers…)
Step 4: What makes you truly happy? Try to choose 3-5 items from the following list, or fill in your own, to answer the following question:
I am happiest when I am … (spending time with my significant other/children/family/friends, praying, exercising, helping others, making money, sailing, creating music, doing yoga, planting flowers, fishing, playing sports, coaching my kids…)
Step 5: What emotional state do you feel most comfortable in? Try to pick the 2-3 emotional states that you find yourself in most naturally, or that you would like to be in most of the time.
My disposition is … (happy, laid back, angry, sarcastic, loving, quiet, excited and passionate, intense, thoughtful, even-keeled, nuts…)
Step 6: How do you deal with problems or life’s setbacks? Try to pick 3-5 ways that describe how you handle rough situations.
When problems come my way I … (jump in and solve them, take a step back and regroup, ignore them and keep moving, shut down, replay the failure over and over in my mind, rely on someone else to handle it…)
Step 7: What do you want inscribed on your tombstone? We know, this is a deep question, but it’s powerful to be able to look at your life from the end and look backward. Take your time, and think about the few sentences that you want to define your brilliant time in this world.
If you’ve gone through this exercise, then you now have the beginnings of a personal credo, and the start of an unshakeable foundation for your Balanced Life Plan! If you’d like to take this one step further, click here to try our Personal Mission Statement Builder.