Discovering your true priorities
The main objective of a personal mission statement is to define what's important to you. Many people say "this is important" and "that is important," but how do you narrow it down to what's truly important in your life? I like to use the following visualization:
Scenario A
Picture a thick, banded-steel cable about 2 feet in circumference and 100 feet long, stretched out across the floor. You are standing at one end, and I'm on the other. I call out to you, "I'll give you $100 if you can step onto the cable and walk across it like a balance beam over to me without falling off onto the floor." Would you try it? Sure! Most people would. Why? Basically, it involves a fairly low risk with a relatively high payoff for the effort required. It could be fun and a little challenging.
Scenario B
Now we're going to suspend the cable just a "bit." In fact, have you ever been to the Royal Gorge Bridge in Canon City, Colorado? It's the highest suspension bridge in the world, with a cable like ours spanning a chasm, with a little tram that travels across the cable. Except you don't get to ride the tram. You are standing on one end of the chasm, and I'm on the other side of the chasm, with the cable suspended between us.
I yell out, "HEY! (Echo: "hey ... hey ... hey ...") If you can cross the cable like a balance beam without falling off into the river below, I'll give you $100!"
There is no way anyone in his or her right mind would attempt that. The risk is too high for the reward involved. So let's up the ante. Would you cross it for $250,000? No? How about a million dollars? How much would I have to offer you? What if I let you crawl across on your belly? The reward might never be high enough to risk your life.
Scenario C
Let's add a little wind (maybe, oh, a slight 40 MPH breeze) and a tad of rain to make the cable a bit slick. I'm on one side of the chasm, and you're on the other. In my arms, I hold your child hostage. I yell, "If you don't cross the chasm in two minutes, I'm throwing your child in the river."
Would you come now? Of course you would! Despite the incredibly high risk to your own life, that child is so priceless to you that you'd risk your own life to save another.
Perhaps if you don't have children, it could be your parents, your significant other or your friend. Clearly, that person is a core value in your life. What other things exist like that in your life? What principles, values or character traits are most important to you, such that if I were to rip it out of your life and throw it into the chasm, you would be willing to cross the bridge to save it? What things are so integral to who you are that you cannot imagine existing without them?
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