Help with defining "life vision" or "purpose" - 50,000 and 40,000 foot views

I started using GTD partially because I was sick and tired of failing to meet commitments I had made in my career and personal lives. That was a secondary motivation, however, because I know that most of my unhappiness stems from going through day to day struggles with no end goal, i.e. purpose, in mind. I believe that a certain level of stress and discomfort is acceptable if they are incurred while serving some greater purpose.

I have been using GTD for the past few months and it has helped me get control of my day to day tasks/obligations/projects/commitments, etc. Like many others, I feel that GTD has prepared me to tackle more complex goals like defining and working towards a set of longer term goals. I also realize that I have too much on my plate and need to cut back to focus on what is most important. The problem is that I have not defined what I call my, "life goals," so what is most important is partially undefined. I am at a point in my life where I need to make some big long-term commitments around family, for example, when to have children and whether to move to another part of the country and career, i.e. stay at current company, apply somewhere else, start my own business, or go back to school full time.

My current strategy is to start by defining my, "life vision," which is a high-level summary of what I want my life to look and feel like. I think this lines up to the 50,000 and 40,000 foot levels in GTD. The challenge I am stuck at right now is defining my "purpose." I know I am not alone in this. I am very interested in hearing from people who have faced this question and successfully answered it. What tools, books, exercises etc. helped you achieve the self-awareness that allowed you to define your life's greater purpose? It would also be helpful to hear from people who have tried some things that failed - what was NOT helpful and a waste of time in the end?

It took me a long time to get some picture of my life at large. A lot of it was doing the same exercising over and over, so if a method doesn't work at first, it might not be the method, it might be a case of letting it sit for a while. Once you make a start at this stuff, your subconscious will keep chewing on it, and every bit gets you a bit closer to something that will eventually click.
There are loads of methods out there. Visualizing, finding your passions, writing mission statements by guides, writing mission statements unguided until it clicks, etc.

What eventually worked for me, was a combination of looking at my values, and the things i have always felt passionate about and have come back to, and sorting them in a mindmap. I found that a lot of what i thought were separate issues, fitted into those values.

A sample of the top stuff for me:

What do i want to live by?
Nature
*garden
*help people appreciate/love nature
*conserve natural resources
*respect for life
Adventure
*hiking
*travel the world
self-improvement
Love
*Self love
*others
Creative
Beauty
*Home
*Me
*art

Have you found clarity in the 20,000 and 30,000 foot areas of your life, your areas of responsibility and 1-2 year goals and objectives? For me, getting to 50,000 meant ascending through 20,000, 30,000 and 40,000 feet first. I had to clarify for myself all the areas of focus in my life--what are all the different parts of me and my life? Then I considered where I wanted to be in each of or a combination of those areas over the next few years. Who am I as and where did I see myself going as a stepdad, as a husband and as a son, in all the various aspects of my job, etc.? To do this I did various things--mind maps, free writing of ideas, imaginative narratives of how I see life in my mind's eye at some future time, etc. I didn't read any books or follow any prescribed formulas. I just sort of intuited my way up through the altitudes. This visioning led naturally to an ever larger vision of my life, a larger, more all-encompassing arch of time. My wife and I discussed at length where we saw ourselves in retirement, in our senior years. I imagined lying on my death bed, reviewing my life as a whole. I wrote about what I would look back on with happiness and joy. What I would cringe at and wish had turned out differently. For me, this led naturally to why. Why did I find joy and happiness in certain imagined memories and not in others. From this came a sense of my core values and purpose. All this drove me back down to 30,000 feet and my 1-3 year goals, were they really in line with the vision I was beginning to paint. Why not? Was there something in my visioning that needed to inform my goals and change them? Were there aspects of my goals that I hadn't used appropriately in painting my life vision at the higher altitudes? I pinballed back and forth, up and down these horizons for some time and still do, clarifying and changing the parts of it as I learn more about myself in my reflection and self-examination. This sort of self-reflection is a lifelong journey that I'll be discovering more and more about every day--a painting that will never be fully complete. But I can say I feel I have enough at each altitude now that each informs the others. I'd like to say I review these regularly, but it's more of a "when I feel the urge" frequency, kind of like how DA describes when he knows he needs to do a weekly review--when I feel a lose of perspective on the important things in life, on who I am and who I see myself becoming, I take some time for quiet reflection, thinking and visioning to work on my painting.

I hope this is helpful.

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Originally Posted by nickv

"life vision," which is a high-level summary of what I want my life to look and feel like. I think this lines up to the 50,000 and 40,000 foot levels in GTD.

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I read GTD first but the great impact to my analysis of horizon of focus came when I read Making it all work.

I hope it can be helpful

Sometime in the next year or so, I'm going to get away somewhere by myself just to think. I've touched on all the higher levels, set some goals, have my areas of focus well defined, I just feel like I need a little breathing room to let myself dream without interruptions.

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Originally Posted by Jon Walthour

Have you found clarity in the 20,000 and 30,000 foot areas of your life, your areas of responsibility and 1-2 year goals and objectives? For me, getting to 50,000 meant ascending through 20,000, 30,000 and 40,000 feet first. I had to clarify for myself all the areas of focus in my life--what are all the different parts of me and my life?

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No I haven't. For some reason, even though I have seen the value of getting things in order at the 10,000 foot and runway levels I had neglected to spend much time on the 20,000 and 30,000 foot levels. I think my assumption was that I need to ascend immediately up to 50,000 feet and work my way back down. I think part of my reasoning was that some of my areas of focus were so "out of whack" because they weren't aligned with any long term purpose that I needed to reassess everything from 50,000 foot down to begin. Reading your post I realized that I have certain "areas of focus" that won't change - for example I know I want to continue to be a "husband," a "learner," and eventually a "father." Maybe I should be looking at all the different things/areas I have taken responsibility for in the past, or hope to in the future, and work off of those.

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Originally Posted by nickv

Reading your post I realized that I have certain "areas of focus" that won't change - for example I know I want to continue to be a "husband," a "learner," and eventually a "father." Maybe I should be looking at all the different things/areas I have taken responsibility for in the past, or hope to in the future, and work off of those.

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An exercise that I found helpful for me. I made a table, each row a 20k item, the columns Now - 2 years - 5 years - Later. Just fill it in. The process of having to think this through helped me to clarify a lot. Also notice, some Areas of Focus only start in the future...

I hope you try this out and report back how awesome it was ;-)

Well put, everyone!

For what it's worth, it took me about five years to define my 50,000-foot view into a relatively stable form.

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Originally Posted by nickv

No I haven't. For some reason, even though I have seen the value of getting things in order at the 10,000 foot and runway levels I had neglected to spend much time on the 20,000 and 30,000 foot levels. I think my assumption was that I need to ascend immediately up to 50,000 feet and work my way back down. I think part of my reasoning was that some of my areas of focus were so "out of whack" because they weren't aligned with any long term purpose that I needed to reassess everything from 50,000 foot down to begin. Reading your post I realized that I have certain "areas of focus" that won't change - for example I know I want to continue to be a "husband," a "learner," and eventually a "father." Maybe I should be looking at all the different things/areas I have taken responsibility for in the past, or hope to in the future, and work off of those.

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I think that's an excellent idea. And don't forget, you can always come back down to the lower altitudes to clarify them as higher altitudes take on clarity and, in turn, ascend back up as the lower altitudes inform the higher ones as they are clarified.

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Originally Posted by Cpu_Modern

An exercise that I found helpful for me. I made a table, each row a 20k item, the columns Now - 2 years - 5 years - Later. Just fill it in. The process of having to think this through helped me to clarify a lot. Also notice, some Areas of Focus only start in the future...

I hope you try this out and report back how awesome it was ;-)

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Will do - this is a great example of the type of actionable idea I was looking for when creating this post - thanks!