The Life Purpose Guide

Copyright Mark Manson, 2012

What is your life purpose and who cares, anyway? When most of us do something, when most of us make life decisions, we rarely make them past pursuing what feels good or what wins us the most approval from others. Sometimes we have a subset of values that we pay heed to, but few of us ever ask ourselves What is the message that my life is sending to the world? That may sound pretty deep and heady, but its a question of your legacy. If you died tomorrow, how would people remember you? That you were a nice guy who was nice to have a few laughs with? Or did you stand for something? Did you affect peoples lives? Did you change things. Is there a message attached to your existence. And if not, why not? This may sound like a bunch of fluff, but its the exact questioning of purpose and legacy that helped renown psychiatrist Viktor Frankl survive a Nazi concentration camp. It then inspired a whole branch of therapy known as logotherapy. This is real stuff. Lets start things off with a simple question:

If you could do anything without chance of failure, and without constraints of time and money, what would you do?
This is the primary question. If the answer isnt an immediate, What
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Im doing now, then somethings wrong. And this report will hopefully help you fix it. Writers and thinkers from David Deida to Camille Paglia to Sigmund Freud himself have commented on how important it is to a mans identity and self-esteem that he has a clear life mission and that hes consistently working towards it. There have been a number of major societal shifts in the past few decades feminism, the information economy, more broken homes and fewer marriages men greatly lack that clear vision and purpose they were once given in their lives. Its my opinion that this greatly affects the overall psychology of the male population. Boys growing up without clear roles to fill, without obvious purposes to fill, meander through their early life reacting and following whatever is put before them. As a result, they never cultivate the independence and self-esteem that comes with following their purpose. They never learn to assert themselves, they remain woefully unaware of their emotional realities and their personal relationships suffer, particularly those with women. I didnt have to look far to realize this either. Back when I was coaching men in person regularly on how to be better with women, every time I worked with a guy who was either unemployed and/or lived at home with his parents and/or hated his job, he inevitably would do terribly with women. Often despite the fact he was goodlooking and a cool guy. I even felt it myself back in 2007. In college I had been doing great with women. Then I graduated, loafed around, held a few part time jobs and ended up broke and living on my friends couch for a while. Suddenly the ladies had no interest in me. And not only that, but I became pretty down and didnt feel good about myself anymore. It wasnt until I started my business and got it going that things began to turn around again.
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A lot of men are endlessly frustrated with aspects of their lives. Whether it be their inability to get with women, to make friends, or just that theyre always insecure and unhappy. A possible cause for this is a lack of direction and purpose in your life. And the amazing thing is, a lot of people dont ever actually sit down and THINK about this stuff. They were always told to go to this school or that school, so they went. Then they were told to get this job or that job. So they did that too. They never sat down and asked the question written above. We will be answering that question in this report. Well be breaking it down into parts and answering it in such a way that youll be able to work towards the answer over the coming months and years. And then a year from now, youll ask it again, re-evaluate, and begin working towards it again. Hopefully each time you do this exercise, youll be a step closer. The system presented in this report can be done repeatedly over a long period of time. I recommend doing it once a year. The first day of each year is a great option, but you can do it whenever. Ive done some form of this exercise every year for four years now. When I started, I was broke, struggling with a new business, living alone and not living a very healthy lifestyle. Now, four years later, Im living the life of my dreams. In fact, I can unequivocally say that this is the first year ever in my life that I answer the prime question with an immediate, What I am doing now. And I think thats a pretty astounding success. Especially at my age. This system is an adaptation of a similar exercise a good friend of mine has done every year for over a decade. Ive modified it over the
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years and its been influenced by some other goal-setting techniques Ive come across. So you may recognize parts of it. Its not revolutionary by any means. But it works. And thats whats important. I will spare you all of the science and information behind goal-setting techniques and why writing things down seems to have a magical effect on your brain. Im just going to tell you flat out: Do these exercises in a quiet place without distractions Take your time, dont rush through it. Write everything down yourself and keep it. This is important. Periodically check back and review your goals at the end of it throughout the year.

In this report, Ill be giving some brief examples of each step of the exercise but will not complete them myself. This is just to give you some ideas and help you get started.

Step 1: Brainstorming
The first step is the easiest and probably the most fun. Pull out a blank sheet of paper and make sure you have a clock nearby. Take 20 minutes to yourself, and write down everything you would like to do in your life before you die. Everything. No matter how big or small, how trivial or important. Just keep writing. Absolutely anything and everything that comes to mind, put it down on the piece of paper. This should start out very easy but get harder as the time goes by. Hold yourself to 20 minutes! Chances are the last 5-10 minutes youll be straining your brain. But keep going anyway.

Example:

Things Id like to do before I die Learn to box Get a graduate degree Speak five languages Complete a triathlon Live in China Go to the north pole Visit the pyramids Play chess in the park Take a trip somewhere nice with my mom Get married Have kids
Etc. As you do this first exercise, you may feel yourself get self-conscious or start judging some of your answers. Stop doing this! Seriously, this list is just between you and yourself. Theres absolutely no reason to be ashamed of anything you write. And if you do find yourself hesitant to write too much down, perhaps you should ask yourself why youre so scared of accepting many of your own impulses. On the other hand, chances are, when youre writing your list, 2-3 entries are going to pop out at you, like giant strobe lights on your page. The specific entries may surprise you as well. This is good. If you particularly have a lot of surprises on your list, or if a lot of your entries have got you thinking or reconsidering some things already, even better In fact, if you feel like youre already processing a lot,
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you may want to put the pen and paper down before the second step and take a break for a few hours.

Step 2: Ideal Life, Long-Term

Now that youve got your brainstorm list and youve come up with more ideas of things to do than youll ever need, its time to start honing in on what you ideal life should look like. This is where things start to get interesting, and a little bit real. But youll still have to use your imagination quite a bit and tap into some desire that you may not have known were there. Take another sheet of paper and spend 20 minutes writing down the following: Describe your ideal life five years from now. Describe it in as much details as possible. Describe where you would live, what you would do each day, what job youd have, who youd spend your time with, what youd spend your time doing. Take your time and be as specific as possible. Example:

My ideal life in five years would be me living in California, probably San Diego. Id have my own place near the beach. My work hours would be flexible so I could go surfing often. Id be focused much more on freelance coding and programming rather than stuck to any individual firm, so Id have a lot more control over my work load and pay. Id have a hot blonde girlfriend who would be awesome to hang out with. Id get back into painting, and do it from time to time each week, maybe even sell a few of them. Etc.
Chances are, once you finish this, your mind will already be brainstorming ways to connect the dots from now to then. This is good. Weve now got your mind working actively on figuring out ways
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to achieve your dreams. This is a fundamental first step. Youre now motivating yourself from your own desires and not simply by pleasing others!

Step 3: Ideal Life, Short-Term

Now that youve got your brainstorm list and youve come up with more ideas of things to do than youll ever need, its time to start honing in on what you ideal life should look like. This exercise is exactly like the last one, except instead of projecting your ideal life in five years, you are going to project it for one year. Make sure your choices are realistic and attainable, but also that they are a step towards your answer for Step 2. Example:

In a year, I will have started my freelance business, and will have saved $20k. Ill be able to approach girls when I go out on the weekend. Ill also have a gym membership and will be regularly going and working out. Etc.
As youll notice, this projection is getting far more actionable. In fact, after youve written it, it should be pretty obvious many of the steps you can start taking towards it. But wait, were not done yet

Step 4: Passion/Time Ratio

Now its time to really dig into your life and what youre spending your time doing and root out the activities that arent serving you or moving you toward your ideal life. This exercise is a three-parter and will probably take a bit longer than
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the others. 1. On a clean sheet of paper, make three columns. In the first column write down everything you spend your time doing each day. Ignore the small things like brushing your teeth or showering or sleeping. Focus on the big ones. 2. Once you cant think of anything else, go back and in the second column write down how many hours per week you generally spend doing this activity. If its something larger like traveling or seasonal like going to White Sox games or something, then just specify that in this column two weeks per year, or 10 Saturdays per year, or whatever. 3. Finally, in the last column, give each item a rating, from 1-10 based on how much fulfillment you get from that activity. Basically how happy that activity makes you. Example:

And so on Finally, once youve got your lists finished, go back through and look at how the numbers line up. Activities which you spend a lot of time doing should have high numbers. Activities you dont spend much time doing should have low numbers. What were looking for are mismatches. For instance, in the example above two big mismatches pop out at you. the first is that the guy really doesnt enjoy his job, and he
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works long hours. That sucks. Its hard to be happy and motivated and confident when youre dropping 50 weeks on something you only value at a 3. The second mismatch is that hes two hours a day of television, but doesnt get much value out of it. Meanwhile, hes averaging less less than an hour a day hanging out with friends, and thats something he really values. The answer for this person is clear: ditch the TV to spend more time with friends (or invite your friends over to watch TV with you), and get the job situation figured out. And this is just from a short, very basic list. Chances are your list has a lot more going on in it.

Step 5: Actionable Goals

Finally, were at the last step the step that youre actually going to use and apply to your life. From the previous four steps, you should have developed a pretty clear idea of what you need to be doing different, both in the shortterm and in the long-term. Hopefully youve been made aware of things that youd like to be a part of your life which currently arent. And hopefully youve identified some things that ARE part of your life, but youd prefer they werent. The final step is putting together a handful of goals for you to accomplish. A few things to remember about goals: They need to be actionable, i.e., they require a certain behavior to complete. For instance, Feel more comfortable in social situations is not an actionable goal. Its not something that can
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be measured or counted. Meet someone new without getting nervous, IS an actionable goal. It can be measured and its clear once its been accomplished. Set goals which are realistic within the given time frame. Setting goals that are too unreasonable is the quickest way to demotivate yourself. Dont set more than a few goals at a time. Another common mistake is when people try to adapt multiple major life changes simultaneously. Select a few important goals and then focus on them one at a time, preferably. OK, now for the exercise itself. Its another two parter. 1. Write down 3-5 actionable goals for you to complete within the next year. 2. Write down one thing you can do TODAY that will move you towards each goal. Example:

Goal #1: Lose 15 pounds Goal #2: Pass my CFA-I exam Goal #3: Get a girlfriend Actions for each goal: For goal #1, I can join a gym. For goal #2 I can buy a study guide to start studying. And for goal #3 I can join an internet dating site and/or go out tonight and approach five girls.
And thats it. If youve completed everything in this guide, you now have a clearer long-term vision of what you want your life to look like, some definable, actionable goals to complete within the next year, AND starting places to begin moving towards those goals. Like I said in the beginning, I recommend repeating this exercise each year. In my experience, its normal to meet most, but not all of the goals you set each year if you keep on top of them. Maybe two out of
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three. If you do these exercises consistently for a few years, youll realize a couple things: 1. That your priorities will change with time, and what you may consider very important today, may not seem as important a year from now. 2. That the more of your goals that you achieve, the easier itll become to achieve subsequent goals. Because thats the beauty of all of this. Discipline is a skill. It needs to be exercised and it gets stronger. Achieving goals based on your internal desires and motivations builds self-esteem, and will increase your motivation into the future. Doing this sets off a chain reaction, that if you follow it long enough, implementing change into your life will become easier and easier. And one day, years from now, youll look back, and maybe you wont even recognize the person you are now. And thatll be a good thing

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