Will you live life as a visionary?

“Is there anything worse than blindness? Oh, Yes! A person with sight and no vision.” Helen Keller

What vision do you hold for your life? Where are you going and what are the principles that you hold that will enable you to get there. If someone asked you the question – what will your golden years look like, would you be able to give them an answer?

George Harrison wrote, “if you don’t know where you are going, any road will get you there”.

This is a scary idea, but it is absolutely true when applied to – a life without a plan. We must begin following some type of pre-defined plan before we can determine where our life is going. We should be able to answer the questions, what is your life mission and vision.

Don’t fret if you are older and have never constructed a life plan; it is never too late to start. I like to remind people that our sixteenth president, Abraham Lincoln, did not start to create the legacy he is known for until he was in his fifties. Ray Croc, the franchising wizard behind McDonald’s, did not see success until he was in his mid-fifties. And, just as important, is the fact that it’s never too early to start your life planning. We have countless stories of men who have revolutionized the world at a young age. In fact, Alexander the Great was finished revolutionizing the world by the time he was thirty-two.

There are great resources available that help one work through the proper introspection that is required for developing a life mission and vision and I recommended that everyone work through the exercise. If we fail to decide and plan where we are going, we either settle for a nebulous idea of a life vision such as – I want to be successful, or we continue to wander down the path that is set before us.

Gordon Livingston says it well, “The things we do, the prejudices that we hold, and the repetitive conflicts that afflict our lives are seldom the products of rational thought,  In fact, we operate in the world mostly on autopilot, doing the same things today that didn’t work yesterday.”

It is true that – the habits we form, form us. So when we think about creating a life vision, we should think about the end of our life first, and then create habits that will help construct our future life. The ability to think forward and see an imagined future is a God given ability that sets us apart from all other living beings, and we should harness the power of it. Stephen Covey coined the idea of beginning with the end in mind.

Covey recommends that we write out our own eulogy. While the first thought of this may seem a little morbid, it is a valuable exercise that can help us think of how we want our story to end. In thinking through this, we can imagine who will be in attendance at our funeral and what will be said.

Will your family and friends be in attendance? If so, will there be great numbers of them who you have personally touched and helped throughout your life? Will the President of the United States be in attendance to honor you life? How about foreign dignitaries? Most importantly, what will the story of your life say?

We can determine what the story of our life will say by realizing that – we get to respond to life and the opportunity that it presents us with, but it can only be done if we make a decision to write our story daily. We must have a life plan (mission and vision) in place before we can act, so I suggest that all of us think about what our eulogy will say and what others will say at our funeral.

I recently constructed my life mission and vision, and I now have a guide to live my life by. I think of them as guard rails that keep my heart, habits and mind focused in the right direction. If we know what we want the end of our life to look like, we can begin to construct it today. We can take tiny steps and other actions that will ultimately lead us to living out the life mission and vision that we design.

My Life Mission –

“Follow Christ, lead my family; be a friend to many. Commit to learning and leading passionately through VEL Institute and ministry.”

My Life Vision –

“Serve God, my family and His children greatly; lead others and help build something that will change the lives of millions and outlive me.”

Written by Terry Weaver, Co-Founder of VEL Institute. To learn more about creating vision and developing your leadership, visit VEL Institute.org