The Two Most Important Days of Your Life
Wisdom is timeless. Regardless of when it was originally authored, it continues to speak to us even with time. Mark Twain is reported to have once said, “There are two important days in your life: the day you were born and the day you find out why.”
I am reminded of another quote, this one attributed to Ben Franklin: “Many people die at twenty-five and aren’t buried until they are seventy-five.”
I know that I’ve been guilty of moving through life with a general idea of why I am here, what I am good at, what I love doing, and what I prefer to avoid, doing so without a sense of urgency to refine further and sharply define these. I know many people, far too many people, who died at twenty-five and are now just waiting for their bodies to drop. I don’t think you are like that, or you wouldn’t be reading this. I am not counting myself among them either, but I confess to not having the sense of urgency that I believe should be warranted toward resolving the “general ideas” into more specificity. I’ve talked recently (See Issue 4) about my new friend, my Mortality Demon, who has been, uh, “assisting” me in correcting this!
One of the first initiatives I’ve undertaken is to formally engage and pay for training in some relevant curriculum that will move my life forward in some meaningful way, and do so yearly. Last year, I joined Strategic Coach for their first-year program. (This year, it looks like it will be piano lessons.) As a result of participating in Strategic Coach, I now have a much clearer understanding of what I am good at and love doing, which is what they call my unique ability. (The concept is hardly unique to Strategic Coach. Gary Hendricks calls it your “Zone of Genius”. Jack Canfield calls it your “Core Genius”.)
As of the time I am authoring this, “My unique ability is to constantly challenge the status quo by inspiring others and creating new choices, driven by my desire to find better, smarter ways to work and live.” I am very clear that my unique ability is not a static statement but more of a dynamic, constantly evolving reflection of who I am becoming. The clarity it has provided me has been striking. I don’t think it is perfect, but right now it is close enough until it becomes apparent that it is no longer close enough. Then, a new version will need to appear. Especially in my vocation, it makes understanding what I should be doing and what I should be eliminating so much easier to understand.
What about you? Do you have the kind of clarity about your unique ability that matches the clarity that mine provides to me? Can you articulate it cleanly and clearly? You don’t need to join Strategic Coach to do it!
First, in my mind, this is not a one-time exercise that, once complete, you are done. If you are building your life so that it is consistent with your unique ability, you are going to change and evolve, so your statement of unique ability will need to do the same.
Let's get the mechanics of the process out of the way. You should get and read the book and workbook combination “Unique Ability 2.0 - Discovery - Define Your Best Self”. Get it and do it. Strategic Coach is a great program, and you work on developing your unique ability statement within it. But the book and workbook take it to the next level.
Having a great statement of unique ability is a starting point. Implementing your unique ability is, for most, another challenge. It took me three or four months of constant work to get to my current unique ability statement. You work on it intensely, then put it down for a while, revisit it, and so on. It is taking me much longer than that to figure out how to implement it effectively. You may be an attorney and discover you should be an elementary school teacher, or vice versa. (I’m picking these to show a LARGE gap, which is not likely for most.) The reality for most of us is that there will be a gap between what we are best at doing and what we are routinely doing. Working within our unique abilities will more likely be a process of subtracting and shifting. You are an attorney, but you hate divorce work and need to shed it in favor of going more real estate-related work, for instance. On a practical basis, that is unlikely to occur overnight. There are ongoing obligations, work in progress, and relationships to manage during the shedding. And there is an effort required to grow the new direction. The process of me shedding my career as a roofing consultant who worked for property owners so I could engage completely in working with roofing contractors took two years or so.
For me, the process of only working on things involving my unique ability has been much more about subtraction, getting rid of the stuff I am good at and like doing, in favor of only doing the things I am great at and love doing. (It goes without saying that we also need to be getting rid of what we dislike and are crappy at). It takes time, intentionality, often some creativity, and, for sure, effort. (It's called growing!)
If you found this issue helpful and want to hear more from Greg, be sure to subscribe to his podcast, Pants Around Ankles Prevention, where each episode delivers a punch of truth to help you wake up, gain perspective, and live with greater clarity and purpose. Listen and subscribe now on Apple Podcasts or YouTube.