We cannot think first and act afterward. From the moment of birth we are immersed in action, and can only fitfully guide it by taking thought.
– Alfred North Whitehead
It’s the starting point for almost every personal development geek: What do I want to do with my life?
You’ve no doubt learned many of the questions you’re supposed to ask at this point: What would you do with your life if you had $100,000,000 in the bank? What would you do even if you weren’t getting paid to do it? What would you do if you knew you couldn’t fail?
And the questions get more and more clever: What would you do if you already had the relationship of your dreams? What would you do if retirement weren’t an option? What would you do if…zzzZZ…zZzZZ…camel approached you in the desert…zZzZ…zZz…you had to choose between terminal cancer, dying in a plane crash, or…zZZ…zzz…
Ever notice how you can ask yourself these question for days, weeks, months, even years, and still not arrive at a satisfactory answer? It’s like you’re training for the Indecision Olympics, and you’re gunning for the Gold.
The drawback with a question-oriented approach to this problem is that it’s at best a limited way to attack the issue, and at worst can easily point you in the wrong direction and cost you a lot of time, money, and effort. To understand why, think of it this way: If I were to ask you where your ideal place to live would be, what would you say? Your range of informed responses would be limited to only those places you’ve already visited, none of which may actually be ideal for you. Naming somewhere you hadn’t yet been would be just a guess. Yet for some reason, we think we can ask our way into our ideal life, making key navigational decisions based on limited experiential data or even none at all.
Figuring out what you want in life is not about asking the right questions. It’s about taking massive action across a wide variety of domains and determining which activities you enjoy most. You can ponder all you want, but when it comes to discovering your passions, the only substitute for raw experience tested against the measuring stick of your emotions is, well, nothing.
To figure out what you’re madly in love with in any aspect of your life, become an experience gourmand. Try as many things as you can. Live every day as a taste test and savour the flavours you cook up through trial and error. Activate your Weird Idea Radar: when you see an opportunity to try something you’d normally consider off the beaten path, Just Do It. Not only is an action addiction infinitely more fun than ready-aim-aim-aiming, it will also give you a much more accurate and precise idea of what your true passions are.
For example, a couple of years ago a musically-talented friend of mine proposed the idea of starting a recorder group. You know, that plastic stick thing that you played in music class in grade three? Yep, that’s the one. This proposal set my Weird Idea Radar off so loudly that it almost shattered windows.
Which is exactly why I said Yes.
We ended up playing once a week, off and on, for about a year. It was fun and it certainly paved new neural pathways in my harmonically-challenged brain. While I never got deeply into it, I did enjoy the social experience of learning and practicing new songs. I eventually ended up leaving the recorder world behind, but not without first experiencing many moments of musical ecstasy. Heh.
Asking questions is still useful, of course. The problem occurs when you start spending all your time asking questions and little time out in the world finding answers. How long is too long to be stuck in thoughtspace? In my experience, the answer is usually a line drawn by frustration. When you start feeling disappointed with yourself and annoyed that you’re whittling away in a whirlpool of wondering, it’s time to shake things up and hitch a ride to anywhere you haven’t been before.
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Strange that you had no luck finding your passion in your recorder group! Seems like a great place to start!!
I have been at a crossroads for sometime.. nooo i’ve been at a traffic circle with 10 exits.
having been married since i was 18 (currently on marriage #2) with 4 kids I’ve never had the opportunity to discover my OWN life.. just the life for my husband and children.. Thank you for your article.. doing instead of asking what should, would, could, i do..
Keep writing :) you have genuine insight
Hey Brad,
I can understand that by experiencing a lot of things you can find what you like.
However, what do you do when you already know what you like? Do you then set small goals that you know you can achieve every week? Or do you just plunge right in?
I have to say Brad, what you say makes a lot more sense than “locking yourself up in your room for a week, and writing what you want to achieve this year through long visualization” that some other bloggers say. However, do you have goals for the year? Do you think long about them, or do they just pop right up in your head?
Thanks man, I feel that you’re one of the better personal development bloggers. :)
I did get some helpful information of, for example StudyHacks – Getting Things Done for Students. But your blog is the only one I feel I can totally agree with.
Right now I might actually consider starting a blog myself. However, to see if I like it, I’m first going to start writing content for 3 months, to see if I can keep that up.
Dear Brad
Truly enjoyed reading your words. I hope you are ok that I posted it (with reference back to your website) on a Chinese blog so that my Chinese Friends can find wisdom in your words. Q
Wonderful post! I have been feeling ’stuck’ for a while now. I have been asking myself many questions about my life and my future, while never getting anywhere and never moving forward. It’s time to stop with the questions and just get out and get active!