Identifying Roles and Goals

Of course, the logical/verbal left brain becomes important also as you attempt to capture your right-brain images, feelings, and pictures in the words of a written mission statement. Just as breathing exercises help integrate body and mind, writing is a kind of psycho-neural muscular activity which helps bridge and integrate the conscious and subconscious minds. Writing distills, crystallizes, and clarifies thought and helps break the whole into parts.

We each have a number of different roles in our lives -- different areas or capacities in which we have responsibility. I may, for example, have a role as an individual, a husband, a father, a teacher, a church member, and a businessman. And each of these roles is important.

One of the major problems that arises when people work to become more effective in life is that they don't think broadly enough. They lose the sense of proportion, the balance, the natural ecology necessary to effective living. They may get consumed by work and neglect personal health. In the name of professional success, they may neglect the most precious relationships in their lives. You may find that your mission statement will be much more balanced, much easier to work with, if you break it down into the specific role areas of your life and the goals you want to accomplish in each area. Look at your professional role. You might be a salesperson, or a manager, or a product developer. What are you about in that area? What are the values that should guide you? Think of your personal roles -- husband, wife, father, mother, neighbor, friend. What are you about in those roles? What's important to you? Think of community roles -- the political area, public service, volunteer organizations.

One executive has used the idea of roles and goals to create the following mission statement: My mission is to live with integrity and to make a difference in the lives of others.

After you identify your various roles, then you can think about the Long Term Goals are plans you make that support the principles described in your Mission Statement. These goals should represent areas you want to focus on in the near future. Typically, Long Term Goals take longer than a week to complete, but are most specific than the lifetime goals of your Mission Statement.long-term goals you want to accomplish in each of those roles. We're into the right brain again, using imagination, creativity, conscience, and inspiration. If these goals are the extension of a mission statement based on correct principles, they will be vitally different from the goals people normally set. They will be in harmony with correct principles, with natural laws, which gives you greater power to achieve them. They are not someone else's goals you have absorbed. They are your goals. They reflect your deepest values, your unique talent, your sense of mission. And they grow out of your chosen roles in life. An effective goal focuses primarily on results rather than activity. It identifies where you want to be, and, in the process, helps you determine where you are. It gives you important information on how to get there, and it tells you when you have arrived. It unifies your efforts and energy. It gives meaning and purpose to all you do. And it can finally translate itself into daily activities so that you are proactive, you are in charge of your life, you are making happen each day the things that will enable you to fulfill your personal mission statement.

To fulfill this mission:
I have charity: I seek out and love the one -- each one -- regardless of his situation.
I sacrifice: I devote my time, talents, and resources to my mission.
I inspire: I teach by example that we are all children of a loving Heavenly Father and that every Goliath can be overcome.
I am impactful: What I do makes a difference in the lives of others.
These roles take priority in achieving my mission:
Husband -- my partner is the most important person in my life. Together we contribute the fruits of harmony, industry, charity, and thrift.
Father -- I help my children experience progressively greater joy in their lives.
Son/Brother -- I am frequently "there" for support and love.
Christian -- God can count on me to keep my covenants and to serve his other children.
Neighbor -- The love of Christ is visible through my actions toward others.
Change Agent -- I am a catalyst for developing high performance in large organizations.
Scholar -- I learn important new things every day.

Writing your mission in terms of the important roles in your life gives you balance and harmony. It keeps each role clearly before you. You can review your roles frequently to make sure that you don't get totally absorbed by one role to the exclusion of others that are equally or even more important in your life.

Roles and goals give structure and organized direction to your personal mission. If you don't yet have a personal mission statement, it's a good place to begin. Just identifying the various areas of your life and the two or three important results you feel you should accomplish in each area to move ahead gives you an overall perspective of your life and a sense of direction.

The important application at this point is to identify roles and long-term goals as they relate to your personal mission statement. These roles and long-term goals will provide the foundation for effective goal setting and achieving day-to-day management of life and time.