Subtitled: A proven plan to stop drifting and get the life you want
Michael Hyatt is known for his productivity planners and books. As he gained success as a speaker and author he felt his life was drifting out of balance. He worked with executive coach Daniel Harkavy, who’s program is the core of this book. Together they wrote the book to help this program – this plan – be more accessible.
This plan, called simply, The Life Plan, seems like it would be a great tool for people who are feeling like they’re drifting through life. For those who would rather be more intentional, more purpose-driven and feel like their time and energy is spent well among all the various aspects of their life.
The Plan is fairly straightforward, yet asks us to get pretty deep into our internal drivers. The first step of the plan is to think of and write down how you want to be remembered – what they call your eulogy. This is the core of their plan as all other aspects point back to whether or not certain decisions will help us become that person we want to be remembered as.
The next step of the Life Plan is to create ‘accounts’ for each part of our lives. The name of and how many accounts are up to us, but are usually along the lines of career, spouse, children, community, church, hobbies, etc.
As we create each account, we are to think about who we want to be remembered as in that particular aspect – as a parent for instance, or in our work.
We review how each account stands currently, and then describe how we want each account to become. Then work out a plan to close that gap for each account.
That’s the gist of The Life Plan, which coupled with prioritizing those accounts and well-thought out time management, is what these guys say has helped many clients move their lives forward with great success.
The book has some good examples from both authors about how the life plan has helped them and others as well. It’s well-written and accessible – they do make it seem like it’s something just about anyone can do.
I think this would be a great start for people who are looking to get more clear on where they spend their time now and how they want to spend their time and energy moving forward.
But as you can probably tell, I’m not wild about this book and the plan. I think it’s because this all feels a bit flat to me – maybe the book and the program have this all a little too planned out? It could also be that I’m not typically driven or motivated by very specific goals and plans, so maybe this is more about my personality style… or maybe my values don’t really match this style of personal and professional optimization.
That’s ME and my style. I encourage you to explore what works for you and this book could absolutely be the spark which gets you going and living with more meaning and joy. So check it out if you’re curious about creating and living a Life Plan, then let me know what your takeaways are!
