While this is relevant at every time of year, often around the holidays it feels like a perfect time to reflect on the future. It’s a great time to consider what you want to bring with you into the New Year, and whether it’s time to make room for new things to grow in your world by letting go of some previous commitments. This year with the launch of our grand, digital nomad adventure this reflection time feels even more relevant for me.
What is the shape you choose to create for this next chapter, and are there activities or commitments that need to be set down or shelved for now in order to make room for other opportunities to grow? This feels like a perfect time to share with you another excerpt from my book, Inspired Action: Create More Purpose, Productivity, and Peace in your life.
Chapter 5: Time for a Commitment Audit – This chapter walks you through an easy process for re-evaluating what’s currently on your plate and reflecting on how you feel about continuing those activities into your next chapter or season. It starts out referencing the work that is done in Chapters 1-4 on connecting with your purpose, but even if you haven’t yet done your personal purpose work, auditing your commitments can help relieve your current stress or make space for new opportunities (or clarity about your purpose) to grow.
I believe that we can benefit from doing this process at least annually at whatever time of year feels right for you. Maybe it’s part of spring cleaning, or maybe it fits during end of summer and preparing for the new “school year” in September. For many of us the holidays (the end of one year and beginning of the next) can be a perfect opportunity. Therefore, I’m happy to share with you this peek into Inspired Action, which might help you get some more clarity for planning your commitments into the New Year.
Chapter 5: Time for a Commitment Audit
If you have become clear on your purpose, then it’s time to clean house on your commitments. No matter how much we may wish to be superheroes capable of being in many places at once, being brilliant at everything, and leaping tall buildings in a single bound…the reality is that we are human, and we have limits.
You only have so much time and energy, but remember: you have the ability to choose where your time and energy will go. As we discuss in Chapter 1, the goal is to live at cause in your life as the creator and captain of your journey. You are in charge of your life’s commitments, and you have the ability to say “Yes” or “No,” as well as “Not now” or “I’m done.” And now your newfound clarity about your purpose gives you a benchmark or measuring stick against which to evaluate your current commitments.
I have done this process of reevaluating my commitments numerous times in my life. I will grant that every time has been slightly harder, since my life has continuously become more complex and has included more people who rely on me. But I will also affirm that the process has been worth it every single time.
If you cannot commit to each of your responsibilities—including your relationships—with a full and clear heart, then the time has arrived to reevaluate and possibly release them. This process of reevaluation is a commitment audit. It has the following steps:
- Brainstorm a list of all the commitments on your plate, big and small. Think about commitments in your personal life, family life, work life, volunteer work, and other areas. In addition to time commitments, include relationship commitments—to your life partner, kids, friends, family members, and colleagues. Both people and activities require energy. On my list I certainly included my cats, my houseplants, my car, and my home, all of which regularly require my effort, care, and attention. Ask your spouse or a close friend to help you make sure you’ve thought of all your commitments. It’s amazing how many small responsibilities we accept without thinking or simply out of habit—and those tasks might be the first to go.
- Consider your commitments in relationship to your purpose. Which commitments fit your needs and passions? Which ones are draining you? Take some time to simply reflect on each commitment. Address these questions:
- How do you feel when you simply think about each commitment?
- Which commitments excite you? Which ones feed your heart, mind, body, or soul? Which ones bring you peace?
- Which commitments make you sigh with frustration or annoyance? Which ones make you internally (or audibly) grumble?
- Which commitments give you a sense of fear, trepidation, or slightly overwhelming possibilities? Consider these items in light of Chapter 3: Dissolving Resistance (which you can find in Inspired Action). If you’re slightly afraid of a particular commitment, then that might mean it’s really important.
- Figure out what needs to go. Anything that generates more frustration, annoyance, or grumbling than pleasure or peace is a strong candidate for removal from your life. These are activities, responsibilities, or people that are draining you. It’s time to come up with a plan to phase these items out of your life and begin saying no to anything new that is likely to frustrate, anger, or drain you.
- Decide what can be trimmed down. Some commitments and responsibilities can’t be removed from your life immediately or easily, but you might be able to reshape them. For example, what responsibilities could you delegate? Are there simple tasks that a colleague, volunteer, family member, or hired helper could accomplish for you? Can you begin succession planning—that is, planning to remove this responsibility from your plate and transfer it to someone else’s over time? For more help with delegation strategies see Chapter 37: Delegation Plans.
- Decide what you can put on hold for later. Perhaps now is simply not the time for a particular commitment to be in your life. Although you would find this commitment interesting, exciting, or valuable at some point—or perhaps it benefited you in the past—now you need to focus on other needs. I did this with dating during a period of time when I was single. After dating for two years with nothing substantial on the relationship front I made the decision to take a break from dating to focus on my business until I achieved a specific business goal. It took about 9 months to reach that goal. Three weeks later I went to my first event to start putting my self out there again, and that’s where I met my husband Brian. Putting a commitment on hold doesn’t mean you won’t come back around and make a large investment in it in the future. It might just be time to push the pause button for now.
- Decide where you want to grow your investment. Consider both the commitments that feed and excite you and those that scare or overwhelm you. What would it mean to deepen your investment of time and energy in those areas? Is there one that you could really focus on and engage more fully?
Ideally, you will emerge from the commitment audit process with some new clarity about where you want to deepen or narrow your focus and what commitments are not bringing value to your life. Now, it’s time to take action.
Next Actions
- Brainstorm your next steps. Consider first the commitments to be removed or phased out. Whom do you need to talk to? What actions need to be taken to extract yourself from those responsibilities? What skills and information would need to be transferred, and can you document them to help the person who follows you? Start creating your removal or phase out plan and add appropriate tasks to your master list. See Chapter 24 for more info on tasks and your master list.
- Repeat the above process for the tasks you intend to delegate. Whom do you need to talk to? What do you need to communicate so that your successor can help and support you effectively? Create your delegation and communications plan. (See Chapter 37: Delegation Plans.)
- Finally, begin exploring how to deepen your involvement in commitments that will feed your purpose, excitement, and engagement with life. This step is the reward after you have done your audit and cleared the decks of all the responsibilities that drained you. What is the next step? Whose advice do you want to seek? What research do you need to do? What is one specific, tangible step that you could take this week to grow this area of your life? Capture these tasks on your master list too.
Interested in More?
If this simple process has been helpful, then you might want to pick up a copy of Inspired Action: Create More Purpose, Productivity, and Peace in Your Life to guide you further on your path into this next season and chapter.
It also makes a great holiday gift for that seeker in your life ;).
