Your Road to Freedom AND Fulfillment

This quote from The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck by Mark Manson recently crossed my path, and it resonated so strongly with me partially because of a recent post I’d seen from a fellow digital nomad. This fellow nomad commented about how she loved the lifestyle of being able to travel and work from anywhere, but she also didn’t want her life to be a string of meaningless tasks that she picked up on Upwork or Fivrr.

I think this topic pushes a lot of buttons for nomads who see the lifestyle as the ideal, the goal, the focus of meaning in their lives. However, for many others both full-time nomads (like our family) and location-independent frequent travelers… we want more from life. Don’t get me wrong, the lifestyle is AWESOME, and TODAY is our one-year anniversary as a digital nomad family.

We LOVE the joys, freedoms, and adventures that being location-independent brings. But, I will take a stand and say… the lifestyle isn’t enough. As Mark Manson said, it grants the opportunity for meaning, but there’s nothing necessarily meaningful about it.

That’s why I think many nomads still yearn for discussions of the deeper questions of life, and we benefit from taking the time to consider our goals, our purpose, and our values. So, let’s talk about all three of these today, and consider how we can embrace them more fully each day.

In my book, Inspired Action: Create More Purpose, Productivity, and Peace in Your Life, I spend multiple chapters exploring the role of purpose in our lives and how to get more connected with yours, but at its simplest, your purpose is your WHY. It’s your legacy and your impact on those around you. As entrepreneurs, many (but not all) of us are lucky to feel like our work and our purpose are closely aligned.

Now, my work has evolved several times over my two decades of adult life, but at it’s simplest I would say that my purpose is to teach location-independent entrepreneurs to improve their business and personal productivity systems so they can experience more freedom and fulfillment in their lives.

In Inspired Action I teach a very simple formula for creating a Purpose Statement: 

I + VERB + [Group of people or focus of work] + so that/they + [Outcome].

Have you ever spent time crafting your purpose statement? There’s power in these words, and finding them can unlock a tremendous reservoir of fulfillment in your life because you can ensure that you are consistently and intentionally taking actions that are aligned with that purpose each day. There’s such power in aligned, intentional action, but it can only happen if you know what your purpose IS.

Put a different way… what’s most important to you? Let me introduce you to the exercise I use to elicit someone’s personal values in different contexts (because often the context matters.) As an example, let’s take the context that most of my community shares – Travel. In the context of travel, what’s most important to you?

Turn on a timer and spend the next ten minutes writing down absolutely EVERYTHING that comes to mind for you in answer to that question? No bad answers, no censoring. If it pops into your head, then write it down. Seriously, keep writing until the timer goes off… you may have 40, 60, 150 different words that come to mind. Often some of the ones at the end of the list are the MOST charged and deeply held.

Do you have any doubt that your list and my list, or the list of someone sitting nearby at the cafe might differ? Of course they will. Will there be overlap? Sure. But, how we express our values is deeply unique. 

What if next we asked you to reduce the list to your top 5 values in the context of travel? To do this, start at the top of the list and compare the first two items listed. Ask yourself “Which is more important to me in the context of travel?” Which ever wins (and trust your gut response here) take that one and compare it to the third item on the list. Doing head-to-head comparisons like this all the way down the list will result in your #1 top priority in the context of travel. Repeat the process again and you’ll get #2, etc.

I bet you all the beer in my fridge right now (which includes our coveted bottles of our favorite Cascade Sour Ale which we picked up in Portland, OR)… that your list will be unique and offer a LOT of insights about the choices you make regarding where you go, the places you stay, and how you craft your experiences. I can also guarantee that if you use that list of 5 Core Values to make your travel decision in future, you’ll be able to create even more powerful and rewarding experiences because they will be highly aligned with your values.

How do you use it? Keep the list nearby, and before you choose a destination, book accommodations, or commit to an event, ask yourself, “Does this honor and align with my core values?” For example, if one of my core values is “beautiful views,” and the place I’m considering booking (because it’s in my budget and preferred location) is a basement apartment with zero window views and limited natural light, then that’s a no. Make sense? I won’t be happy there because it’s sacrificing one of my core values, so I need to keep looking.

Bonus: If you’re traveling with a partner or family, then this is a great activity to do independently, and then compare your results. You may not be able to hit everyone’s 5/5 each time, but it gives you a method to weigh everyone’s needs/values in the decision.

If you’ve followed my work over the past several years, then you may already know that I have something of a love/hate relationship with the word “Goals.” For me, the term is too bound up in a bunch of mucky connotations about things you hope will happen or that you’ve tried and “failed” to do in the past *blech*. In my upcoming course, The Freedom Evolution, I teach the process I use to create “Vivid Future Accomplishments,” which I find dramatically more powerful than those “SMART” goals you’ve been told you need to have.

Therefore, basically, I see goals as outcomes that you are committed to creating in your future, and I do believe they are a necessarily and valuable part of our lives because they allow us to “set our course” and steer the direction of our lives towards the outcomes we most want. They are a life navigation tool you might say, but the ones that will have the largest impact are the goals that are fully aligned with both your personal values and your purpose.

Now, depending on the goals you’re setting, you might need to elicit a different list of values because your core values in different contexts might vary. Think about it, your core values around your health might be different from those about relationships or about your life’s work or purpose. That doesn’t mean that you need to go repeat the exercise above in every context you can imagine. But, it can give you some greater insight about HOW to create more fulfillment in different areas of your life.

Fulfillment comes when your core values are honored and you feel fully and deeply aligned to the actions you take each day. I’m blessed to be able to say that’s true about my life, and I passionately hope that trying some of these exercises might help you feel even more fully aligned each day in your life as well.

What if you could plan each day to ensure that you are consistently focused on tasks that bring you a sense of purpose and fulfillment? How might your daily life feel different? Imagine how much more empowered you could feel if every single day you to complete tasks that are aligned with your values and fulfilling your purpose?

What would be different in your life if that were true?

If you haven’t yet picked up a free copy of the Five-Minute Daily Plan eGuide, then make sure you click the link below to request it:

1. Create your purpose statement.
2. Brainstorm and identify your five core values in at least one key area.
3. Consider if your current goals are fully aligned with your values and purpose, or set some new ones that are.
4. Identify your next actions, and use Your 5-Minute Daily Plan to start weaving a sense of purpose and alignment into your daily life.