Don't Live Someone Else's Life: Live Into The Life YOU'VE Designed For Yourself

It's in us to design and live the lives that we want and not to live somebody else's life. So there's so many people in our lives that try to tell us what to do to succeed that it can really muddle us up. And when we start to live the idea that somebody else provided, whether that's parents, whether that's the way your job's been designed, from a corporation, whether that's how we operate in society, in our culture, what our culture says, we, we can get stuck feeling like we're not living our true authentic self. And it's on everyone to make sure that they're doing the work to change that ratio of I'm doing things that other people have designed for me than things that I've designed for myself. Hey, everyone, this is Sean Butner, certified high performance coach. And we're talking about designing the lives that we really want to today. And it's such an important topic because when we feel like we're in control of our destiny, when we feel like we're using our time wisely, that we're creating an impact and a legacy that we really want, that's when we feel really connected to our lives. That's when, again, we feel happy. And when we feel like we're going through the motions or that we're in a rut or that, you know, we're living the life that somebody else designed for us, that's when we feel miserable and restless and anxious and trapped. Right. Like, we don't have a lot of choice in our lives. And so it's super important to really be thinking about how have you designed your life? How have you designed your relationships, your career or work or your primary activities, your health, your wellness? Like, how does that all factor into your life? And are you happy with how it's all working? Right. If you were to give a score to yourself, one through 10 on each of those different areas, work, relationships, health, wellness, how would you score yourself? One Being terrible, ten Being high. Right. And looking at the scores, what would be three words you would attribute to each of those scores? And it's such just as a thing to consider, like when you rate yourself on these types of things, you know, ascribing words to it can help you get a little bit of clarity, what's going on and what you might need to improve or look at in your life. So let's say you do that exercise and you rate your health, relationships, career and wellness on a scale of 1 to 10. You know, how does that measure Up. And I know for myself, right out of grad school and college, you know, I went to grad school for information systems, was in tech for a long time. I was prescribed this through my parents and through high school that what you do is you get good grades, you go to a great college, you get a good job, life is happy, you profit. And what I found out is that when you graduate school and start that first job, that is the beginning of the next chapter of your life. And for me, that was titled Debt to Spare. I had so much student loans, I was managing, like, you know, doing the whole game where, like, do I pay for food today? Do I fill up my car with gas? Do I pay the electricity? Or do I pay rent or my student loans? And that is soul crushing, right? Like you, I followed the formula that school plus good job equals great life. And it wasn't great. And so I took it personally. I felt like I had done something wrong, that there's this formula for success. I followed it. It's not working out for me. There's something wrong with me. But it turns out there's something wrong with the formula. Because missing through that formula was the what is meaningful to you in your life? What do you want to leave as a legacy or have as an impact with the work you do? And that addition just sort of question is, what shifts people, I think, from sustained success to people that get stuck and give up or despair and just kind of resign in their lives? So for me, after doing that for like six months to a year, right, of just kind of grinding, thinking things will change, not understanding that I had the formula wrong and that it wasn't anything particularly wrong with me other than the fact I wasn't adapting. That's when I started to say, you know what? I need to fix this. And I made the decision that I was going to change, right? And so part of that surge of reading books and taking trainings and seminars, of all the things I thought were my problems, what really made the difference to me was attending High Performance Academy from Brendan Burchard. So he's one of my mentors. I absolutely love that guy. Big shout out to Brendan if you know him. If not, look him up. Number one motivational guy, end of plug. But at High Performance Academy, he asked me one important question. And that question is, are you living your truth? And that's a big question, right? And maybe you'd ask yourself that right now and you're journaling it and you'll think about it after you watch this video and it's so impactful because up through school, you know, I was living my truth. Like, that's what you did to succeed. I really believed in it and I thought it was going to work out, and then it didn't work out, so that wasn't true. And then you feel lost. I felt lost. But that question helped me realize that, you know, what, what is my truth? You know, what do I want to give? And ultimately, that led me into a series of decisions that, okay, like, I'm not happy with my current job. I'm not happy with how I'm showing up every day. I'm not happy with my health. I need to get that figured out. And I made the conscious decision to change, right? And I crunched some numbers, did a little bit of planning, talked to some mentors of mine about what to do next, and I decided to leave that job and start a business. And had I not made that decision and had that business fail, which sounds like a bad thing, I would not have gotten a job at Apple and have totally corrected that financial part. That feeling, you know, on the edge of great technology, around really bright people that helped shape how I think about the world. So a lot of really amazing things happened after a little bit of a messy start after that. Then it all became. It all came down to that one question. Are you living your truth? So I offer that as something for you to think about. And if you're like, oh, I'm not living my truth, how do I figure that out? Well, I got five areas for you to consider or five pieces of advice that you can take and really apply to your life and journal about and think about to help you figure out how to design the life that you want, help you design the life that you need to feel like you're thriving, to feel excited, to feel super vibrant, to feel alive. Okay, so if you're with me, then here's the first point on that five points of advice. So from high performance, being a high performance coach, we know that if you are consistently trying to get clear on what your ideal life is, how you would ideally show up and how it exemplifies your values, like that's the first step, right? And so we know this through all the high performance research that people that continually try to seek clarity tend to be more successful, tend to be more impactful, tend to feel a lot better about their lives. And so that question that we just asked in that story I just told was, are you living your truth? Is a clarifying question. You know, another question is, you Know, I. If you could wave a magic wand and jump three years into the future, what would your life be like? Like, if you could picture the where you lived, your career, your day to day job, where you are you waking up, sitting down with your spouse or your kids or your family, having coffee, joking around, go get up, get to the office at 10 after working out, maybe you walk to work, maybe you picture yourself biking to work or driving to work, maybe you work at home, you know, whatever that is for you, walk through your day, write it out and get really clear on what the goal is. Because so many times too, like, when it comes to designing the life you want, if you don't know where you want to go, you're not going to get there. And so it's super important to be thinking about, okay, like, what do I need to do right now to start building that life that I want in the future? Ideally, right, and maybe you'll hit the mark and maybe you won't. That's part of the journey, it's part of the fun of high performance. It's the fun of living your own life. But there's some excitement to working towards something that you could see in your head, something that'll benefit your family, something that'll benefit your mission, your purpose and having that all combined, it's super, super important and it's an easy task to do. It's hard to get really good at it and get really clear about what you want. And that's why sometimes people hire a coach. But we'll get to that in a minute. Second piece of advice is, you know, really thinking about how are you energetically, you know, like, how do you feel every day? Do you feel energized? You feel like you have good energy to go out and do the things that you need to do to make your ideal life happy. Because so many times if you have that clear vision of your future, like, oh, I'm gonna be a millionaire, I'm gonna live in the Caribbean with a pina colada or whatever, if that's your vision of living abroad and you know, having all that abundance in your life, but you're not making progress toward it, maybe it's because you're tired, maybe it's because you're burnt out, maybe it's because you don't have the energy to think through what the next steps are. All these things that hurt us energetically, emotionally, spiritually, physically, mentally. If you don't have the energy to get after it. This is the second thing that prevents people from Getting the success that they really want in their lives. And I've seen it time and time again as a coach. And sometimes a little bit of tweaking in your energy, how you're approaching, you know, your workouts and taking care of your body, you know, really can shift the amount of results, the amount of achievement, the amount of success and progress you make towards your big goal. The third thing to really think about is so if you're clear on where you want to go, if you are like, oh, I have boundless energy. I'm always bouncing off the wall show. I'm like, oh, my gosh, people think I'm annoying because I'm so energetic. Third thing that prevents people from taking those steps is the courage to go boldly towards that vision. And it shows up in people's lives as this thing where, you know, like, oh, I want that big beach house in the Caribbean. And I don't want to shift my job. Like, I get. Don't get paid a bunch, but I'm comfortable where I'm at, and I'm not going to take, you know, a chance and look around at other jobs in my industry that I could do and reevaluate what the market will pay for me. It shows up like that. It shows up as, oh, I want to start that business to really have that impact in this particular community. But I don't think I'm a good business person and I'll probably fail, so I just won't try. Right? And so we avoid the tasks, the, the efforts, the projects, the shifting and movement that will actually bring us closer to that vision. And it's human nature. Right? Like, there's always going to be doubts. There's always going to be things that. That we can't handle by ourselves. Right. And again, that's sometimes why you hire a coach is to help you identify those moments or help you be aware that you're avoiding. Like, we're really good at tricking ourselves to be like, oh, it's not working out. And, you know, my business isn't working out. I'm like, well, why isn't it working out? It's like, I don't know. I'm doing everything I can. And then they're like, okay, so how many sales calls did you make yesterday? You're like, zero. How about the last week? Well, zero. How about the last month? Like, maybe a half. Maybe one. Okay, so, like, you're avoiding this marketing part, making these sales calls that'll drive your business, that'll help you achieve that big monetary goal that you have to provide for your family and community and all that stuff. And so you're, you've tricked yourself into thinking you've done everything, but you have a blind spot. And a coach can help you identify that and be like, hey, like, okay, so you haven't made these sales calls. What are we going to do about that? Do you need to hire someone? Do you need to just grip through it? Is it something that you need to learn? You know, you go through that whole list of things, but it all comes down to taking bold action towards your vision, towards the life that you've designed for yourself. And that's, it's so powerful when people get that right. So real quick, before we get into the next two pieces of advice, if you really want to design your life and live into it fully, I want to let you know that I do offer two ways to get started. If you need a little bit of help getting some clarity in building your design best future, and that is you can either one, sign up for a free half hour coaching call that I'll post on YouTube so you can inspire other people with your story. If you have like a one off thing where it's like, if I just fix this thing, I know that I can make huge leaps and bounds. I love interacting with people and helping people in this way. So that's a free half hour call. It's usually $250 for that half hour if we're doing like a group coaching thing. So you get that for free. We post it on YouTube, we inspire everyone, we do some really good work, we high five over a camera and away you go. Right. The second way that I can help people, if you're like, I, I'm shy or introverted, I don't want my story or my problem, it's really personal. I don't want it out in the world. No problem. I will offer a free one hour strategy session on high performance coaching where we'll give you a tailored plan and set of habits based on your situation to help you kick into that next gear and start moving closer to that life that you've figured out and designed for yourself or help you figure out that design and then create a plan. And that's $97 for an hour. Right? So again, usually like that's like $500 for an hour call with me for $97. And if we do coaching after that, that'll apply to that fee and we can talk about that after we help you build your plan. So if you're interested Below this video, you'll see two links. One to sign up for that half hour call, one to sign up for that hour call that's private that you have to pay for. So that's two ways to get in the game, to really start figuring out what you want, or, you know, getting it a little bit more in focus or building the plan to get you to where you want to go. So click this link below if that's for you. If not, let's get into these last two points. Okay, guys, point number four is when you're trying to build that life that you've designed for yourself and live into it more. If you're clear about it, if you have all the energy in the world to achieve it, if you're making bold actions towards realizing it. We have to take a look at your productivity guy. So what that means is, you know, sometimes we're doing busy work and we're not doing our life's work. So it looks like it feels like if you've ever had the day where you've had like three pages of to dos and you knock everything out and you still feel like you haven't moved any closer to your big vision or to completing that project or to moving the things that are important to you forward. And so that's a function of, are you getting distracted? What are those distractions? When do those come up? Are you working on the right things? Right. Tim Ferriss is really good at figuring out the 20% of the effort that does 80% of the results. I think I got that right. But the idea that there's a small section of the tasks that you do that actually move your life forward. And so part of coaching, part of, you know, reflecting on that is what's effective? What am I doing that's actually moving the things forward? What have I convinced myself maybe that I'm doing that's moving things forward that I can delegate or eliminate altogether? And so there's a process for doing that that's really, really important. But the first step is being aware of where. What are the, like three tasks in my life, in my work or relationships or health or wellness, in each of those areas that are giving me the most results, you know, is it date night with the spouse every Thursday really helps you stay connected. Is it an daily thing where you're meditating together? Is it, you know, I have a daily walk that in the morning so I could see the sun rise. And that fills me with joy, like, whatever. There's so many different ways you can be productive Right in those different areas. But it's figuring out like what really fills up your cup. Like if those, those morning walks really help for you. But you know, doing a, you know, 10 mile run just drains you and all you want to do is sleep for the rest of the day. Like what's really going to help serve you in your health and your energy and all the other things to help you move forward. So, okay, so we need to figure out your productivity. The fifth thing that if you are working on the right things, if you are taking bold action, if you have all the energy in the world and are super clear on where you're going and the life that you want to live into, the life that you've designed, it comes down to influence. Like where in your life are you getting the support that you need from family and friends or your community? Where in your life are you convincing people to buy into that idea of that life that you have for yourself and help support you in moving that forward? You know, so is that people at work helping you? You know, building a team around you that helps you achieve even more than you can do yourself to really scale up results, to help you keep on track, to have guide rails again. A coach is a great resource to help make sure that you are getting the support that you need to help celebrate those wins that we all have to brainstorm when we have setbacks. But it could be a mentor, it could be a family member, it could be a good friend, you know, so there's a lot of building that we do. You don't design your life and just think about how it impacts you, right? If you're doing it right, you're thinking about like, if I do this career change, I'll have more time with the kids and the spouse, I'll have less time commuting so I can work out more, you know, these types of things. But that influence thing of like can I get the wife and the kids to support maybe a little bit of uncertainty financially while we shift into this new thing or you know, that kind of stuff. So if you know any everything said right, if you don't have the support you need to move forward on your dreams, then you're not going to move right. You're going to feel stuck and weighted down. So guys, that's the five different things to consider when you want to design your life and move closer to it. Again, it's increasing the level of clarity, energy, courage, productivity and influence in your life to support you towards moving forward there. If you enjoyed this video, you should watch the next video where I talk about burnout, right? So it's been a huge topic this year. So many people shifting jobs. So if you are experiencing burnout, if you want to avoid burnout, you can feel it coming on the horizon. And burnout really, to me, as a high performance coach, is really just damaging your health or relationships in pursuit of what you want. Then you should watch it. So check over here, wherever this is, and scope out that video and we'll see you guys next week. Take care, Sam.