12. Why EVERYONE Should Write Their Own Obituary

I want to live a life of purpose. I want to make an impact. I want to matter in this world. And as I sat down and went through the process of writing my own obituary, I realized that there was more that I wanted to be remembered for. There was more to the legacy that I wanted to have when my time on this earth was done. And so that process of writing my own obituary really forced me to rethink my priorities and rethink the way that I was spending my time and energy in this world.

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Hey, my friends. Welcome back to the Connected Accountant. My name is Michael King, and I will tell you that I am all about a good productivity tool, a time management hack, a project management tool. I love finding those things that will help me be more efficient and more effective with my time. And I'm assuming you do, too, because just by virtue of the type of work we do, we love efficiencies. But today, I want to share with you a different perspective on time management and what you're spending your time on. We have a finite amount of time on this big blue ball that we call Earth. And I know that conceptually we all understand that. But I think a lot of times, for me, anyway, I get lost in the task to task, minute to minute, day in and day out activities. And I sometimes lose perspective on the bigger picture. And I know that at the end of my life, I'm going to probably look back and ask myself questions like, did I have the impact that I had hoped to have? Did I leave the legacy? Did I have the type of relationships that I want to be remembered for? And I think for me, the key to answering that question with a resounding yes is living a life of intention and living a life of purpose. But it can be daunting sometimes to define or figure out what is the life of purpose that you wanted to have. And recently, one of my coaches challenged me to write my own obituary. And at first it sounded kind of morbid. Honestly, it was kind of freaky to think about, you know, me dying and being okay with that. But the coach told me, he said, look, Mike, you're going to live 60, 70, 80, 100 years on this earth. And when that time is over, what do you want to be remembered for? And he said, as you get into this obituary, what you're going to realize is the obituary only allows you to write a few paragraphs about your legacy and what people remember you for. And so he's like, just kind of trust the process and get in there and go through the Exercise. And I said, all right, cool. I'm going to lean into it. I'm going to do it. And I had two big takeaways from the process of writing my obituary. The first one was it really did force me to kind of think about those handful of things that I wanted to be remembered for. Did I want to be remembered for being a particular type of husband? Did I want to be remembered for the impact that my business had in my community or to my clients? It forced me to think about, did I want to be remembered as being a particular type of son or friend? And that process of really defining what I wanted people to remember me for when my time on this earth was done was just such an amazing and empowering and sobering exercise. The second thing that writing my obituary forced me to do after I kind of wrote it was to think about, hey, am I living a life in congruence with. With the way that I want to be remembered? And we spend so much time thinking about minute to minute that when we lose that sight of the bigger picture, a lot of times we lose that congruence or there's an incongruence with it. And this really forced me to kind of reprioritize and rethink what am I doing with my time day in and day out? Is spending more time on social media really going to drive that impact? And that change that I want to see in the world? Is spending more time on making that process or procedure just a little more perfect going to be the thing that leaves the legacy that I want to live? And so today, I want to challenge you to really think about what type of legacy do you want to leave in the world? What kind of impact do you want to have? What is it you want to be known for when your time is done? And you know, yeah, find some more of those time hacks and productivity tools. But I want to encourage you. Stay mindful of the bigger picture. Stay mindful of what your purpose and your intention on this earth is going to be, and make sure that you are spending your time and energy on those things that are going to leave you the legacy that you want to have. I hope you thought this episode was helpful today, my friends. I look forward to seeing you right here next week on the Connected Account.