Life! By Design_ 6 Steps to an Extraordinary You - Laura Morton [71]
I have been living By Design for twenty years, which has taken me to an expert level of awareness and the need to start each day in the right frame of mind. Although I don’t expect you to jump in at this level, I want to share my daily routine, which sets the tone for everything else that follows. My first phone call of the day is usually to an affirmation partner, who is like a workout buddy. You are there to encourage and motivate each other without judgment. Lisa came to me as a client in January 2009. She’d had a moderately successful year but was worried that things might take a turn for the worse. I could tell she already felt as if she had fallen off track. What Lisa needed was someone she could talk to on a daily basis to help get her out of her head and away from her doubts and insecurities. I suggested she become my affirmation partner because she had a good plan in place but still needed some mental reinforcement to stay on her path and follow her vision. Lisa would affirm her financial goals, relationship goals, connection with family, fitness goals, and the things that gave her the power to meet these goals. We spoke only for five to ten minutes every morning, but it helped us both start off our day in a positive frame of mind.
My next phone call is with my “Ten Daily Questions” buddy. Every morning we ask each other ten questions that are designed to keep us both authentic and on track. We customize our questions, which means that mine vary slightly from his. As we progress, some of our Core Seven areas need more accountability than others, so we make the appropriate tweaks as we go. We engage in this routine only on workdays, usually Monday through Friday. Our answers are limited to “yes” or “no.” No explanations or stories allowed. The value of this daily exercise is to quickly gauge where you’re at and make you accountable to someone else with your answers.
My buddy’s questions are the following:
Did you live By Design yesterday?
Did you have a sweat-breaking workout?
Did you take 100 percent responsibility for the passion in your relationship?
Did you slow down and connect with each son and be present to his needs?
Did you give yourself any Tom time?
Did you start off your day with gratitude and clarity?
Did you manage your wealth and create more of it?
Are you incomplete with anything? Is there anyone you need to reach out to?
Did you make any new contacts yesterday to build your business?
Did you lead, delegate, and inspire the team around you?
By question ten, I have a clear idea of whether or not I am in inspired action and pursuing my vision. If I rattle off a bunch of “no’s” in a row, chances are I’m off my path and I’d better do something to get back in line. This exercise is a quick way for me to gauge where I am, what areas of my life need tending, and what areas I’m avoiding.
Occasionally, we add a couple of extra questions at the end of our lists of ten. The first is “Did you end the day with silent meditation and appreciation for life and everyone around you?” This question is dropped in to remind each other to live with gratitude every day, something everyone needs to become aware of and practice. (Later I delve into why this is so important.)
The second add-on is “Did you lie to me?”
This is always a bit of a “I’m calling you out” question because we aren’t allowed to give explanations in our answers. So if either of us lies to the other, clearly we are not living the vision and are so uncomfortable by that failure that we are covering it up. The whole idea is to create accountability for our daily actions, even if we need to be called on the carpet.
When creating accountability, the ultimate liability is money. It’s a source of angst and one of the hardest things for people to part with, especially when it’s a penalty. Money makes people think they no longer have the option of giving up, motivating them to create structure and accountability in their plan.
To create this kind of accountability,