The Best Way To Figure Out What You Want From Life

Today’s extract from my forthcoming book about happiness explains the exact technique that I used when I was at a crossroads in my life and I decided I needed a new method to work out exactly what I wanted and where I was going.

I’m keen to know what you think about this, so please do leave me a comment below.

 

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The first step in this part of the process, then, is to sit down and work out precisely the kind of life that you want down to the very last detail. And the very best way of doing that? You need to dream—and dream big.

 

You’re going to have to take some time out to work on this. Have a think, and determine the sort of environment that will be most conducive for you for dreaming, away from distractions. Bear in mind also that you may well need more than one session to work through everything.

 

When I undertook this process myself a couple of years ago, I instinctively felt that it would be best for me to take myself out of my usual surroundings with the firm intention of thinking seriously about my life. Why? Because I believe that location matters—a lot. If you are sitting at your desk in your office at work, or in the kitchen at home with a sink full of dirty plates then you will inevitably still be enmired in the day-to-day. By definition you won’t be able to see the proverbial wood for the trees.

 

For this reason, I decided to take myself away to the following places:

 

• The town and area outside of London where I grew up as a teenager
• Hampstead Heath, the largest, most ‘rural-seeming’ expanse of land I could think of in London
• The crematorium where my grandparents are buried

 

The trips were taken over the course of a week or so. When I embarked on them, I sought to clear my mind as much as possible so that I could think freely and deeply about what I really wanted for my life.

 

You will note that two of the locations were outside of the city, and third was in a very ‘green’ part of it. This was intentional. I had become aware from my extended stays in Berlin that London has a somewhat strong pull on my consumerist tendencies. It is, after all, a city where no one seems to do anything very much other than work, spend money and eat and drink. I had to escape her  orbit for a little while, not least because I was aware that one possible option open to me was moving away from the city altogether. And I didn’t want to cloud my judgement by holding my heart-to-hearts with myself in her centre.

 

You can also see that at least two of my destinations were influenced by my childhood and younger life. Again, this was intentional. For me, getting honest with myself—which is what this is really about—is best achieved by removing the trappings of adult life for a time, and going back to things that are elemental: formative things.

 

When I visited my grandparents’ place of rest, for example, it was in part to pay tribute to them. But it was also to be with them for a period of time. To commune with them, as though I were seeking their advice (which in a way I was).

 

The same sort of thing was true when I visited the places I used to frequent as I was growing up. In a way it was less about their physical aspects and more about what I felt when I was there. I wanted to strip off layers, you see. I wanted to confront my younger self and ask him: ‘Well, what do you think I should do?’

 

When I took these trips I had no agenda at all, apart from the commitment I made to myself that I would use the time to think seriously about what my next moves should be. All I took with me was a notebook and a pen. I had my iPhone, of course, but I switched it off when I reached the locations. I didn’t want anyone to have the ability to get hold of me, or to interrupt the flow of my thoughts.

 

On each of the trips, my actions were very simple. I would walk around slowly, ruminating without an agenda on my life, and noting down whatever thoughts came up in my notebook.

 

When I looked back at that notebook later, it struck me that what I had written looked like prose poems. There were scraps of memory there. Snippets of thought. Reflections on my childhood. And one-by-one, more concrete observations on what I had done thus far in my life and where I wanted to go.

 

In a way, the purpose of the whole exercise was to get to know myself once more. That sounds hippyish, but the reality is that modern life, particularly in big cities, where everything moves at a million km a mile, does divorce us from ourselves. It’s not that I didn’t have a vague inkling of who I was and what I wanted before, of course I did. It’s just that my thoughts were submerged in a fog of consumerism, social media, corporate work and other ephemera that were titillating, but weren’t central to my values or who I really wanted to be. In order to cut through all of that crap it was necessary for me to take myself away to work through the process I have described.

I hope you found this useful. By the way, if you want to find out more about how to beat bullies at their own game then get hold of a copy of my book How To Be An Assh*le—it’s packed full of actionable tips and advice on how you can win in the boardroom and in the bedroom.