How to get ahead of 99% of people (In 3 Months)
99% of people are self-sabotaging on a daily basis.
You are (probably) self-sabotaging.
You feel stuck on autopilot, stuck in a life you don't want, a life that isn’t fulfilling and isn’t YOURS. You don’t know you can achieve more because you can’t visualize it or don't believe you can do it.
If you’ve said yes to much of the above, this letter is for you.
There is a great temptation to relax into a comfortable life. It becomes more tempting as you begin making enough money that you feel free to live a good life. This is the biggest threat to living an energizing, passionate, inspiring life.
The reason why I've created a life that makes me want to jump out of bed in the morning is because I've been where you are.
You want to create a life you're in love with. What do I mean, create a life you're in love with?
I mean create a vibrant, meaningful life.
By the end of this letter you'll have everything you need to create a vibrant, meaningful life. One that pulls you instead of relying on brute force.
To create this kind of life comes down to reinventing who you are at your core.
This is how you get ahead of 99% of people.
You may be asking yourself, “who the hell is this person talking to me through my screen telling me what to do? Why on earth would I trust them?
Well allow me to (briefly) introduce myself.
I'm a Canadian islander. I grew up wearing second hand clothes. My family was (and still is) very religious. Very Mormon. I love my parents, yet my parents never had dreams. Never pushed me to be better. I knew this wasn't the life I wanted to live. I wanted adventure, challenge, and greatness. On my twenty-second birthday, I decided to move to the big city of Vancouver and that's where my life changed forever.
Fast forward to today, I’m a self-made multi-millionaire living in Dubai.
I redesigned my life from the bottom up. Before my husband and I got married, we talked about what we want out of life. We created a vision. And since that day, we’ve been working toward that vision. And hell, we made it.
Reality is negotiable
If you don't design your life, it's designed for you.
You’re living a default, cookie-cutter life if you aren’t designing it yourself.
The default life looks like: go to school > get a job > buy a house > have babies > go on holiday once a year > work until you retire.
In contrast, an abundant life looks like being the architect of your life. This goes beyond being the main character of your life. This is becoming the designer, the author, the creator.
If you want a house and babies and to have a job until age sixty five, then go for it! Being the architect of your life is about choosing how you want to live life.
But, you don’t have to accept the life you were born into.
Something my father taught me is that getting a stable government job is as good as selling your soul to the devil.
Stop being realistic.
Yes, work with the resources you have. But I guarantee that you are not exhausting the opportunities available to you.
Are you making the most of the opportunities in front of you? Most people aren't, yet they still feel out of control.
The people who change their lives find a way to take a small opportunity and create a domino effect. One small action leads to another and another and another.
Then one day they wake up to a life they never thought was realistic or possible for them.
Often when people tell you to be realistic, it’s coming from a place of lack. Not opportunism.
Reality is negotiable.
Remember, I came from a family who didn’t teach me any of this. I’m self-taught. I found a spouse who loves business as much as I do and we grew together over the past eight plus years.
I reinvent myself (and thus my life) every damn year. Each year of my life is vastly different than the year before. It’s been like this the past decade of my life.
Imagine if I never took the chance to move to a new city, question my beliefs, and question what I want out of life.
I would still be on that island going to the same church with the same people. I wouldn't see the world like I do now, I wouldn't have the wealth and creative freedom I do now. And I definitely wouldn't be writing this right now.
Our choices form our reality.
Stagnant living is contagious. Momentum is contagious. Choose your contagion.
Doing the unrealistic is easier than doing the realistic.
What seems impossible to you, can seem possible to another. It’s a matter of perspective.
"The first responsibility of a leader is to define reality." – Max Depree, Chairman Emeritus of Herman Miller, Inc.
Define your reality
When you define your reality, you make it possible to find your craft. When you find your craft you can fall in love with the process of creation. When you fall in love with the process of creation you feel connected with life.
Creation is life.
A forced life is a lifeless life. A vibrant life is one that pulls you. Follow what pulls you.
Follow your curiosity.
If you’re like me, you want to feel energized and passionate and like you are actively participating in life. You want to create, build, connect, and grow.
This is what self actualization is all about.
“Your programming leads to your thoughts. Your thoughts lead to your feelings. Your feelings lead to your actions. Your actions lead to your results.” – Tim Ferriss
Common belief says the next step is to visualize your dream life then take steps to make it a reality. It prescribes discipline, structure and optimization.
This is an easy path to burnout.
What if there is a way to avoid burnout?
The actions you take are a direct reflection of who you perceive yourself to be.
Do you believe that success comes from forced hustle? There is a certain allure to bending the universe to your will. Yet, there is a limiting belief layered beneath.
There is an energetic difference between forced discipline and natural discipline.
What's the limiting belief underlying forced discipline?
It's believing you must force yourself to do something that you wouldn’t normally do. Because the action you are forcing yourself to take is not who you are, or what you naturally do.
The solution is to reinvent who you are.
Become a person who naturally desires to take actions that create a meaningful life.
Become a master of reinvention. Become a Creator. Creator's are founders, authors, inventors, scientists, designers, architects, composers.
Creator's don't have to force themselves. They're pulled by their why, their vision, and their self-perspective. It's baked in their DNA.
They are more afraid of their anti-vision. Their anti-vision (what they don't want) fuels them.
As a Creator, you are the definer and the author of your reality. You are the storyteller.
The Meaning Economy
"The most powerful person in the world is the storyteller." —Steve Jobs
Meaning starts with you. You must create a story for your life and romanticize it so that it’s exciting and motivating for you.
There is no way in hell you can help anyone else (long term) if you don’t first help yourself. It always starts with you.
When we rank more over meaning we self-sabotage.
To avoid self-sabotage, create your narrative. Choose why your business exists, who it's for, and how you give value. Value is something useful or enjoyable.
When you know who you are, every action you take is in alignment with your values. Successful entrepreneurs create a narrative to remember their why. A story directs you through your next steps.
We all want to do work that matters. – Story Driven, Bernadette Jiwa
Greatness does not exist without a vision. Great ideas have vision, purpose, meaning.
Meaning is a competitive advantage.
It's a competitive advantage because the 99% skip this part. If you want to get ahead of 99% of people, create meaning. Everything is meaningless until you create it.
You are the author.
"Today we’re seeing a powerful shift towards the building of the Meaning Economy. The businesses that thrive are the ones that enable us to work with our hearts as well as our heads and hands." – Story Driven, Bernadette Jiwa
The will to succeed is vital for your self-evolution. Don’t feel guilty for doing what’s best for you.
Self discipline is self love.
Before we get into the exact steps of how you get ahead of 99% of people, I'll tell you about a simple yet powerful concept.
The Daily Reframe
The Daily Reframe is a concept I’ve coined that's improved my life.
Life ALWAYS makes you forget why you started doing something. This is normal. It's part of being human.
Remind yourself of your vision every damn day. This is what Corey and I did for years and still do.
Have you ever visited a chiropractor? If you have, you (probably) went to align your body. Think of the Daily Reframe like your chiropractor. It's a mental tool to bring your mind back in alignment with your vision.
Reframing brings you back to center. It refocuses your mind on what you are intentionally creating.
Now we can finally talk about a lifestyle design framework I've developed called the C.L.E.A.R. Framework.
C.L.E.A.R. Framework for Lifestyle Design
“You can always get another job, but you can’t get another life.”―Richie Norton
By implementing this your life will never be the same. You will have clarity, direction, and meaning.
C - Clarify What You Don't Want
“The first step in crafting the life you want is to get rid of everything you don’t.” - Joshua Becker
Start by listing or brain dumping all the things you don’t want in your life. This helps you clarify what is not working or what you wish to avoid, setting a baseline for the changes you desire.
L - Learn Why
Use the 5 Whys technique on each item you listed (for all the things you don't want). All you do is ask "Why?" five times to each thing you don't want. Write down all your answers.
This digs into the root cause of why you don’t want these things. This will help you find hidden issues and motivations.
E - Envision the Opposite
For your list of unwanted things, think of what it's opposite look likes.
For example, if you don’t want to feel tired, the opposite is feeling energized.
Ask yourself:
What am I curious about?
What is interesting to me?
What excites me?
What do I enjoy?
Look for things that pull you (and I don’t mean pull like an addiction). I mean the things that call to you deep down. The things your soul magnetizes toward. Look for the things that feel effortless or that poke at your curiosity.
A - Align With Life Areas
Take the opposites and map them to the Life Wheel. The 'Life Wheel' divides aspects of life, such as health, career, and relationships. This helps you see across different areas of your life and which areas need more attention.
Notice if any areas on the Life Wheel are blank. Think about what you don't want for those sections.
For example, It's easy for me to skip setting relationship goals and focus on my career. What I don't want is to have no one I can trust or have no one to share moments with. Envisioning the opposite of that looks like having people I can trust and share moments with.
When you have this ready, refer to this as your vision of what you are creating for your life. Use The Daily Reframe to realign to this vision.
R - Roadmap to Reality
Transform your vision into actionable steps. Break down each goal into smaller tactics or habits that you can do daily, weekly or monthly.
To do this, we're going to create a personal gap analysis. A gap analysis is how companies identify where they are currently at and compare it with where they want to be.
By identifying gaps, you can create an action plan to build a bridge to your vision.
With this gap analysis, you’ll have a practical roadmap that guides you from where you are now to where you want to be.
Your vision doesn't have to be an earth-shattering, change-the-universe kind of vision. It can be simple. In fact, it's better if it's simple.
Let's create your personal gap analysis.
1) Identify Your Current State (what is your life like now?)
(Add series of questions that help someone identify their current state of life (their current lifestyle)
2) Identify Your Desired State
Use the Life Wheel vision you created earlier in this CLEAR workshop. Be clear about the lifestyle you actually want to live.
Be aware of limiting beliefs. Don't be afraid to think big. Be honest about what matters to you.
With your completed Life Wheel, answer questions like these for your desired state:
- What does your week look like?
- What do your weekends look like?
- How do you spend your days?
- What do your mornings and evenings look like?
Write down everything you can think of. If your mind goes blank, don't worry about it. Don't overthink this.
3) Identify the Gaps
This is where you bridge your current state and your desired state.
Start by comparing the differences. Write down all the differences you see.
a) Are there knowledge gaps?
Are there things you don’t know that will help you live your desired life? For example, you want to get into shape, but don’t know where to start.
b) Are there execution gaps?
Do you already know how to get from your current life to your desired life but you simply are not doing it?
For example, you want to get into shape and already know how to start but just aren’t doing it yet.
4) Build the Bridge
To build your bridge you need bricks. Think of these bricks as goals.
Now we’re going to transform the gaps you identified into your goals.
Let's make this very down to earth and practical. I personally have found much success in using the OKR goal framework.
OKRs (Objectives and Key Results) is a goal setting framework. Used and popularized by Google and many other successful companies and individuals. I’ve used OKRs in my businesses and personal life since I learned about it years ago.
If you don't want to use OKRs, use the SMART goal setting framework.
Learn more about SMART goals here
"Objectives are the stuff of inspiration and far horizons. Key results are more earthbound and metric-driven. They include numbers for one or more gauges." – Measure What Matters, John Doerr and Larry Page
Fill in the blanks:
Objective/Goal:
- Key Result 1)
- Key Result 2)
- Key Result 3)
“If an objective is well framed, three to five KRs will usually be adequate to reach it. Too many can dilute focus and obscure progress. Besides, each key result should be a challenge in its own right. If you’re certain you’re going to nail it, you’re probably not pushing hard enough.” – Measure What Matters, John Doerr and Larry Page
Create an OKR for each goal. This is how a goal becomes a project, a project becomes a series of steps, and a series of steps achieves the goal. The more specific you are the better.
That’s my entire strategy.
That’s how you create a vibrant, meaningful life.
Three months from now, not only will you be ahead of 99% of people, you will be living a drastically better life.
Tomorrow becomes never. Take the first step now.
Thanks for reading.
Cait