You can chock certain things up to coincidence in life but sometimes it seems like life is truly putting up a billboard and screaming “here’s your sign”! Ok Life, I hear you. About a week ago, I sat through a course for continuing education called Achieving Your Highest Priorities by Franklin Covey. In the course they go through recommendations for time management and identifying what is or is not truly a priority. One of the suggested recommendation was the identify what you want your “legacy” to be in life. Hmm, ok. How you ask? By identifying the virtues you want to live by (based on Ben Franklin’s 12 Virtues) and writing a mission statement for your career. So, ok fine, obviously in a work related course they want you to do an exercise to verbalize your goals. Then, while Googling decorating ideas for the house renovation and trying to determine the best color for the rest of my house (see entry on my renovation painting hiccup), I came across an article that suggested writing a mission statement for your home and family in order to help your home reflect your family ideal. So, in the same week I’ve been told to write a mission statement for my career and my home. This got the wheels turning and I have set myself a goal of writing a mission statement for my family/home, one for my career and one for myself. In the meantime, here are the virtues that I hope to include in my statements and now that I’ve made them public, I hope to live by them. What virtues are important to you?
12 Personal Virtues
(Help with choosing/defining virtues)
· Fidelity– – being faithful in my marriage, my relationships with family and with my friends
· Philanthropy– – give back, support my community and teach my child the importance of giving
· Organization– – make strides to organize our home more regularly
· Patience– – patience with my family, friends and the awareness to take time to live in the moment
· Frugality– – budget and save where necessary to provide myself and my family a better future, avoid wastefulness
· Confidence– – “having faith in [myself] and in life”; leading by example for my daughter
· Creativity– – respecting the fact that creativity is an exercise for mind and soul
· Grace– – Accepting life as it comes, good or bad, and being thankful or moving forward as needed
· Diligence– – work hard at home and career and have pride in the details of that work
· Hope– – maintaining the awareness of optimism
· Happiness– – focus on the joy of life while being content with what we have
· Health– – provide the foundation of healthy eating and staying active for my entire family