Recently, I took a version of the Birkman. I now have new insights into my life style, areas of interest, and job strengths. As a career coach, I have good familiarity with several assessment instruments, including the Myers Briggs Type Indicator, the Strong Interest Inventory, the DISC, and the Clifton Strenghts Finder. Overall, I feel that these instruments can provide powerful insights into one’s preferences, interests, style and talent themes. So, I do think taking such assessments is worth the investment.
Still, I think the insights gained can only take you so far. They don’t really help you create a vision for living your life. For that you need to answer questions that get at your values, passions, vision and purpose. While there are many questions and exercises to help you uncover these, I want to share one set of questions that I particularly like.
In Zen and the Art of Making a Living, Laurence Boldt discusses work as an act of creative self-expression. In this context, he provides an “I S.E.E.” frame of reference to guide one’s search for ideal work. Essentially, he sees the search as involving a mix of four elements, each with it’s own fundamental question; specifically:
- Integrity: Who am I?
- Service: How can I make the world a better place?
- Enjoyment: What do I love to do?
- Excellence: What can I dedicate myself to enough to achieve excellence?
Personally, I think these are great questions for creating a vision for living one's life, and should not be limited to just career. If you would like to be more satisfied in your life, you probably need to ask yourself some deeper questions. Why not start with these?
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