“Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?”
“That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,” said the Cat.
“I don’t much care where …” said Alice.
“Then it doesn’t matter which way you go,” said the Cat.
– Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland

Is your life in the right direction? Let’s check together.

Here is a practice that I learned from Thanh Pham¹, and I call it Direction examination, that can tell if you are on the right track:

Grab a piece of paper and draw down a line in the middle of the paper. On the left, write down 5 things that are most important to you (order does not matter).
Done?
Now on the right side, write down 5 activities you spend most of your time doing (order does not matter).

The things that are most important to you should be your values, while the activities you spend most of your time doing are your actions. After finishing the two questions, try to align the actions to the values if there is any contribution or connection. If all actions can be aligned with the values, congratulations, you are perfectly on the track. However, if the two lists mismatch a lot, then obviously you might be off track.

Is there any solution? Of course we have. Let’s make a DEAL as advised by Tim Ferriss².

• D for definition. Actually you have already completed the definition of your own values.
• E for elimination. Now you can clearly identify the unnecessary actions in the pursuit of your values. Remove them from your day!
• A for automation. For the activities aligned to your values, you can optimize and improve your productivity with automation and delegation.
• L for liberation. Follow the steps above strictly, then you can enjoy your life with a clear direction.

It looks pretty much like a practice of PDCA³ from the end. If you already had a habit of having a weekly, monthly, quarterly, annual, or any regular review, you should be familiar with this examination. Otherwise, it is strongly recommended implementing this examination to your daily life. Keep advance with a compass in hand.

Notes