3 tips for being fully alive

When do you feel fully alive? You may be teaching, fixing a problem, renovating a house, selling to certain customers, leading a team or whatever. What are you doing right then? How can you follow these principles more in the future? How can you base your life on doing the things in which you feel fully alive? Let’s explore some ideas for making this happen.

1) You can clarify when you feel fully alive.

“I split this into the personal and professional sides,” said one person. “On the personal side, I feel fully alive when encouraging our children, walking in Scotland, gardening, listing to certain music, painting and spending time with friends. On the professional side, it is when doing one-to-one coaching – rather than running workshops, working with high-tech companies and, strangely, travelling by train to assignments – rather than getting stuck on motorways. The coaching part provides an important pointer. I can run workshops, but feel more comfortable working with individuals. Sometimes I have five sessions a day and still have energy.”

Try tackling the exercise on this theme. Looking at your personal and professional life, describe the times when you feel fully alive. Be as specific as possible and complete the following sentence.

The times when I feel fully alive are:

*

*

*

2) You can do more of the things in which you feel fully alive.

Let’s start this part by exploring what you are doing right when you feel fully alive because this highlights principles to consider when shaping your future life. One person said:

“My partner and I enjoy walking together in Scotland. Looking at this activity, the things we are doing right then are: a) Planning and spending quality time together – this takes discipline, but the alternative can be to drift along; b) Doing something we both enjoy – going on an adventure; c) Being in our element – feeling able to reflect yet also getting outside stimulation. We now go to Scotland four times a year – but we also try to follow these principles elsewhere in our lives.”

Let’s return to your life and work. Looking at the activities you wrote in the previous section, how can you do more of these in the future? Then go deeper. Choose one of the activities in which you feel fully alive. What are you doing right then? How can you follow these principles more in the future? Bearing all these answers in mind – and being as specific as possible - complete the following sentence.

The specific things I can do to do more of
the things in which I feel fully alive are:

*

*

*

3) You can base your life on doing the things in which you feel fully alive.

This may seem radical - perhaps unrealistic – but it can provide a good starting point. Let’s imagine your life is an empty white room. Start by putting your family and friends in the white room. Then move onto the personal and professional activities in which you feel fully alive. Put those into your white room. Focus on the professional activities. How can you make these the basis for your future work? One carpenter said:

“Ten year ago I worked as a builder and carpenter, erecting ‘assembly-line’ houses. Then I was approached to build a house extension in French Oak. I set-up my own firm, managed the whole project and satisfied the customers. Their friends saw the ‘work in progress’ and asked me to do something similar in their house. Now I have a waiting list of customers. People say, ‘You have to wait a year for him – but he is worth it.’ I am doing carpentry work I love and it pays the bills. What more could you ask?”

Different people will employ this approach in different ways. Looking at the fulfilling things in your professional life, for example, consider how you can expand some of these activities. The answers will not always appear straight away but, with some creativity, they may well emerge. You will then be able to keep developing the areas in which you feel fully alive. Try completing the following sentence.

The specific things I can do to base my life on
doing the things in which I feel fully alive are:

*

*

*