Taking Charge of Your Life
PURPOSE
“Amid all our busyness, our impossible schedules, our frantic quests for fun and excitement, we must find time for discovery, for taking that journey into true meaning.”
RICHARD J. LEIDER
LIFE SKILLS
WHAT TO EXPECT
Taking Charge of Your Life has been presented to hundreds of people as a seminar. The response has been such that it is now offered as a series of personal study guides.
If you are interested in growing to fulfil your potential this course is for you.
The approach is wholistic. Many are amazed at the scope as emotional, relational, motivational and spiritual needs are comprehensively addressed.
It uses insight from practical psychology, life skills, motivational and biblical perspectives to assist you in your personal and professional development.
Your Purpose
01
Taking Charge of Your Purpose
Assisting you to look again at what life is all about for you—your direction, goals, unique set of talents—the first life management step.
Relationships
02
Taking Charge of your Relationships
Practical insights and skills that impact on friendship, marriage and career.
Wisdom Drops
“Unless a person has a reason to live other than for himself, he will die—first mentally, then emotionally, then physically.”
RICHARD NIXON
TIME 2-4, 1990
Your Feelings
03
Taking Charge of Your Feelings
Dealing with depression, anger, anxiety, conflict management.
Addictions
04
Taking Charge of your Addictions
Workaholism, perfectionism, codependency, as well as substance addiction.
Wisdom Drops
“To be truly happy, you need a clear sense of direction. You need a commitment to something bigger and more important than yourself.”
BRIAN TRACY
MAXIMUM ACHIEVEMENT
Choices
05
Taking Charge of your Choices
Awakening the giant within.
Personal and Professional Success
06
Taking Charge of Your Life
Time and life management skills— getting in touch with those deeper passions that motivate and drive us to achieve…
Your Purpose
The Foundation of your growth
Among our greatest needs is a
sense of identity and purpose..
Richard Nixon
Richard Nixon, in his post-Watergate experience, wrote about purpose as a matter of life or death.
“Unless a person has a reason to live other than for himself, he will die—first mentally, then emotionally, then physically.”
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Richard Leider, writing in his book, Life Skills, defines lack of personal purpose as a state of ‘inner kill’. He asserts it is ‘the most insatiable killer’ in modern Western society. ‘Inner kill’ is dying without knowing it. It’s feeling like you’re coping without being fully alive.
“Inner kill” is not growing, It’s taking the safe way. Always covering for yourself instead of taking risks. It’s reacting, instead of thinking. It’s giving up control of your life to whatever or whomever is around you. “Inner kill” is the death of self-respect (see quote below for Richard Leider’s summary of the symptoms of “inner kill”).
“You have ‘inner kill’ when you:
• Avoid decisions
• Daydream about early retirement
• Talk a lot about what you’re going to do, instead of doing it.
• Seek significance on the basis of past accomplishments.
Knowing Yourself
A central goal of the Taking Charge of Your Life course is to assist you in understanding yourself and what you really want from life.
Warren Bennis
“Knowing yourself is the most difficult task any of us faces. But until you truly know yourself, strengths and weaknesses, know what you want to do and why you want to do it, you cannot succeed in any but the most superficial sense of the word.”
On Becoming a Leader
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Take a few minutes to ask yourself…
• What are my values—the things that really count?
• What difference does my life make?
• Do I have a personal sense of purpose?
• Does my life have more to offer-is there more to discover?
SETTING GOALS
THE WAY TO FOCUS
The setting of goals is a powerful way of
defining and focusing on purpose.
1
Take a few moments to think of one specific goal you would like to acheive. It is important to write it out. You have space to write out three of the strategic steps needed to achieve your goal
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“For by the grace given to me I bid every one among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith which God has assigned him.”
ROMANS 12:3
RSV BIBLE
YOUR SELF IMAGE
— A CENTRAL FACTOR
A major block to taking charge of our lives is an unrealistic self-image.
Drs. Minirth and Meier
“Knowing how we became the way we are, understanding the sources of our damaged self-esteem, is a major step toward becoming emotionally whole and healthy.”
Drs. Minirth, Meier and Arterburn, The Complete Life Encylopedia
Purpose
“—THREE DESCRIPTIVE LEVELS CAN HELP IN THINKING ABOUT PURPOSES
Each level has to be mastered, in turn, before the next can be fully processed. All three parts need to be discovered as we grow toward “Our talents and abilities are gifts of life, but we must choose the work in which we will invest them.” fulfilling our potential.
1. Source Level
Why do we get up in the morning? What is worth striving for? If the universe is an accident, then so are we. If the universe has meaning, then so do we.
Our understanding of origin impacts powerfully on our understanding of who we are and why we exist. That sense of identity is the vital first step in establishing our sense of purpose.
2. Service Level
How shall we live? How shall we express our purpose now and in the future? A service revolution is taking place in the business world. Many are rediscovering, at the personal level, that fulfilment is achieved as a result of contirubting to the well-being of others.
Each of us is unique— with the capacity to contribute to life in a way that cannot be duplicated by anyone else. To express that uniqueness in service to others brings purpose into focus.
3. Vocational Level
Ask yourself:
• What are my talents? Where is the best place to use them?
• What do I most enjoy doing?
• How best can I invest what I have in my life’s work?
Dr. Jonas Salk points out that to have a purpose in life is part of living systems and is essential to all living things. He said, “to become devoted to a calling, to have a sense of responsibility and to have hopes or aspirations are all part of being human.”
Looking Deeper into your Purpose
When we look “above the sun” we discover the underlying principle of life—LOVE.
Alfred Adler
“All human failures are the result of a lack of love.”
quoted in Why Am I Afraid to Tell You Who I Am?
Solomon, in the Scriptures, expresses the same kind of frustration with life we find today. He became convinced that life is meaningless.
He looked to the same sources for meaning that are common in modern society: wealth, wine, women, song, knowledge, and entertainment. (See the Bible book of Ecclesiastes).
In describing his despair, Solomon used a recurring phrase.
On 29 occasions, we find the phrase, “under the sun.” He says everything under the sun is meaningless; “there is no profit in anything done under the sun.”
(Ecclesiastes 1:5, 9, 14; 2:11, 17, 18, 19, 20, 22; 3:16; 4:1, 3, 7; 6:1, 12; 9:5)
The Central Reason for our Existence—
Dr James Dobson
“I’ve observed that the vast majority of those people between the ages of twelve and twenty years are bitterly disappointed with who they are and what they represent.”
“We are capable of love because we have been loved: the warmth and comfort of a mother’s breast, the protection and security of a father, the unconditional acceptance by our parents regardless of the ups and downs of our growing years..”
Love is basic to our senses of purpose and the great healer of emotional pain and emotional dysfunction.
Many find the ancient wisdom found in the Scriptures provide a deeper understanding of love.
It speaks of God as the initiator of love. At the practical level of life, God’s love is expressed through the nurturing care of parents.
Those who have been deprived of love, especially during their tender years, experience deep-seated emotional pain.
“We love because he first loved us.”
1 JOHN 4:19
RSV BIBLE
Finally
THE DIRECTION OF MY LIFE IS LARGELY DETERMINED BY THE PREMISE UPON WHICH I BUILD MY PURPOSE
Victor Frankl
Victor Frankl was one of those who miraculously survived the horrors of Aushwitz, the dreaded concentration camp in Poland. Millions perished there during the Second World War.
His focus on love and hope were the vital empowering factors in his great time of need. His book, Man’s Search for Meaning, is a fantastic read.
Man’s Search for Meaning
“A thought transfixed me: for the first time in my life I saw the truth as it is set into song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The truth—that love is the ultimate and highest goal which man can aspire. Then I grasped the meaning of the greatest secret that human poetry and human thought and beleif have to impart: the salvation of man is through love and in love,”
