Wednesday, February 14, 2007

Importance of Creating a Life Management Plan

After I aged out of foster care, I entered college at age 16 years old. Only one other person that I knew from foster care went to college. When he and I met up in grad school, we discovered that we had more than our past history in common.

He and I had both created mission statements for our lives. No one told us to, we just found ourselves mapping out a plan for our lives. I have a copy of his plan, and mine, and although we were not in touch with one another at the time that we wrote them, our mission statements had much in common...

When I moved to another state and started my career, I ran into another alumna of foster care, Gayle Loyola, and learned that she had created a management plan for her life as well.

Brainstorming to create a life management plan:
-What are your short-term and long-term goals?
-What resources do you need in order to reach those goals?

Before you even get started, it's important to realize that...

Personal mission statements are influenced by your belief system.
There are two familiar stories about this...

1.) The story about two brothers: one is an alcoholic and the other never touches alcohol. If you ask the first one why he drinks, he will rationalize his actions by his father. If you ask the second one why he avoids drinking, he will say, "My father was an alcoholic."

2.) A man is walking down the street and he falls into a deep hole. A priest walks by and he yells up for help. The priest offers to say a prayer for the guy in the hole and walks away. An executive walks by and throws a dollar down the hole.

Finally, a friend walks by and jumps into the hole with his friend.

The first man, in shock, asks, "What did you do that for, Are you nuts?!?! Now we're both stuck down here!"

The friend replies "Yes, but I've been down here before and I know the way out."

My point?
-No more excuses
-There is a way out of the hole

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