Are you scared of what your life will look like 10 years from today?

“Most people overestimate what they can do in a day and underestimate what they can do in a year. We overestimate what we can do in a year and underestimate what we can accomplish in a decade.” Bill Gates

On this exact day ten years from now, what will your day look like? Where will you live, what kind of house do you have, what will you be eating, how does your health look, are you married, do you have kids, what kind of career do you have?

Umm hello, scary questions! Does the thought of this send you into panic mode? Do you automatically start to ask yourself disempowering questions like, gosh I don’t know, what if I’m not married, what if I can’t have kids, maybe I’m still working the same 9-5 job?

Just stop for a second and before you ask yourself anymore disempowering questions, ask yourself, what if I could? What if I were able to create my perfect day ten years from this moment, what would that look like?

Now that’s a little more exciting, huh?

False Evidence Appearing Real

If you’re like me, thinking about where I will be in 10 years can stir up a lot of uncertainty and fear. I was listening to a podcast recently and heard someone say that a popular acronym for fear is: FALSE EVIDENCE APPEARING REAL.

So many things that we fear never come to life, true. But does this false evidence that we focus on hold us back from where we want to be in 10 years? You bet it does! It disguises itself as practicality and holds us present in its reality. This false evidence causes your dreams become a distant fog that slowly fades, to the point of unrecognition.

False Evidence Appearing Real has held me back for a long time; I think it quietly holds a lot of people in our society back. Because of this, we cower at the thought of where we will be in 10 years. We are taken on a mental rollercoaster ride of fear, doubt, and complete uncertainty of how we can attain all of the things we want.

BUT THAT’S IT!

We don’t have to figure out HOW we’re going to get what we want in 10 years; we just have to know WHAT it is we want! With that vision, we will start to plan and attract things in our life that will set us on the right path to the destination we desire.

 

Planning must Co-inside With Your Vision

Just imagine planning a wonderful vacation. You saved money, packed your bags, loaded the car, and filled the gas tank. You get in the car and start driving, but wait, you forgot to pick a destination. So you just start driving. You drive and drive, and eventually get somewhere, but is it really where you wanted to go? Maybe you packed bathing suits and shorts but ended up in Alaska.

I know what you’re thinking, this example sounds silly, no one would ever do that!

You’re probably right; most people wouldn’t do that. However, friends, I think we would be shocked to realize that a lot of people do this with their life.

You see, we take steps every day without realizing it’s leading us somewhere. The steps seem like part of life, our routine if you will. And in 10 years that routine will determine our destination.

Can you see how our lives could end up like the vacation without a destination? At the end of the day, we are going to end up somewhere. And I don’t know about you, but I want to choose that destination myself!

How do we accurately choose the destination we desire? By first creating an extraordinary vision. Without the vision, there is no driving force to lead us in right direction.

There is no inspiration in a plan but there sure is in a vision” – Bob Proctor.

Could it be that we have lost the ability to be inspired about our future because we are planning without a vision? Are we packing for a vacation without knowing where we’re going?

I was for a long time!

Below is an exercise that changed the game for me. It helped me develop a real and strong vision for what I wanted for my life by planning what my day would look like ten years from today! It’s a fun, eye-opening experience.

If you feel fearful, uncertain, confused, or unexcited about what your life will look like in 10 years, I encourage you to try this exercise below. I think it can help you:

• Gain a clear understanding of what you really want for your life
• Discover things that maybe you didn’t realize you wanted
• Get excited about your future
• Start to attract the right people and situations in your life
• Get you unstuck in your thinking
• Set you a path toward the destination you most desire

Your Ten-Year Plan Without Fear

Recently, I was listening to a podcast by Tim Ferris. He was interviewing a lady by the name of Debbie Millman; you can find the whole episode here. Debbie is a writer, educator, artist, brand consultant and the host of the radio show, Design Matters.

During the interview titled: How to Design a Life, Debbie shared an exercise that had a powerful impact on her life a long time ago. So much so that she incorporated it as part of her curriculum with her students.

She calls the exercise “Your Ten-Year Plan for a Remarkable Life” where you write a very detailed description of what your day will look like in 10 years from this very moment.

Here is the exact description from Debbie on how to create “Your Ten-Year Plan for a Remarkable Life.”

“So let’s say it is Winter 2027. What does your life look like? What are you doing? Where are you living? Who are you living with? Do you have pets? What kind of house are you in? Is it an apartment are you in the city are you in the country? What does your furniture look like? What is your bed like? What are your sheets like? What kind of clothes do you wear? What kind of hair do you have?

Tell me about your pets, tell me about your significant other, do you have children? Do you have a car? Do you have a boat? Talk about your career. What do you want? What are you reading? What are you making? What excites you? What is your health like?

And write this day, this one day ten years from now. Start from the minute you wake up, brush your teeth, have your coffee or tea, all the way through until minute you tuck yourself in at night. What is that day like for you?

Dream big, dream without any fear. Write it all down. You don’t have to share it with anyone other than yourself. Put your whole heart into it. And write like there is no tomorrow; write like your life depends on it because it does. 

Read it, once a year, and see what happens.”

The Key to Success and the Key to Failure

I wholeheartedly encourage you to try this exercise! I took 30 minutes and wrote out my day ten years from now WITHOUT any fear. The words flew from my fingers as typed a vision that came to life. 

Just by writing this out is the first step in making it a reality. In Tony Robbins book Awaken the Giant Within, he has you complete a similar exercise! I love what he said:

“What we are going to do now is take the first step in turning the invisible into the visible, in making your dreams a reality. By the time we are finished, you will have created for yourself an anticipation so great, a future so compelling, that you can’t help but to take the first steps today.”

I hope your vision is so spectacular that it creates a movement in your life. A movement to alter your actions and catapult you towards YOUR destination.

THE STRANGEST SECRETE

Earl Nightengale said this: “Here’s the key to success and the key to failure: We become what we think about. Now, read that again. We become what we think about. Throughout all history, the great wise men and teachers, philosophers and prophets have disagreed with one another on many things. It is only on this point that they are in complete and unanimous agreement. 

So what do you do with this vision you’ve created? You think about it! You think so hard about it that it’s what you become. Purge the False Evidence Appearing Real and replace it with the truth!

Debbie said she often receives emails her students amazed at how accurate their life looks compared to what they had written in their Ten-Year Plan to a Remarkable Life.

I would love to hear if you have already done an exercise like this, or what you learned from completing this exercise?

Take one small step today,

X0-Jenna