Why You Need a Personal Mission Statement
There are several reasons why you need a personal mission statement.
It identifies your goals and values,
and defines what is most important to you.
If goals are clearly defined, it’s easier to make decisions that support your mission statement.
You can more easily weed out thoughts and ideas that don’t promote your goal.
Instead of crashing headlong into what looked like a good idea at the time,
you can weigh the pros and cons and make right decisions.
What is a Personal Mission Statement?
When I think of a personal mission statement, it seems it would comprise not only your natural goals in life, but also spiritual goals and Christian values.
Natural goals should line up with spiritual goals, because spiritual goals come first.
A mission statement comprises the ultimate spiritual and natural goals for life.
It guides decision making and creates boundaries you don’t want to cross for any little whim.
Why a Personal Mission Statement is important.
Guardrails on a mountain road keep a car from plunging over the edge into a world of pain. Perhaps a guardrail can’t physically prevent an out of control vehicle from going over. But drivers proceed with more caution when they see them. “Okay, that rail means a drop off right there.” Brain says, “slow down and re-assess.”
A specified mission statement acts like a guardrail.
Keeping goals front and center makes you aware when you veer to one side or the other. When you skim the guardrails, you can make course corrections before you crash and burn.
If the guardrail is missing it’s easy to assume you’ve got smooth sailing. You pick up speed, pursue wants and whims, and whoa! Suddenly your goals are way back in the dust; you’re circling in a desert, quickly losing sight of the destination.
How Will You Decide Your Focus?
This part of the process works best with pen and paper. Do a brain dump, then read it over a few times over a week or so. Pray about it. In time, your thoughts will coalesce into what feels right.
Here’s a few things to ask yourself:
- What is most important to you spiritually?
- Is there a personal trait you want to change?
- Does a weakness in a certain area keep you from feeling peace?
- What do you want to be known for?
- How do you want to serve your fellowman?
- What would my friends tell me to focus on?
- How do people describe me? (Ask around. Be open.)
- What talents and abilities do I have?
How to Write Your Statement.
Think of your statement as following this simple template:
I will (pick an action)
for (choose your audience)
by (specify the skills and talents)
to (desired result).
Or a simpler version: I will (do what) for (whom) by (using which talent) to (get what result).
A minister shared his mission statement with the congregation. It was “nothing to forgive.”
Do three words fulfill the template?
I think so. In template form it would be “I will (action): forgive anything and everything (audience:) everyone has ever done to me by (skill or talent:) accessing God’s power to (desired result:) live my best life.
I asked my niece if she had a mission statement.
The gist of what she said, if put into the template, might say,
“I will live life so the people around me by experiencing my joy and kindness results in others desiring my company.
Keep Your Mission Statement in View.
Write down your vision for your life:
- in your journal
- as wall art
- put a sticky note on your mirror
- stash a note in your wallet
- download our editable PDF (you knew that was coming from these paper people, right?)
- pin it to your Pinterest board
