Compass (1990 - )

Introduction

• This is something that has been developing since I was 20 years old.  It accelerated in 2013, inspired by the wisdom I was collecting for Wisdom Trove.

What is it?

• An evolving system (set of principles, practices, exercises, skills, processes, tools and guiding wisdom) that can be applied to any project - including the greatest project of all: living a meaningful and inspired life.

Purpose

• Allow me to apply and experiment with wisdom from Wisdom Trove to transform my life and passion projects.
• Practices, exercises, principles, processes and wisdom to move me towards my life’s purpose and vision and help me with my passion projects.
• Support me in connecting to Consciousness and growing in love.
• Provide a conscious process of growing, learning, transcending and evolving.
• Help me to tap into universal intelligence, inspiration and revelation (beyond the mind).
• Increase my sense of well being and lessen psychological pain.
• Increase my sense of meaning, fulfillment and gratitude.
• Allow me to embrace life more and experience moments of aliveness.
• Help me to develop and share my gifts with others.
• Give me a sense of my life being “in order.” 
• To allow my mind to go on retreat and rest in Being (mind like water).
• Get perspective during tough times - life is an ebb and a flow (especially through well-being charting and reflection)
• Appreciating and learning from the past, planning for and anticipating the future, and most of all, embracing the present.

Components

• Purpose: A clear sense of my life purpose and the purpose of each passion project.
• Vision: A clear picture of my desired outcome for my life and each passion project.
• Guiding principles: Principles and values that guide my life and each passion project.
• Strategy: Initiatives for each major area of my life. Strategic plans for my passion projects.
• Success measures: How I measure success based on my purpose and vision.
• Planning and reviewing: Bucket list, weekly and annual planning and reviewing.
• Processes: Identifying life and project processes and making them as fun and effortless as possible.
• Task management: A way to manage my daily tasks based on David Allen’s Getting Things Done.
• Passion projects: Projects that tap into my life purpose and vision.
• Guiding wisdom: A collection of wisdom I find especially relevant to my life.
• Guiding quotes: A collection of quotes I particularly resonate with.
• Guiding questions: Useful questions to ask myself regularly.
• Progress tracking: Tracking and celebrating progress in my life and my passion projects.
• Well-being charts: Charts of my well-being and spiritual connection.
• Digital journal: A gratitude journal to curate all I love (especially memories) and to share parts of my life with loved ones.
• Practices: Regular practices and skills including serving others, prayer, mindfulness, meditation, creative thinking, reflecting, decision making, problem solving, exercise.
• Inspiration: A trove of inspiration, immersing myself in works of genius, documentaries, museums, reading etc.
• Lists: A collection of regularly updated lists including things I’m grateful for, things I’m proud of, moments of joy I’ve experienced, spiritual experiences, insights, my life challenges and what I’ve learned from them.
• Risks and worries: A log of my worries with actions I can take and contingency plans where relevant.
• Tools: The tools I use to manage Compass include Evernote, Mindmanager, Excel and Blogger.

Guding principles

• Spiritual connection
• Managing my life consciously and strategically but with heart and soul
• Learning, growing, transcending, evolving
• Processes and practices integrated into everyday life
• Helping me to embrace life, not escape into my computer
• Experimenting with new approaches and breaking patterns.
• As much focus on visioning and planning (future thinking) as collecting and reflecting on the past.
• A process, not a destination
• Developing skills through daily practices (a lifestyle)
• Being my own personal coach (patient, constructive, encouraging, affirming, compassionate)
• Coming from a place of inspiration, passion, excitement and fun, not striving or self imposing.
• Intentions and principles, not rigid rules. Guides and inspires my life, rather than rules it.
• A combination of routines and shaking things up
• Applying the wisdom of Wisdom Trove into my own life - then feeding real life wisdom back into it
• Celebrating progress.
• Seeing mistakes, back-sliding, failures, plateaus as inevitable and a chance to learn
• Capturing that translates into insight and action.
• Doing it to embrace life more, not to “improve” or because I’m incomplete
• Vision, purpose
• Strategy, planning
• Process
• Review, reflect, learn
• One step at a time with vision in mind
• Power of small steps
• Power of habit, ritual, routine, process
• Integrated into daily life
• Practice, action, implementation
• Effectiveness, efficiency
• Fun
• Meaningful productivity
• Success defined, measured
• Evolving, learning
• Focused
• Practical
• Experimentation (life is my lab and I am the experimental subject)
•  Relaxed
• Fluid
• Simple
• Real impact

Scope     

• Past - tracking, learning from, re-framing, celebrating, savouring, sharing
• Now - applying and living (principles, skills, being, savouring, doing, learning)    
• Future - visioning, planning, preparing, anticipating

Success measures

• Practice, practice, practice: not getting lost in systems and theory
• Real life impact - tangible, visible, experienceable transformations in my life
• Depth of connection with loved ones
• Certain key practices becoming daily “can’t do withouts”
• Well being (inner peace, inner joy, sense of meaning and purpose)
• Spiritual connectiveness (degree of surrender, trust, gratitude, prayer, Being)
• Usefulness and degree of enjoyment from my passion projects
• Moments of aliveness (joy, connection, release, love, triumph, peace, wonder)
• Skill development
• Confidence
• Increased resilience (bouncing back)
• Feedback from others 
• Income
• visible real life change

What success is not

• Hours spent at the computer
• Amount of data
• The system itself if there is no real life impact

Guiding quotes

• A little knowledge that acts is worth infinitely more than much knowledge that is idle.  Kahlil Gibran  
• Knowledge for its own sake was meaningless, its mere accumulation a waste of time. Knowledge must lead to understanding.  M I Finley    
• What’s measured improves.  Peter F. Drucker    
• You can't control what you can't measure.  Tom DeMarco    
• A list of 5 key things, read daily and practiced, is infinitely more valuable than an encycolpaedia of knowledge.  
• Socrates:   The unexamined life is not worth living.
• Alphonso Lingis:   The unlived life is not worth examining. 
• Life is only worth examining because this can help us to live more fully.  Time Freke