How to you keep track of where you are right now vs. where you want to be in life, and increase your self-esteem in the process?
Something I picked up from Steve Pavlina’s blog (sorry I can’t find the exact post) is the idea of keeping a monthly scoresheet. You score different areas of your life, and re-score them again one month later to see how much better or worse you’ve done.
I didn’t expect much out of it, but as I finished my first month and re-scored myself again, I was very pleasantly surprised. The areas I used were:
1) Mental
2) Physical
3) Emotional
4) Social
5) Spiritual
And I scored them upon 10. For the first month it was:
1) Mental = 7
2) Physical = 5
3) Emotional = 5
4) Social = 6
5) Financial = 5
6) Spiritual = 6
And with a surprised chuckle, I found this month was:
1) Mental = 8
2) Physical = 5
3) Emotional = 7
4) Social = 7
5) Financial = 4
6) Spiritual = 6
While my Physical and Spiritual areas had stayed the same, and my Financial area became worse, my Mental, Emotional and Social areas improved! Reflecting upon the scores to give for each area of my life made me think about the things I went through the past month, and made me realize that, yes, I have made improvements and I have grown.
You won’t believe the happy hits this gave me! Talk about depositing value in your Emotional Bank Account! Ka-ching ka-ching!
I can see how useful a tool this is now for keeping track of where you are in your life versus where you’ve been and where you want to go. It helps you:
1) Know which areas you need to focus on
2) Recognize your own growth (big points for your self-esteem)
How about a coach’s challenge? Score your 6 areas of life at this point in your life right now, whether in the comments if you’re comfortable with that, or offline in a place you’ll keep. And in a month’s time we’ll check in on that, and track the differences we’ve made over the past month, both good and to be improved.
P.S. My PPC just coughed up a little reminder of David Allen’s challenge from his book Ready for Anything. In it he says that in the one month from the time you read that chapter, something significant’s going to happen that you don’t expect.
Whoa. How very true. I wonder what’s going to happen one month from now for both you & me? 
April 5th, 2006 at 1:02 am
go 4 WORKOUT !
April 6th, 2006 at 2:52 am
Hey Alvin, care to define a bit on the difference between the various components? For eg. mental vs. emotional vs. social. Thanks!
Gd job!
And just a side not, once u hit 10, you can reset your score and raise the level of difficulty i.e. a 6/10 on your scale could be someone’s 9/10.
April 6th, 2006 at 10:41 am
Hi Eric!
Good question.
1) Exercising your mental resources include things like reading, audio programs, watching movies or TV shows that expand your knowledge.
2) Physical growth is about exercising, growing muscle, stretching, anything that’s good for your body.
3) Social expansion is time-out connecting with people, new or old friends and family.
4) Financial is about your financial well-being. How much cash is in the bank, how little debt do you have? I need this area because it’s something I’m actively working on to improve.
5) Spiritual is the most personal of all, some people get it by attending church, taking a walk by themselves, meditating, reviewing their lives. It’s time-out to re-connect with yourself.
April 7th, 2006 at 5:35 am
Thanks Alvin. Shall try it on.