Big Plan

On Tuesday I attended a day workshop at UT. Being an urban campus (not quite as urban as BU but not much different), it really felt like college to me. Tangent: when I visit more campus-y schools, those don't elicit thoughts of undergrad from me. Quad? What's a quad? Frat row?? Give me a subway stop and downtown skyline any day!

Anyway, in addition to nostalgia for college, strategic planning was the focus of the day. I think I learned some good things I can use at the office. But for the purpose of this blog, it was also interesting how the prof pointed out using strategic planning in your personal life. Without being morbid, he made the point of when you die, what do you want to be remembered for? What do you want to have under your proverbial belt?

It got me thinking. Ross and I talked a little about it and while I know it was recommended to have three objectives, we're steadily at four:

• Fulfilling careers: Probably pretty self explanatory
• Positive impact on community: Whether at work or by volunteering, this one matters. What good are skills if you don't use them to help people?
• Meaningful relationships: The first two were easy but this one was kind of a product of saying "but we want friends! and date night!" because accomplishments are cool and all, but people are important.
• Happy & healthy family: I don't mean to imply this is the least important but it is the one that makes me giggle. Certainly it's big things like healthy kids who eat good food and exercise (ditto for us) and who are generally happy because they know they are loved. ...But it's also travel, college-savings, ranches and beach condos. I had to have a bucket for those because I am not giving them up.

In chatting about this on a Lexi walk, we realized none of our objectives were "to have a clean house." By the logic of my class, I should eliminate those tasks from my to-do's... which to me means another check mark in my mental "reasons to hire a cleaning person" column. I mean that's the only logical conclusion right??