My personal mission statement.
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Do I have a personal mission statement?

By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Counselor.

My personal mission statement.

I recently wrote a post for this blog about creating a personal mission statement. (Creating the life you want.) I offered several suggestions on how to go about defining the mission of your life, the essential thing or things that gives your life meaning and purpose, and how to write a personal mission statement. This raises the question of whether I have done this process and what my personal mission statement is.

Maybe explaining my own personal mission statement will help you in crafting yours.

Let me tell you about my personal mission statement and how I came about writing it. I wrote a personal mission statement several years ago after having taken a class on creativity and how to apply that creativity to writing. I followed the instructor’s suggestions for creating a personal mission statement. I have no doubt that the instructor was primarily thinking about a mission statement for my writing activities. However, I had taken the viacharacter.org character strengths and virtues test shortly before, which influenced my thinking.

A mission statement should be the “why” of what you are doing.

I especially like Simon Sinek’s book Start with Why. While the book is mainly about businesses and what makes them successful, the principal has a broader application. People who know why they are doing something are much more likely to be successful and happy with their lives. Planning a course of action based on what you will be doing, rather than why you’re doing it, may take you in the totally wrong direction.

For example, many people start with, “I’m going to make my life happier by making a lot of money.” Then, they set out on whatever path they think will make the most money. I see many of those people end up in jobs or careers that make them miserable, but they continue to try to convince themselves they must do it that way because, in their minds, they will be happier if they make more money. The connection between money and happiness is much more complicated than just more money equals more happiness. I’ll write more this year about happiness, what this strange creature looks like, and how to achieve it.

I seem to be chronically busy. But why?

In working on a mission statement, I had to think less about what I wanted to do and more about why I was doing it. Some parts of my life didn’t fit together coherently. I’m one of those people who has spiraled through various careers. My most recent career, and one I’m still working at, is being a counselor, therapist, and coach. Clearly, one of my joys in life is trying to be of service and help others. But that didn’t fit clearly with the other parts of my life.

I also spend a lot of time reading, and I read very widely. Some of its technical counseling-related publications, and I read a large amount of research. But I also read a lot of novels. It’s hard to spend a lot of time talking to people, which is what a counselor does, and still get a lot of reading done.

The other thing that brings me a lot of joy is writing. I find it hard to spend time writing, and I often procrastinate. But once I get started putting the words on the page, it brings me a great deal of joy. So, taking all of these various aspects, the things that I was struggling to find time to fit into my schedule, and making them into a single coherent “how do they fit into my life’s mission” was a challenge.

I started by incorporating my core strengths into my mission statement.

My top core strengths, listed in order, are as follows: 1. Love of learning 2. Creativity 3. Curiosity 4. Humor 5. forgiveness, and 6. Zest. There are, of course, 24 character strengths overall, but I thought if I could incorporate at least those top 6 into my mission statement, it might provide a blueprint for organizing the rest of my life.

My mission statement needed to include what I would do and why.

Love of learning and curiosity go well together. My whole life, I’ve been incredibly curious, which has led to me learning a little bit, often more than just a little, about a wide variety of subjects. Clearly, this fits well with all the books I read and the fact that I’ve been going to school, either as a student or a teacher, for over 70 years now. But that didn’t exactly address the why.

Creativity certainly fits with writing a blog, writing books, and creating YouTube videos, all of which are certainly activities I enjoy. Still, there needed to be a deeper meaning and purpose for all this frantic activity.

The frantic minutes of my life certainly are addressed by core strength number 6. I’ve always had a lot of zest for living. Most of my life, I couldn’t wait to get out of bed in the morning and get to doing all the things I wanted to do that day. I’ve learned that my to-do list needs to be things I “want to do,” not things I “have to do.” I’m much happier when I can do as many of the “want to do’s” as possible each day.

How did I incorporate forgiveness into my mission statement?

It dawned on me that I started my counseling career working with people with substance use disorders, criminal justice populations, and people with serious mental illnesses. One of my firm beliefs as a therapist is that people can change. So, no matter what they’ve done in the past, I tried to see the potential that if they learn more, they can change their thinking, feeling, and behaving and create a positive well-functioning life.

What was the end result of my personal mission statement?

My mission in life is to learn, create, and share with joy, enthusiasm, and love.

That statement pretty well sums up the direction my life is headed these days. I hope you enjoy reading some of the things I’m writing or watching some of the videos I’m making and that, in the process, you might create that positive, flourishing, happy, and contented life you deserve.

Does David Joel Miller see clients for counseling and coaching?

Yes, I do. I can see private pay clients if they live in California, where I am licensed. If you’re interested in information about that, please email me or use the contact me form.

Staying in touch with David Joel Miller.

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