Notes for An Awesome Life with John Spence

Envisioning Your Ideal Life

• Notes for An Awesome Life with John Spence • Episode 5

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Episode 5 - Envisioning Your Ideal Life 

What does your ideal life actually look like and how do you get there? John and Josh unpack a practical visioning process, talk about why “hope is not a strategy,” and then talk about maintaining boundaries, how to say no without guilt, all in the service of much needed self-care.

  • Email us: awesomelifenotes@gmail.com
  • Learn more about John: JohnSpence.com
  • Familiar Wilsons Media: FamiliarWilsonsMedia.com

About John Spence: John is a globally recognized business thought leader, former owner/CEO of five companies, and advisor/coach to organizations from startups to the Fortune 10. He’s lectured at more than 90 universities and was named by the American Management Association as one of “America’s Top 50 Leaders to Watch.”

About the show: Notes for an Awesome Life with John Spence focuses on personal growth, happiness, clarity, and the everyday habits that compound into an AWESOME life.

Credits: Hosts John Spence and Josh Wilson • Produced by Josh Wilson for Familiar Wilsons Media • Special thanks: Amanda Wilson (writing and production), and Domingo Jimenez (writing and marketing).

SPEAKER_02:

This is a familiar Wilsons Media Production. John Spence is recognized as one of the foremost business thought leaders in the world, a global top 100 business thinker and advisor to companies from startups to the Fortune 10. But it didn't start that way. In college, John hit rock bottom, kicked out of one university and rejected by another. That's when he made a decision to change his attitude and take a systematic approach to building the life he wanted. Through hard work and relentless learning, he went on to create a life full of meaning, joy, and connection. I'm Josh Wilson, and this is Notes for an Awesome Life with John Spence. We invite you to join us in conversation as John shares with us the lessons, habits, and tools that he used and that you can use to build an awesome life. And I'm John Spence. John, what is your vision for your ideal life? And has it changed since you were 14 years old?

SPEAKER_00:

14. Well, it has changed since I was 14, but it hasn't changed much since I was about 30. And uh, as we've mentioned before, I'm a little bit over 60 now.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

So um the the exercises, and people are gonna think I'm a freak now, but I am, so that's okay. Um, the exercises we're going through, when I met my wife, I asked her to sit down and do the workbook that you're using that goes over these. What are your values? What's your purpose? What's your mission? And we sat at different ends of a table, did the workshop, sat together, and it was almost exactly the same. So I said, I'm on the right page, or I've got someone that we share the same values, the same thing. But what we did is we sat down and said, All right, what would we like our life to look like five years from today? What's a clear, vivid, realistic vision of the life we want to live? And you know, the list is long. Um, we'll talk about how much do I want to make, how much do I want to have saved, what kind of a house do I want to live in? Uh, you know, for us, do we want to have kids? Do we want to travel? Do we want pets? Are we going to be involved in our community? Are we involved in faith? I can go down a long list of it.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

But she and I spent quite a bit of time and wrote about three pages of if things were going really, really well, and we get up every day and say, Man, this is awesome, as noted in our podcast title, what would that look like? I have them all the way back to that first one we filled out together, uh, which would be what, 30 years ago.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And the life we live now, other than things that are completely out of our control, like health or a few other things, is 90% what we wrote in that book. You know, the only one is we said we wanted to live on a on a lake or on the sea. We ended up living on a next to a guy that's on 400 plus acres uh farm behind us. So it looks like we have a thousand acres. Uh, other than that, the kind of house, the pets, boom, boom, boom. I mean, literally, we gone now. People go, you know, I guess you just, you know, wished that into life. No, we created a checklist. Like my values, you know, we test everything against us. Is the decision we're gonna make right now gonna take us towards the vision we have of our life, allow us to live our values, live our mission and purpose? If it is, let's go do it. If it isn't, it's not gonna help us. So we've redone that that exercise every single year since then, pushed it out another couple years, and like magic, it's the what our life looks like today. So, my vision uh early, I think we've talked about this in it, was about wealth, fame, and power, what most people consider success. Um, my wife and I's vision is quite a bit different. We we still want to do well and enjoy, but here's the key we've made the decisions over the years, three decades, that would take us closer and closer and closer to what we hoped our life would look like at this stage in our lives.

SPEAKER_02:

This sounds every bit like manifestation, the power of positive thinking. Uh oh, that face you're making. Good lord. Wowzers.

SPEAKER_00:

Watch the uh video The Secret.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, yeah. All of these things. Yes, yes. That what what you wrote made me laugh, and I circled it, and it was that it was that we'd all be gorgeous billionaires, and I've at least got one of those things. But you know, when did you make a billion? That's ah, very good. Excellent, yes. Welcome to the last episode of this show, ladies and gentlemen. Um, everything that you're saying is, you know, sounds like that, except for what you said about this just isn't wish. I feel like people right now they have no problem visualizing their perfect life, but I feel like everyone is is trapped in the wish section and not in the okay, let's get this done section.

SPEAKER_00:

There's a two-part lie to this, I think I mentioned in the work. Number one, people think it's easy. It's not, it's really hard work, but it's fun, hard work if you're moving in the direction of your vision, mission, values, and purpose. You know, I no one said it would be easy or super enjoyable at every step along the way, but at least you can get up and say, I'm making progress. And then again, uh people think it'll happen fast. If you've got a lofty, you know, goal or a you know, we're talking about a vision five years from day. Some people are like, oh, yeah, um Mark Zuckerberg started Facebook right out of college and became a billionaire. 17 years before he made his first million.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Uh so you know, and you could go Bezos and all the way down and be, oh, overnight success. No, 15 years, 10 years, 20 years. Uh so it's hard work and it takes a long time, but that's why it's critical that it aligns with your values, your purpose, your mission, and that it's something like your purpose worth dedicating a lot of time, energy, and effort to. There's an example I use, not having a clear vision for your life, clear purpose. It's kind of like if you walked in a sub shop and said, just give me whatever you want to make. Give me no direction, nothing, you know, just give me something I'm gonna love. And then, you know, for me, I'm allergic to mayonnaise and mustard. They would probably slather it with those two things, and I'd get something that I couldn't eat, literally. That a lot of people do that with their life. They'll just, I hope it turns out good. I hope it's, you know, hope is not a strategy. But if you walk in and say, I'd like a turkey sandwich with Swiss cheese, lettuce, tomato, light onion on a white hoagie roll, I'm probably gonna get something pretty close to what I want. Life doesn't work exactly like that, but if I can figure out what I really want, then at least I can make the decisions along the way, and I might get something that's pretty close to what I wanted instead of just hoping that my life turns out good.

SPEAKER_02:

How late is too late to do stuff like this?

SPEAKER_00:

Never. I mean, the earlier you start, the better. You know.

SPEAKER_02:

Again, you had the forethought or the the brilliant flash of of insight to start all of this stuff early. But this isn't just for young people.

SPEAKER_00:

No. No, well, you know, we mentioned I get a lot of people in my classes in their mid-50s.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And they make uh actually, I got an email from one yesterday from uh my class at the Wharton School of Business who said, I took your class 15 years ago, I've been following the outline, I've gotten to where I wanted to get in my career, and now I want to go out and be uh, he's gonna be a consultant, do some other stuff. He goes, but I I did not know this is what I wanted to do until I was in your class and realized I like my job, but I have to get beyond it. I have to I have to make a contribution beyond just helping my company be successful.

SPEAKER_02:

I I am just gonna flash back to the story that you told about sitting with your future wife and running through a workbook. And yeah, you're crazy.

SPEAKER_00:

But it worked well.

SPEAKER_02:

It's interesting though, because as you are crafting your vision and you do have a list of categories of things that that people would go through career, relationships, living situation, vacations, lifestyle, finances, community, and contribution, daily life. What kind of daily life are you gonna have? Social connections, free times, career stage, legacy, and well-being. Wowzers. You know, people don't ever take that full of a stock of when they're figuring out what it is that they're envisioning for their lives, they'll do career, relationships, finances. But this gets really grandular.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, I will go home this evening after we're done and go to the giant grill area behind my house in our giant yard, filled with flowers and butterflies, and run around with our our Vigla uh enjoy. And if you go all the way back, we literally we said we will live someplace, John will grill, we'll have a great yard, and we'll own Vigla. Uh, you know, I could have got a pit bull, but according to my vision and or my wife's vision, uh, we wanted Vigla. And it's it was just as simple as could be. So people go, wow, you know, look at this cool stuff you have, you know, life you've lived. Well, it's been pretty simple. I've been getting up every day and checking off boxes to allow me to do the things that I hoped I would be able to do in my life.

SPEAKER_02:

Let's talk about living in this vision here because you have it set out. Um, in a way, you've created this great shortcut for decision making. And what if you reach the point that an opportunity comes up or something is asked of you and you need to make the decision not to do that? I want to transition a little bit into this whole idea of learning how to say no, which is so difficult for so many people.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, the way I look at it is every time you say yes to something that doesn't get you closer to your purpose, um, your vision, and align with your values is when you're you're saying no to yourself, no to your family. I mean, I get asked to join boards a fair amount, and it's an honor and it's it's great. And I politely decline by saying thank you very much, but I've made a commitment to my family that we will only support one charity at a time so that we can give all our time, treasure, and effort to that. And I think your your uh your charity is wonderful. But if I said yes to you, I'm saying no to my wife and my family, and I can't do that. Uh most of the time people go, say that again. I want to write that down for when people ask me. Yeah. Uh well, let's I'm gonna use a business analogy, but it's exactly the same for people. I mean, I we've said that the stuff I'm teaching you is like putting together a strategic plan for your life.

SPEAKER_02:

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00:

At its essence, strategy is just the allocation of scarce resources. It's how do you invest the time, money, people, equipment, assets you have in an organization to achieve the organization's vision. It's the same in your life. Your life is bounded by very scarce resources. And so I'm gonna go to step two of strategy. One of the greatest things a great strategic thinker does is figure out what to say no to. Where will we not invest money? What markets will we not pursue? What customers will we not serve? Companies that try to be all things to all people be always turn out to be this great thing, bankrupt. So it's the same thing in your life. I have very scarce resources, time, people, money, whatever it is. How do I learn to say no to anything that isn't going to take me in the direction of what I have told myself I want to do? Now, you know, Josh, you and I have talked about this three times. These things can change. You know, uh, if something dramatic had happened in my life or my wife's life, perhaps our vision would have changed. We've been fortunate that, again, other than health things we can't control, um, we've been able to pretty much pursue this with discipline and enjoy the and enjoy the trip very, very much. We've had fun every single day of the week. But I'm not saying that your vision for your life is locked in like your values or your purpose. It may change, and that should, you know, one of the ways I say this is the destination may remain roughly the same, but the way you get there might might take a different route.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And and I want to underline there's a couple of key points we've hit a couple times. First of all, it's never too late to start this, ever. And number two is if you want to be rich, famous, and powerful, and that is truly what you want to achieve in your life, there is nothing wrong with that. You know, if your vision is to become a billionaire and fly around the world and own a private aisle in the Bahamas and, you know, fleet of helicopters, that's truly what you want, that's fantastic. It's just, you know, that is your direction. And another phrase I use, you could pretty much, pretty much have anything you want in life if you're willing to pay the price. The price in time spent, money spent, effort spent, time away from your family, or time away doing other things that you might want to do or think you need to do. If you're will if you're willing to pay the price, you can pretty much accomplish anything you want to.

SPEAKER_02:

This idea of learning to say no is is a very cogent thing to me because, like I've spoken about before, I had a difficult childhood, and that served to turn me into a people pleaser. And, you know, it's been a thing that I've struggled with and that I've had to learn to learn how to say no and not feel bad about it.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. You just the last part of that sentence was the part is to be able to not feel battered or feel ashamed or feel like you've let someone down or offended them. Uh, I've struggled with that too. You know, people ask me for help, and sometimes I don't have the time uh or I don't have the ability to help them. And it's hard to say, no, I'm I'm unfortunately I'm not able to help you. You can't help anybody else if you don't help yourself first. You can't give away what you don't have.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. Yeah, let's talk about that a little bit more because really learning to say no is setting boundaries for yourself and healthy boundaries. Um, talk a little bit more about this idea of self-care not being selfish care.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, um, especially today. This is something A, I learned personally when I went through, and I don't think you and I have uh talked about this so far, but I I have suffered and still suffered from very severe depression. Um, it's been much, much better under control for the last eight years, 10 years. But for a while, I was really struggling hard. And I was embarrassed to tell anybody, you know, I'm supposed to be this thought leader guy. And I I was falling apart. And it wasn't, and and I felt bad, you know. My job is to fix other people's problems. My job is to fix companies, my job is to fix stuff. I didn't feel like it was my job to fix me. That that felt selfish and self-centered, and you know, taking time to to meditate or to go for a walk or read a book or you know, do something like that just felt that's that's wasted time because I'm not doing something to help other people. And then one day I realized if I didn't take the time to take care of myself, and if I wasn't courageous enough to ask for help, I my life was not going to get better. It was only going to get worse. And I think a lot of people feel that, you know, I haven't earned the right to take care of myself, or I don't have time, or that's silly. I should be strong enough, I should be able to handle this pressure, I should be able to. No, you can't. You know, you gotta ask for help. You've got to be um make yourself your own best friend.

SPEAKER_02:

Treat yourself just as well as you would treat someone that you love.

SPEAKER_00:

Absolutely, because you should be someone you love.

SPEAKER_02:

Well, see, yeah, that's the other thing that's what I was about to say is like your ability to love someone fully and deeply goes only as far as your ability to do the same to yourself.

SPEAKER_00:

And people don't think that that's so that what you just said is profound, and I hope people listening to this will stop and and think about that because that's a really, really important idea that a lot of people struggle with. And until you can grasp that and live it, it's really hard to achieve some of the things we're talking about uh that would be your ideal life or the vision for the life you you want to lead.

SPEAKER_02:

On the onset of this section, as I was reading it, um you said that determining some of these things takes takes a really uh honest view and and um assessment of yourself. And that honest view and assessment includes some of the real basic things about being a human, like how to love, how you love, how to show compassion, how to show empathy, how to take care of yourselves. These things should be foundational things, but I don't know that we get taught these things. In fact, no, we don't get taught these things.

SPEAKER_00:

No, we don't. A lot of us don't. You know, many of us don't. I, you know, there was a point in my life, and I don't know how long it was ago, uh, maybe 20, 25 years ago, that I just decided I was gonna try to be the kindest person people met all day. If I go to the grocery store, I go to a store, I go out, um, I want to be the person that makes people smile. The reason is it feels good to me. It makes me feel like I'm making a positive impact on other people's lives. I uh what there's two things that I try to do all the time. You know, a lot of times people go, Hey, how you doing? You go, fine, how are you? Just walk right past each other. And there's no connection there. When some stranger, anybody goes, Hey, how you doing? I stop, I turn them down, I'm doing very well. How are you doing today? And look them in the eyes and I listen to them. Um, and that shocks them at the like this, isn't just a throwaway thing. This person, and I do truly want to know how they're doing. And if they're not doing well, I say, I hope things get better. I truly hope things get better. The other thing I try to go out of my way to do is to thank people that have thankless jobs, to thank the person cleaning the bathroom, or when I'm in a you know, in a hotel or someone wiping down the floor, cleaning the elevator, or you know, being insanely polite to the waiter or waitress because after all, they're waiting on you, they're serving you food. Yeah, why would that not be someone that you really appreciated and and thanked for their willingness to carry stuff for you to eat? So I I have had people remark that they can't believe that I know the waiters and waitresses' name and I thank them and point things out. I'm thinking, uh how would you not? How did how does this not work that you're polite and kind and say thank you and show respect for other people? But I I believe it took me a while to realize that I thought I thought that was important. It matched my values. Yeah. So I decided to change the way I act and behave to be more aligned with my value, honesty, health, love, laughter, learning. Yeah. I've got to be a loving person.

SPEAKER_02:

Very, very good. All right. What's the homework for this week when it comes to really what talks about vision? We talked about saying no, but really setting boundaries, and then we wandered into self-care as we are wont to do.

SPEAKER_00:

I think I'm gonna say two, two or three things. Number one is I think people need to dedicate some time to writing down their vision. Uh, and but key here is be realistic. If you actually believe you're going to win the lottery, then go ahead and put that. And if you believe you're gonna quintuple your income in three years, and it's possible, then put that. I think a lot of people write a vision statement or a vision that is so outrageously out of their reach that's not going to do anything but depress them. So you've got to be realistic. Number two, I would look back at something you said yes to in your life that is something you should have said no to. I think every one of us can look back and go, I should have had enough courage to say I don't want to be on that committee, or I don't, I can't do this, whatever it might be, or I shouldn't go out to, you know, tonight, or whatever it might be. And then number two is like you said, set your boundaries. Think about some stuff going forward of how to protect your time or how to live your values and have the courage to say, I'm, I just can't do that. I I appreciate the offer, but I'm my time is tied up on some other things that I'm dedicated to. And I I wish you well in this endeavor. Uh so what should you have said no to that had a negative impact? And what are a few things that you will say no to when they come up in the future?

SPEAKER_02:

All right. Well, I'll get on that too. Folks, we want to hear from you. Drop us a line, ask us questions, tell us how you're doing on the journey by emailing awesomelifenotes at gmail.com. That's awesome life notes at gmail.com. To find out more about John Spence, you can go to johnspence.com. This has been a Familiar Wilsons Media production. You can find out more about the other podcasts we offer at FamiliarWilsonsMedia.com. Or maybe you want to start a podcast. Let me know. Special thanks for this episode, of course, goes to Amanda Wilson and Domingo Jimenez. And until next week, folks, you got your homework. Now go out there and live an awesome life.