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Episode 4200:
Colin Wright explains why describing your ideal lifestyle in as much detail as possible matters before making a major change, an often skipped step in intentional living. He shares how this exercise once led him to give up most of what he owned and travel full-time, and how dreaming freely again helped him combine travel, home comforts, work, and routines into one new plan. The takeaway is to spend time envisioning what could be, so that what you build is something you truly want.
Read along with the original article(s) here: https://exilelifestyle.com/envisioned/
Quotes to ponder:
"Realizing when something needs to change, and allowing yourself to consciously acknowledge that fact, is important."
"Taking your first step toward accomplishing the goal you set as your new ideal situation is also critical."
"And the more accurately you can calibrate your compass, the more specific you get, the more direct your path to your intended destination will be."
Optimal Living Daily is a daily personal development and self-improvement podcast where we narrate the best self-help articles on minimalism, productivity, and intentional living, read to you by a professional narrator so you can live your best life a little more every day.
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[00:01:10] [SPEAKER_01] This is Optimal Living Daily. Envisioned by Colin Wright of ExileLifestyle.com. I'm your narrator, Justin Malik, the guy that reads blogs or articles to you every single day of the year, including weekends and holidays. I appreciate you listening every single day. It means a lot. We're going to get right to our next post as we optimize your life.
[00:01:38] [SPEAKER_01] With as much detail and precision as possible, describe your ideal lifestyle. This is what I asked myself to do back in 2009 when I first allowed myself to think about a world beyond my business, beyond LA, beyond the goals I've been chasing my entire adult life. And this was a necessary ask because at that moment, I didn't really know what my ideal lifestyle was. I knew there was travel involved and I knew that I didn't want to maintain the breakneck professional pace I'd been keeping for the preceding few years.
[00:02:08] [SPEAKER_01] But beyond that, much fuzziness, vagueness, a lot of not this and not much this. Which is a problem if you're hoping to actually move towards something rather than just moving away from something else. It's useful to know where you don't want to be, what you don't want to be doing with your time. But unless you want a chance ending up somewhere equally non-ideal or perhaps even someplace worse, it's prudent to at least determine in which direction you should be walking.
[00:02:36] [SPEAKER_01] And the more accurately you can calibrate your compass, the more specific you get, the more direct your path to your intended destination will be. It's this thought process that resulted in me getting rid of almost everything I owned, scaling down my business to something I could run from my laptop, and beginning to travel full-time. Which turned out to be one of the best decisions I've ever made in my life. I found myself making this same internal request for clarity not long ago.
[00:03:02] [SPEAKER_01] I've enjoyed this most recent, more geographically tethered juncture of my journey, but I'm also ready for what comes next. Unfortunately, aside from something different than what I've been doing these last two years, I hadn't figured out what my next step should be with any specificity. So I took a couple of days to just dream, to imagine what life might look like if I could have all the things I wanted, to envision the specifics of that dream,
[00:03:28] [SPEAKER_01] even if they didn't seem like elements I'd be able to cram together into one cohesive lifestyle. Then I got to work making the resultant, cobbled-together vision a tangible reality. I wanted to travel, but also to continue to enjoy some of the benefits of having a home base I've come to love these past two years. I wanted to have my guitar and keyboard, my cooking vessels and oven in which to put them, a consistent bed and a really cozy duvet. I wanted to maintain my beloved workout routine and eating habits,
[00:03:58] [SPEAKER_01] and to continue producing my podcast each week. I wanted to be able to keep improving upon these models while also elevating a few of my professional pursuits to the next level. I wanted to ensure I can make positive lifestyle adjustments alongside positive career adjustments. I also very much wanted to get back out into the world to meet up with folks who read and listen to my work and who might be interested in some of the things I'm keen to share and talk about. And I was determined to make all of this happen
[00:04:26] [SPEAKER_01] without resorting to a lifestyle model I've tried before. I knew, for instance, that I could probably set up a home base somewhere and spend half my time there, half on the road, living out of my carry-on bag. But I've done both of those things before, explored those lifestyle models, and I felt like predicating my next steps on reliable knowns rather than venturing into the unknown would make me more comfortable but would also stymie my growth. My current plan to tour North America in a motorhome,
[00:04:54] [SPEAKER_01] performing a speaking tour along the way, took a surprisingly long while to bubble up as a possibility despite all the time I spent letting these next step preferences percolate. The combination of moving to a new location every two weeks, exploring the area, giving a few talks, meeting some new people, and then moving on makes perfect sense to me in retrospect. But even with all the pieces there having imagined a life with all these elements somehow yoked together, I still needed to spend some time with them.
[00:05:22] [SPEAKER_01] I needed to get a sense of the scope of the thing before I could amalgamate them into something meaningful and before I could plan out something that might actually emulsify rather than remaining a jumble of disparate ingredients. Realizing when something needs to change and allowing yourself to consciously acknowledge that fact is important. Taking your first step toward accomplishing the goal you set as your new ideal situation is also critical. But don't neglect that middle step of envisioning what could be,
[00:05:50] [SPEAKER_01] of shuffling all the pieces around, sorting them out, getting a sense of how they could work, so you can be more certain that what you're putting together is something you truly, passionately want to make a reality. You just listened to the post titled, Envisioned, by Colin Wright of ExileLifestyle.com. And I'll be right back with my commentary.
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[00:07:10] [SPEAKER_01] fast free shipping, and financing with flexible payment options. Visit dell.com slash deals. That's dell.com slash deals. Thank you to Colin. I think it's a great practice to try. Simply imagine your ideal day. Write it out as if you were scheduling a day that was actually going to happen. You can do this by hour if you want. For example, wake up at 8 o'clock,
[00:07:39] [SPEAKER_01] have breakfast while listening to a podcast, exercise at 9 or 10 o'clock, get ready for the day, and so on. This is just picturing what your perfect day would look like, and it might surprise you, it might be completely different than you think. For Colin, this re-evaluation made him realize that going on tour is the perfect model for him at that moment in time. And sure enough, he was able to turn that vision into reality. He went on tour and booked the venues.
[00:08:08] [SPEAKER_01] You never know what could come from a simple exercise and by writing it out. So something to think about today. Let me know how it goes and what you come up with. It's always nice to hear from you. Have a great rest of your day. Thank you for being here. And I'll see you tomorrow as usual where your optimal life awaits.