What is Your Mission Statement?

Before we can really dive into the topic of mission statements, their importance, and how to form one, we need to have a good, working definition of just what a mission statement is…  Wikipedia defines a mission statement as: A mission statement is a statement of the purpose of a company, organization or person, its reason for existing.

For the purpose of this thought I want to focus on the personal aspect of a mission statement, why it’s important to have one, and the heightened sense of purpose that one can gleam from making one to fit their life.  The website, eHow.com, put it perfectly in their response to the question: what is a mission statement:

“A personal mission statement is a written culmination of values, roles, objectives, and self-reflection and self-evaluation. It has the flexibility to change as you change and the ability to keep you focused when you travel down a path that is not acceptable to your own morals and values. Creating a personal mission statement is the first step to a life of success and satisfaction, and anybody with a little time can create one.” By James G. Pradke, eHow Contributor

It’s very common in life to go through your days, your weeks, months, and the years of your life without every really knowing why you’re living, or for that matter, what you’re living for.  What a mission statement can do for you is give you focus and direction towards being a certain kind of person, and it can keep you in line with your highest ideals that you hold about yourself.

In a world where we as people are constantly being pushed from here to there without as much as a thank you from our calendars, it’s growing increasingly important to be able to say “no” to things that conflict with what we want most.  But what happens to the person who doesn’t know who they are or what they stand for?  They get lost in the commotion of life; they grow old and die, and all without reaching their full potential as a human being.

Have you ever wanted to be able to say no to certain things in life and yes to more of what you’d really like to explore?  Have you ever had the sinking suspicion that you were made for more than your current day-to-day?..  A mission statement can help you answer those questions and it can simultaneously help direct the course your life takes from the minute you create your own.

If you don’t stand for something as a person you will inevitably fall for anything.  If you are not grounded in an ideal or a desire in your life, then the wind will be all that’s needed to dissuade you from any course of action, worthwhile or not.

I found that by setting a mission statement for my life I was instantly aligned with what meant most to me, plus it made it a lot easier to say no to people and circumstances that did not align with my statement.

In order for your mission statement to be powerful it needs to be clear and concise, no more than a few sentences, and as much as possible, direct and to the point of your purpose and existence.  For example:  To live a fun life in accordance with my beliefs and values at any given time, and use my talents to add value to my environment in ways that I choose.  Kurt Schmitt (http://www.inspirational-sayings-in-action.com/sample-mission-statement.html) As you can see it doesn’t take many words to start focusing you towards being the person you were meant to be.

My mission statement is as follows:  Choose love and acceptance over everything.  Be the light for others to follow.  Never let someone else define how I view myself.  Your mission statement can be almost anything you want it to be, it can be more broad, or more concise, but in the end it needs to be powerful enough to guide your steps in all occasions. 

The beautiful thing about a personal statement of definition is that it can be done for any aspect of your life, but I believe that the most powerful statements are those that encompass your life in a nut-shell.  The thing to remember here is that you should be totally honest with yourself and the direction of your life, you need to be one with the statement you make or else it won’t be able to serve a true guide.

Once you have established your statement you can base everything you do and say on it.  If someone asks something of you that doesn’t fit your statement about yourself then you have the ability to say no to them, and feel good about saying no. 

A good mission statement will provide you with all the motivation you need to be successful in whatever pursuits you take on.  There’s one thing you must remember though:  life is in a constant state of change and evolution, so be open to allowing your mission statement to change with you as you grow into a different person with different views as time goes on. 

Let your statement be a light in your life that gives direction and motivation; a good personal statement should never limit what you want to experience in life, it should only be a bridge from who it is you are to who it is you know you desire to be.

Once you make your own statement, memorize it and say it out loud as much as possible; make sure the Universe knows just who it’s now dealing with.  The act of saying something out loud sends energy out into the Universe so that who you really want to be can start becoming a reality.

You might find that the statement you come up with does not vibe with how other people see you, that’s perfectly okay…  How often are we truly honest with other people about who we really are?  You’ll find that if you start living by your mission statement the people around you will never second guess who it is that you are again.