The Measure of a Life

The bulk of the work I do revolves around how work, money and meaning weave together to create a legacy from your life. 

Conversations with several clients have been reverberating for me around this topic of how to measure the impact of the life they have each lived.   

One bemoaned to me that she felt as if she hadn't made anything significant of her life yet, seeing as how she hasn't risen to the CEO role in a Fortune 100 company yet. Her young son asked her if she thought it was worth it to be running another big company. She answered, "Absolutely." Her son muttered under his breath as he walked away, "Well not for me."  

Another expressed disappointment that he hadn't been able to secure a close yet with an anchor investor for his new fund. Meanwhile, he and his wife have drifted so far apart that I've suggested on multiple occasions that they seek out a therapist before their relationship is beyond salvage. He's told me that he's not sure it's worth trying, especially since chasing down investors has him on the road more than he's home. 

And, a third client is struggling with how to navigate his one-year "garden" leave while his non-compete period runs its course. Instead of focusing on doing things that would give him pleasure with his high school age daughter and aging father in this paid year off, he continues to obsess about positioning himself in the marketplace for visibility because he worries he's becoming "stale" and won't be "marketable" if he isn't "in the game". 

The Making of a Legacy  

I think these conversations are all the more poignant because, this week, our nation has been reflecting upon the life and legacy of a former President. The news has been filled with talk of what constitutes George H.W. Bush's legacy. What are the marks of significance for this man's life (or for yours)? For what will he (or you) be remembered?  

Whose Version of Your Legacy Matters Most to You?  

The interesting thing about a legacy is that it depends upon the lens through which we are viewing it. 

One client recently told me that he wanted to live the kind of life that would WOW anyone who was reading his obituary. I asked him to tell me the details of the last obituary he had read. I then asked him to tell me the feeling he had when he thought of that person. And how long those details and feelings stuck with him.  

Then I asked him to tell me a story about a grandparent or a mentor, not a stranger about whose life he had read. To tell me the feelings he had when he thought of that person who he had actually known and how long those details and feelings stuck with him. 

Are you surprised that his answers were different? 

An obituary is a snapshot, not a nuance-filled biography of a life. The average obituary is 836 characters. Not even 836 words. It is a public summary of a life. A summary that barely lingers for longer than a few minutes in the minds of the strangers who read it. 

What 836 characters would most sum up your life? And, for whose consumption would it be written? 

If you are laying out the trajectory of your life in the hopes to create a powerful snapshot, what would you most like to be in it? Who would you most like to treasure those snapshots? 

I heard Linda Wertheimer of NPR tell a story recently. She had asked President Bush whether being sworn in as President was the most satisfying moment in his life. He replied that, in fact, the happiest day he could recall was actually when he had been a young husband and father, newly returned from war and just enrolled in college. He reflected on knowing that his wife and young son (Bar and Georgie) were safely at home in their small apartment in New Haven and that he knew he would see them later that warm Fall afternoon. It wasn't the big moments that filled the lens of legacy for him and his family, it was the small ones. 

That doesn't mean that the man wasn't ambitious, nor that you shouldn't be. But, the focus of your ambition may shift in an interesting way when you shift the lens through which you most want your life and your legacy to be viewed. 

Is it a public lens? Or a private lens? Is it the lens of those closest to you or the lens of strangers? 

Who do you want to be taking the measure of your life? 

How Do You Want to be Remembered? Has Your Life Been Significant?  

Starting with this question "How do I want to be remembered?" opens the gate to the garden where you will plant the seeds for living your life as if you matter.  

In a prior column called A Simple Tool for a Happy Life You Can Be Proud Of , I considered the questions: What is important to you? What are your values?  

I invite you now to ponder: How do you want your life to touch others? What would make you proud? If you had to do one thing to improve your world, what would your contribution be? How can you increase the well-being of those who depend upon you? How can you leave your mark on whatever you do? How has your life mattered SO FAR?  

The answer to these introspective questions will help you develop a meaningful philosophy of life that goes beyond just creating public awe. Your words and your actions are the building blocks of your legacy. Knowing what's important, what drives you and how you want to be remembered (and by whom) creates tremendous clarity in how you should live your life. In fact, it IS the measure of your significance.  

How Would Your 836 Characters Read?  

If your life was to end today, what words would be written? Who would read those 836 characters? Who would treasure them? What would have to be left out?  

If you're feeling uncomfortable, good.   

We live in a culture that pretends that death happens to other people, that WE will somehow have more time to do or say what matters most. On average, 6,775 people die every day in the United States. What makes you so arrogant as to believe that you are exempt from being one of them? Or that someone close to you will be exempt? Or that you will know in advance when you will die and will be granted a solid measure of additional time to do and say the things that matter most?  

I was at a cocktail party last night and a man I was talking to about this topic said, "Well, my family is long lived. My grandma lived to the ripe old age of 98, so I've got plenty of time. I don't have to worry about that!" I challenged his assumption with this question: "Do you know anyone who died from anything other than old age?" And then with this one: "Do you think they knew they would die prematurely? What made them deserve to have their life cut short?"   

The truth is that no one deserves to have their life cut short, but the reality is that it does happen. Unexpectedly. To continue to live in the fantasy that you have an unlimited amount of time and to mindlessly choose to spend your time and energy doing things that don't matter to you and the people you love is madness. Snap out of it! I'm betting that every single person reading this column knows someone who died unexpectedly or long before reaching "a ripe old age."   

Read this - you do not have a Hall Pass that will allow you to bypass death - yours or those of people you love - so make your choices wisely. Your legacy is being made from the choices you make, day by day.  

Worry About The Right Things  

The most precious resource you have is TIME, not money. It's the one thing you can't save or make more of. You know you have an allotment, but you have no idea when you will run out. Time is actually the resource with the most uncertainty around it and yet we pretend that it is money we are most afraid of running out of. Focusing our attention on ensuring we have enough money is how we foolishly try to banish our uncertainty about our own certain death.   

The man at the cocktail party tonight said, "I worry I'll outlive my money. I have to be conservative with my estimate so I don't run out." I asked him, "What if your calculation is off in the other direction and you run out of life?" He nervously laughed and said, "At least my wife & kids will be well taken care of." Is that what it means to take care of our families? Is that the legacy you want to leave from your life? "At least Dad left me some money." Seriously? 

Look, money matters ... it's just not the thing that matters MOST. 

I taught a workshop recently to a group of CEO's and their spouses. One of the men said he "planned to die at his desk."  When I pressed him, he said, "I feel like I'm dying when I'm not working. That's the place I feel most alive." I watched his wife's face. She tried to hide her profound sadness as she realized that he just said out loud that he would rather work than spend time with her. At work , not with her or their children, was where this man said he felt most alive.  

What 836 characters would most sum up the actual legacy this man was leaving as he poured his life's energy into creating an obituary that would WOW readers of a national paper but was leaving his family parched with longing for his affection and attention? 

Success, Significance and Legacy  

To be certain, you can be successful without having a significant life, but success without significance is hollow. A legacy of significance transcends one's lifetime, influencing the lives of generations that follow.  

We will all leave some sort of a legacy, even if we did not plan for it. Others will always describe our legacy from their lens. Your job is to figure out which lens you are building your legacy for - 836 characters of WOW to be read by strangers or memories that line the hearts of the people who knew and loved you most. 

It really is a choice you make, moment by moment, day by day. Don't be lulled into thinking money is what you have a limited amount of. The clock IS ticking and what you do with the time you have is what will make the measure of your life. 

There will be much talk over the coming days about what the former President's legacy was. Pay attention to what you hear and from what lens the speaker is viewing.  

Perhaps of greater significance is the question "What will be your legacy and whose measurement matters to you most?"

*** 

As part of my own tribute to the conversation around legacies, I am offering a limited number of sessions for readers at a discounted rate of $100 each. To claim yours, or to pay it forward for someone else who needs it, send me a note with the phrase "The Legacy Conversation" in the subject line.