IF YOU DON’T WANT TO BE AIMLESSLY BUSY, ASK YOURSELF WHAT’S NEXT?

If someone ask you so ” WHAT’S NEXT? “, what would your answer be?

From experience, many people don’t answer this question with great clarity and preparedness. Most seemed to be caught off guard by the question. For instance, you can sense their unpreparedness in their shifting eyes, verbal preambles, and pregnant pauses.

Ambushed By What’s Next?

Yesterday at lunch, I was sharing with my friends what I have been busy with lately. And then, out of the blue, I was ambushed with that question, “so what’s next Kim Pong?” 

I was definitely not expecting the question. But when it came, everything that I was doing or thinking up to that point all came to a screeching halt. I was momentarily “stunned”. And my mind was racing to find answers to the question.

I remembered I started rambling. It began with a preamble, a pause, a shifting of eyes and then a response … “well … I think … I am deepening my competencies for what I am doing …”. 

As I was saying it, I was screaming in my head “WHAT ARE YOU SAYING?!”

And I tried to deflect my rambling by asking the same question around the table, “so what’s next for you guys?”. And interestingly, the answers I got that sounded very much similar … “I don’t know”, “not much ”, “no change lah” and “litat lor”. And all said with preambles, shifting eyes and pregnant pauses. 

Wow. It certainly looked like I am not the only person who didn’t quite have a ready response.

Annoyed

In retrospect, I was a little annoyed with myself. Because for someone like me who has the “Futuristic” talent theme in the CliftonStrengths StrengthsFinder, thinking about what’s next should have been a very natural thing for me, and yet, I found myself reaching for the answer. I should know my “what’s next” and be able to articulate it. 

But I struggled.

As I pondered on my hesitation and uncertainty yesterday, it actually made me question the relevance and impact of all the things I have been busy with everyday. Have my busyness been the best use of my time and resources? Have they been really useful, helping me reach my goals and hitting the mark? Or am I deviating, stuck in status quo, aimlessly busy and should be doing something else?

A Moment Of Clarity

I realized that although I have consciously been busy doing, I may not have consciously been busy thinking about my “what’s next?” 

It turned out that this realization was a significant moment of clarity for me.

So if I don’t know my “what’s next?”, then I probably wouldn’t know where I am going or what I really wanted to achieve. I may therefore be aimlessly busy with no clearer strategy for my life, work, relationships or the things I truly wanted to accomplish. 

Knowing my “what’s next?” crystallizes my present and align it to my desired future. Because knowing what’s next gives me the clarity and intention to do what’s right. It tells me if what I am doing today is relevant, impactful and going to help me achieve what I wanted.

And not knowing my “what’s next?” can simply be me just being busy. Or even worse, be aimlessly busy.

So Kim Pong, what’s next? …

… I guess I have some thinking to do.

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#reframemasterclass #leadership #purposedriven #clarity #engagement #personaldevelopment #purpose #strategy

Note: this article was first published on www.kimpong.com where I publish frequently my thoughts and observations that helps individuals be a better more purposefully driven person and hence a better leader, manager, executive, parent, friend ...