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Copyright © Louis Schmier and Atwood Publishing.
Date: Tue 3/9/2004 3:59 AM
Random Thought: Personal Mission Statements, III
I've been sitting in the dark by the fish pond this morning,
aching and thinking a tad more than usual. Aching because it was a very,
very rough and tough walk. I barely made it. This powerful antibiotic
the urologist has put me for the next couple of week is subtley killing
me. Better an antibiotic should be "killing me" figuratively than to have
a cancer do it literally. But, even if that Levaquin does drain some of
my physical energy, having the biopsy come back clear as a bell, to use a
mixed metaphor, is more than enough to give me an emotional and spiritual
compensating kick. Thinking because I reflectively think and mediate each
morning to prepare myself for the day, my sense of life is a bit more
sharpened because of my near-death car accident in December and the deadly
prospect of being afflicted with cancer, and because of the overwhelming
number of responses to my first sharing on my personal mission statement.
You know, to acquire a personal mission statement does take a lot
of long and hard personal reflection. That's not easy. Personal
reflection stuff can be a tough swallow for those whom reflection is not
their cup of tea. It is uncomfortable and difficult and humble question
marking. It is not comfortable and easy exclamation pointing. Trust me.
I know. I avoided it for decades and blamed the world for my pain. My
unexpected and volcanic epiphany broke the pattern. Imprisoning blame has
since metamorposed into a releasing responsibility. "Me" has since
transformed from a comfortable, weakening, paralyzing, unnatural
stasis-like "is" to a challenging, strengthening, dynamic, naturally
ever-changing "becoming." Now, after over a decade has passed since that
crucial moment at Hyde School, reflective time is built into every fiber
and every moment of my life. I struggle to live a conscious, reflective
life in order to know myself, who I want to be, what I want to do, to whom
and what I want to give my life, the values I value, and the legacy I want
to leave. It's akin to asking myself the tough question, "Will you follow
me wherever I take you?" and coming up with the even tougher answer,
"Yes."
"Know thyself." That's what the ancient, wise, old Greeks said
to do. That sums up the purpose of a Personal Mission Statement. If you
know who you are, you know what you must think, feel, and do.
Institutions don't not have mission statements; people do! I think I've
said that a few times lately. It's worth saying a thousand times to drive
home the point. Institutions aren't sentient; people are. Anyway, if
people want institutions to have mission statements, they each have to
start with their own. Then, they can work long and hard to build from a
"my" to a shared "our." It's no different from saying that if someone
wants to change the world, he or she first has to start with himself. We
each create and are contained in our perceptions, thoughts, personal
relationships, and social associations. We create our own personal
"systems." We choose to be who we are. To understand that simple fact,
and accept the consequent responsibility, we have to acknowledge it. A
personal mission statement is simply the publically articulated emotional,
intellectual, spiritual, and social "system" of our own creation in which
we choose to operate.
A personal mission statement, then, is, as Emerson might have
said, the blossom from which comes the seed that develops into the fruit.
It is the inseparable cause of the effect. It is a suggestion for the
future of ourselves, a template for meaning, a reason for being, a living
"on purpose." It gives someone the chance to establish what is important,
to chart a course, to go on an adventurous journey into the unknown, to
draw energy, to weather the storms, to slog through the swamps, and to
make decisions to stay the course. It's a way to connect with your sense
of purpose, your vision, your mission, your doings, and get profound
satisfaction from doing it. It is, as Maslow might have said, so
compelling, so strong, it is inseparable from a person's self. For me, as
my e-colleague, Stu Harvey, succinctly put it, you have to struggle to
become your personal mission statement. A personal mission statement is
for your own life; it is your life. If you live by a personal mission
statement, you make the heady decisions and don't waste your time on the
"small stuff." For me, as these past couple of weeks have shown me,
acquiring a deeply reflected and articulated personal mission statement,
and struggling each day to fulfill it, is probably the most vital thing I
could have done.
My Personal Mission Statement talks about my own life rather than
about my institution, although they can be a shared vision. It is a
vision for the future of my life, not the operation of my institution,
although they can be compatible. It is what Plato might have said is the
"good academic life," maybe even just the plain ole "good life." By the
"good life," I mean being in the place where I belong, being with the
people I love, doing the right "on-purpose" work, using my talents on
something I believe in and is greater than me, retaining my intellectual
independence, holding on to my moral convictions, having an unshakable
ethical anchor, being personally responsible, and being spiritually whole.
My personal mission statement, for me, meets my four criteria for
a personal mission statement or maybe for any institutional mission
statement for that matter:
1. It had to obey, as Newton phrased it, Nature's Law of Parsimony. It
had to be short and simple, short and simple enough to leave no room for
the meaningless and nice sounding embellishments and ramblings of those
undefinable "oh, you know what I mean" shopworn buzzwords, tired cliches,
and catchy phrases.
2. In its simplicity it had to have clarity, that is, it had to be clear
enough to be understood by a teenager.
3. I had to be able to recite it instantly on Jeopardy.
4. It had to be at my moral, ethical, intellectual, emotional, and
spiritual core. Or, in the words of Steve Sample, it had to be the "hill
you're willing to die on."
Oh, want to know what my Person Mission Statement is? I've said
many times in the course of my sharing. But, I never tire of saying it:
Just remember, it's mine; it's me. So far, it reads like this:
"I am that person who is there to help another person help
him/herself become the person he or she is capable of becoming."
I still have to learn to better live it and better live up to it. More
later. Until then....
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