The Cycle to Design, Engineer, and Build the Life You Want
You are constantly developing your life.
Creating your ideal life is a constant and iterative process. You move from one part of the cycle to another, constantly changing and improving. In a minute, I will lay out my easy-to-follow four-step process for creating the life of your dreams.
Nothing in life is a linear journey. You must be dynamic and willing to fail. Without mistakes and falls, there is nothing to learn and grow from.
Let's explore how this cycle works and how you can leverage each phase to craft your ideal life.
The Cycle
The cycle represents an ongoing process where each stage feeds into the next.
However, you can jump into any step at any time. When you remain fluid, you can revisit past steps to gain more understanding for future steps.
The cycle is as follows:
Assessment - assessing where you currently are in your life
Design - develop what you want to achieve, who you need to be to achieve it, and why you want to do it
Engineer - create a feasible plan of how to do that
Build - get into action and build the vision into reality
Each phase builds into the next. Since the cycle is iterative, you constantly learn from one phase to the next. What you learn will improve other phases, ensuring you are continually developing and progressing.
Here is a deep look into each step of the fours step process:
Assessment
Assessment addresses the question, "Where are you at?"
Building the life you want requires forging your path. This starts with a pivotal step: self-assessment. You must understand where you are to plan your next steps toward your objective.
Assessment is the foundation of life design. It requires you to thoroughly inventory your current situation—your skills, passions, and values. Then, you analyze the balance of crucial elements of your life, such as health, connection, work, play, and finances.
Start by asking yourself these questions:
How are things going?
What brings me joy?
Where do my strengths lie?
What are my core values?
By diving deep into where you are, you understand where to go next.
Design
Design addresses the question: "What do I want to do?" "Who do I need to become?" and "Why do I want it?"
Design is an art form. It is creative self-expression and uses human emotion to express an idea. You are using your creative instincts to sketch out your vision for your future life.
If you are going to dream big, do so with precision. Design a lifestyle around your key strengths, your core values, and what brings you joy. Envision yourself living that life and write down all the juicy details. What does it feel like? What does it look like? Who is around you? How have you structured each day?
This phase is not just about the 'what' but also about the 'who.' Who do you need to become to realize the vision? What skills does your future self have? How do you present yourself? What are you like to be around?
The most critical step of this phase is clarifying your why. Why is this important to you? Who will you be helping? How will becoming this new person change your life and the lives around you?
Use all your creative and emotional energy. Pour all your imagination and artistic energy into this step.
Engineer
The engineering phase asks, "How will I do it?"
Engineering is the science. The architect develops the building's purpose, look, and feel. Engineers develop how to make that vision stand up to the physical limitations of our world. They take the core concept and figure out how to make it work.
You need a basic plan before you can build the life you want. You need to figure out at least the next few steps to confidently take action.
That plan can be partially ironed out. You can make a hypothesis and define the experiment you will run. Once you have built and run the experiment, you can return and assess how it went.
Spend a little time to crunch the numbers and put a plan on paper.
Build
Building is getting into action.
The final phase of the cycle is where the rubber meets the road. Building is about taking action and implementing the plan you've engineered. It's about making things happen through consistent effort and adapting as you learn from each step.
Doing something can teach you a great deal. Once you do something, you can assess how it aligns with your core self and make critical design and engineering changes to build again. This feedback loop is crucial, helping you refine and improve your approach.
Building the life you want is a dynamic and ongoing process. By actively engaging in each phase of this cycle, you move closer to your dreams and continually evolve as a person.
When you get stuck, keep the cycle spinning.
