Part 5 - How To Define and Map Your Life’s Work
Do you know what you'll be doing aged 80? Fate willing, I do. Or at least I have an idea in my head of what I'll be doing because my life's work is very clear to me.
This is Part 5/6 in your Everything You Need To Plan Your Best Year Yet and is the method I use to organise my year. Read the other parts here but remember it's essential to do your Big Woman Energy docs here. I hope this is useful for your 2025 planning!
The concept of a "life's work" is much more than just a career or a series of achievements; it’s the guiding thread that links your passions, values, and skills into something that is bigger than yourself. It’s the thing you can imagine yourself doing at any stage in life because it’s the core of who you are. I settled on mine by asking myself, would I still care about this issue when I'm 80? When I'm on my deathbed, apart from time spent with my loved ones, what would still matter to me?
It's the thing that keeps me motivated but it also is the thing that can overwhelm me. Your life's task is your Important Work, your noble work and it can sometimes feel crushing if you don't achieve it. However the firm knowledge of my life's task keeps me focussed on what to do next and I even if I know it won't be solved in my lifetime, I want to feel that my contribution was honourable.
My life's task is Gender Equity. What's yours?
In an era saturated with productivity hacks and quick fixes, the idea of one’s “life’s work” can feel almost abstract and daunting. It's so far into the future, and possibly unachievable that you may well feel there's no point trying to pinpoint it, but I think it's essential.
To articulate your life’s work is not necessarily to have a neat answer ready for a dinner party. Instead, it’s about recognising patterns, finding meaning in repetition, and, often, giving yourself permission to do what you can’t stop thinking about.
Remember the thing I hate the most is being Busy Doing Nothing
If you feel unsure with what you’re doing with your life then NOT having your life's work clear to you will only make you run faster on your hamster wheel. You may find yourself ping ponging in all different directions and exhausting yourself doing random work, instead of experimenting and testing to uncover your purpose.
You’ve definitely already started working on it
Even though I didn't identify what my Life's Work was until after age 30, when I look back, it was clear that I started to care about Gender Equity when I was 21 years old. I made WAH Magazine in the corner of my student bedroom in 2005 with the aim of highlighting women in hip hop, sort of like Hypebae before Hypebae. That then turned into a unique nail salon/community centre, which had a female empowerment energy and it was only through having a coach and doing self development work, that I realised this was my purpose.
But it was there all along. I was always drawn to Strong Female Characters. I didn’t really notice I was a girl. I played football and believed every opportunity was available. I was born in the era of The Spice Girls. This was me. My thesis is that whatever you were obsessed with between the ages of 5-12 is what you'll be doing for life. So let's figure that out.
In this article I'll share some of the methods I used to find my life's work. There are hundreds of ways you can do this but I'll share what worked for me.
- I'll outline three simple exercises to help you define your life's work
- I'll give you three frameworks from business and spirituality
- You have a Canva Template for the three exercises.
I'll also show you my personal life's work map including what I think I'll be doing in the next decades to come...
