by Jack Skeen
This is not just a business issue. Far from it. It's a matter of physical, emotional, and spiritual health as well. In the middle of so much uncertainty—with the old ways and old rules giving way to new paradigms and new ways of working and living—we owe it to ourselves to become the best, happiest, most fulfilled, contented, and successful human beings possible.
We all know people who are financially successful but unhappy and dysfunctional. Yet the good news is that we live in a time of ever‐increasing awareness about the value of happiness and peace. More and more people are realizing that enduring is no longer enough. We deserve better. No matter where we are in our careers, we want happy lives, healthy relationships, and a sense of purpose and meaning.
We owe it to ourselves and the people around us to not merely survive but to thrive—and The Circle Blueprint offers us a way to get there.
John M. Goense
Introduction
Are you as happy as you would like to be? Don't think too hard about this question; it's a simple yes or no. If the answer is honestly yes, put the book down and look for something else to read. If the answer is no—not that you're unhappy, just not as happy as you would like to be—then this book is for you. Our guess is that if you picked the book up in the first place you are searching for something more. You might not know exactly what it is, but you hope the “more” is out there and if it is, you want it.
You have been successful…at least to some extent. You have probably worked hard at life. You may have a good education. Perhaps you have risen to some level of leadership at work, or raised a family, or put away some money for retirement.
But do you ever ask yourself, “Is this all there is?”
We have asked thousands of people one very simple question: “Are you thriving in your life?” We use the word “thriving” to describe a life where nothing is missing, where you have it all. Thriving doesn't mean you are particularly wealthy or popular but that your life is rich, happy, and meaningful. Those who are thriving have found the more that others seek. We asked them to choose one of the following descriptions of their lives:
I am hanging on by my fingernails. Despite all I have accomplished my life isn't good at all.
I am eroding. I'm not desperate but my life is a grind and does not seem to be headed in a positive direction.
I am treading water—just sort of enduring my situation. My life isn't bad, but I would not say it is good, either.
I am growing. My life is on a positive trajectory. Certainly, it could be better, but I am reasonably satisfied and optimistic about the future.
I am thriving. I am creatively engaged in my work and life. I am at the top of my game. I feel energized, balanced, healthy, and happy.
Approximately one‐third were reluctant to choose a response because the question itself made them uncomfortable. Almost no one chose number five—I am thriving. Most people responded that they were eroding or treading water—enduring their life rather than living it purposefully.
What is true about your life?
We all know stories about people who appear to be thriving. People like Warren Buffett who, at 86 years old and despite his wealth, goes to work every day. You might expect a man who has achieved such financial success to have cashed out and retired to a tropical island, or to have spent at least some part of his wealth on a lavish lifestyle. Not so with Mr. Buffett. He lives in a very modest home—actually the first house he purchased in Omaha, Nebraska. He drives an ordinary car and works in the same office he and his partner have occupied since they started their business. Mr. Buffett does not work because he has to. He works because he wants to. It brings him life. He thrives in what he does.
But, thriving is not only for those who are financially successful. Perhaps you know a couple who, after years of marriage, are still in love. They are thriving in their relationship. Or, people who feel deeply satisfied with their lives, who are making a difference in the world around them. It is not always the rich and famous who live great lives. In fact, more often than not, it is easier for ordinary people to find the pathway that leads to true satisfaction and deep joy.
Marianne Williamson, in A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of “A Course in Miracles,” wrote:
Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, “Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?” Actually, who are you not to be?… We are all meant to shine, as children do…. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.
Williamson speaks to a deep truth; that every one of us has such potential for greatness that it is difficult for us to comprehend or accept. She is calling us to give up our proclivity for mediocrity and to stretch for greatness. As we shine, our light encourages others to shine, as well. Each of us has the ability to radiate a deep joy and contentment while exuding a power more than sufficient to change the world.
It is your right to shine, to thrive, to live a life of purpose and meaning. It is your right to wake up every day saying, “Wow, my life is amazing,” and to radiate joy, power, and peace every moment of every day for the rest of your life. It is your right to thrive.
Thriving is unrelated to material success. Does this surprise you? Certainly, we need money to support our lives, but excessive wealth does not add to life satisfaction. Many very wealthy and outwardly successful men and women feel neither secure nor happy. We know of a man who is desperately working toward his goal of building a $100 million nest egg. He claims he will feel safe enough to relax when he has reached that goal. If this is the standard for well‐being and security, very few of us will ever experience it. Our friend is looking for security where it cannot be found. Until he looks in the right place—inside his own life—he will live with constant anxiety. If he arrives at his goal, he may discover he feels no more secure, and he may just move the goal to $200 million.
You probably are not worth hundreds of millions of dollars, or tens of millions. Most likely not even a million, or a hundred thousand dollars. You find this story to be amusing, if not ridiculous. But if you make $40,000 a year and think you would be unburdened if you only made $100,000, you are playing the same game. Security, peace, and success are not tied to increased financial wealth.
In his book, Drive, Dan Pink observed that thought workers (those who don't work with their hands for a living) are not motivated by money. Once they are paid sufficient money to meet their needs, three things increased their motivation: (1) Autonomy. People liked to have control over how they approached their work and how they did their work; (2) Mastery. People are naturally motivated to improve their skills; and (3) Purpose. People want to feel like their work matters, that it contributes to something bigger than themselves. (Pink 2009) Pink discovered the importance of what we call the Circle Blueprint: a map of life choices that shape the quality, satisfaction, and impact of your life. We all long to live satisfying, meaningful lives. Money has its place, but it is not the primary driver of thriving.
Thriving is the result of tending to what you put in your Circle and mastering the elements of your Circle Blueprint. All of us have the ability to thrive in our lives but many of us have lost track of the path toward thriving and get stuck just enduring or even worse, eroding or hanging on. We end up settling for less. This book was designed to help you rediscover the path that leads to thriving.
One client said, “Using these concepts helped me understand my unique map, the way I am wired on the inside and how to best align with the world around me. I transitioned out of a career I didn't love and started an entirely new one. Now I am much more successful. I find joy and deep satisfaction every day.” Another told us that these concepts helped him find his happiness: “While working through the Circle Blueprint, it hit me one day. I felt a se
nse of freedom and joy I hadn't felt since I was a kid—well before I worried about being popular at school or stressed about pleasing others with what I did in sports or at work. The funny thing is, it was there the whole time, I hadn't really changed, I just needed to free myself to be happy—and the Circle Blueprint helped me do that.”
Our hope is that you will find in this book encouragement and the tools to thrive in your own life. This book is the starting point in a system we have created and designed to move you forward on a path to true contentment in your life. The book introduces and explains both concepts and elements required to create and sustain you on your path. We also acknowledge that a book isn't always adequate to equip you to apply these concepts to your unique life situation. To help you more directly apply the Circle Blueprint to your life, we created the second part of the system: a psychometrically validated self‐assessment designed to bring forward your latent dispositional enduring personality traits as they pertain to the concepts and elements of your Circle. Once these areas have been self‐assessed, the final piece of the system includes workbooks and exercises created to help you move through each element as you gain mastery and balance in your Circle. This system has been designed to allow you to move through your development at your own pace and in total privacy.
Chapter 1
The Circle Blueprint
What is the Circle Blueprint? The Circle Blueprint is a framework that illustrates the conscious and unconscious factors that determine the quality of a person's life. Your Circle encompasses values, dreams, character traits, causes, people—what truly matters to you. It determines who you will become and what you will accomplish. It defines your purpose and ultimately your happiness and satisfaction.
Everyone has a Circle. Your Circle probably includes people you love, such as family members and friends, or causes you care about, like saving the whales, defending your country, or taking a stand for the rights of others. It might include character traits such as honesty, responsibility, or self‐discipline. You may have personal hopes, dreams, or goals in your Circle: finishing your undergraduate degree, working for a certain company, writing a novel, or running a marathon.
In terms of human development, everyone starts off with a small Circle that includes only self‐centered values: comfort, safety, pleasure. Infants are exclusively focused only on the comfort of a full stomach, a dry diaper, and a warm bed. As we grow, life challenges us with opportunities to expand our world that require adding new things to our Circle. The “terrible twos” are noted for a push for independence that shows up in endless questions and persistent defiance. Going to school requires following rules, forming friendships, and learning new skills. Adolescence brings the challenge of breaking away from your family to find your unique place in the world. Each stage of life changes the composition of your Circle. New content is added that changes the mix and balance, and other times, content has to be removed to bring balance. Imagine an adult wearing a diaper and having a pacifier in his or her mouth—these items were long discarded, and much as we remove these items from our lives as we grow, we also have to remove items from our Circle at times if they unbalance our Circle. How we negotiate these challenges of adding and subtracting significantly impacts the quality of our adult lives.
By the time we have reached young adulthood, most people—but not all—have expanded their Circle with activities beyond pleasure, self‐protection, and other self‐focused values. Those whose development has been stunted by trauma or neglect will still prioritize values that are life‐limiting. A person whose Circle is filled with activities limited to pleasure, for example, may take drugs or steal without concern for the future or other people. Even those who grew up in healthy and happy homes can fail to fully develop their Circle and, so, they limit their success and life satisfaction. They may have not completed a fundamental developmental challenge, stopped adding new and more meaningful content to their Circle, or failed to keep the elements of their Circle in balance.
Self‐focused values such as pleasure and self‐protection are not inherently bad. You might listen to music or read classic novels because they give you pleasure. A healthy degree of self‐protection will enable you to set appropriate boundaries and avoid dark alleys. But self‐focused values are inherently limited in the degree to which they allow your Circle to grow—and when your Circle stays small, your accomplishments stay small. In the same way a child's world expands when she learns to walk, the quality and impact of our lives expand as we increase what is in our Circle and as we balance our Circle.
The ways you choose to spend your time is the starting place to understand the size and richness of your Circle. Everyone fills every 24‐hour day with some mix of activities that range from self‐centered to other‐centered, wasteful to meaningful, and pleasure‐centered to cause‐oriented. By keeping track of how you allocate your time over a month, you will have a good approximation of the activities you have included in your Circle. But knowing the activities that are important to you isn't enough to determine the true value of your Circle.
People engage in the same activities for a variety of reasons. One person might serve in his community watch program because he wants to make sure his neighbors are safe. Another person might serve because it makes her feel important or for a sense of adventure. The purpose behind our choices can vary from being extremely significant to being petty or even devious. There may be those who serve in their community watch program only to case the neighborhood for burglary opportunities. Hence, not only what is in the Circle but also the values in your Circle are critically important to understand.
The values in your Circle are not wishes or actions, but motivators that lead to actions. The people and causes in your Circle as well as the values you place within your Circle keep your attention, focus your energy, and direct your activity. They are not merely pipe dreams, but dreams that lead to action, expand your Circle, and impact your life and the lives around you.
How you enlarge and balance your Circle makes all the difference in the world.
Many of the people the world considers to be great were ordinary people who created a very big and masterfully balanced Circle. Mahatma Gandhi began his adult life working as a lawyer, but his career was unremarkable at best. He was so self‐conscious and shy that he could barely speak in court. People made fun of him and it was difficult for him to find work. When he found a job in Africa, he was deeply troubled by the mistreatment of his people by the white ruling class. His concern for others forced him to expand and balance his Circle leading to new choices. Rather than dressing and behaving like an Englishman, he began wearing clothing from his native country. He regularly tended to his countrymen in the hospital. His Circle expanded further when he realized that he needed to do something that would permanently change the political and social landscape of India. Liberating India from British rule was now the focus of his life. This rather inept lawyer now led a nation in a resistance movement and became a man people traveled the world over to learn from.
Similarly, Martin Luther King Jr. was a gifted preacher, but when he expanded his Circle to include the cause of civil rights for all African Americans, he earned a place in U.S. history as an influential leader. Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. are not alone—men and women whom the world might view as just ordinary people impact their lives and the lives of others by enlarging and balancing their Circle.
What Is in Your Circle?
Determine the content of your Circle by asking yourself two questions. What do you spend your time on, and why do you make those choices? If you choose to spend 10 hours each week working out in the gym, it demonstrates that something about your physical well‐being is important to you. If you spend 60 hours each week working, you have placed a high priority on work.
However, it is not enough to only know how you allocate your time. It is also necessary to know why you make some activities important. Working out at the gym because of vanity is quite a differen
t motivation from exercising in order to promote and protect your health. It is not that one is good or the other bad, but we believe the latter motivation to be richer and more meaningful. Similarly, if you are working 60 hours each week because it is demanded of you, that is far different from putting in those long hours because your work is meaningful to you and you believe it has great benefit to others.
Our assessment—which we will walk you through in later chapters—will assist you in understanding the size and quality of what's in your Circle and the balance of the values in your Circle. If you are interested in using the assessment, we encourage you to do so. It will help you understand where you are now in various areas of your life. Are you hanging on, eroding, treading water, growing, or thriving? We offer steps in each chapter that can help you move forward as you begin your journey to make your Circle bigger, more balanced, and richer. It is only by knowing where you are that you can take the next step toward building an even better and more meaningful life.
Chapter 2
Enlarging and Balancing Your Circle
The Tale of Two Brothers
Two brothers were raised in a middle‐class home in a stable, loving family. Both played sports. Both graduated from high school. Both appeared to be living good and meaningful lives and seemed destined to continue on that path. But, appearances can sometimes be deceiving.
In college, the older brother chose to party instead of study. Soon his grades began to suffer and he found himself at risk of failing out of school. He hid his failure from his parents. When he was finally kicked out of school, he pretended he was still enrolled and continued to take his parents' money. His parents took on debt to support him.
