Design your Life

Many of us live our lives passively. We do not have complete oversight over our life. We go with the flow hoping to latch on to anything good that comes our way. This is why a lot of us are in career paths that we have no interest in. We are in relationships with people who do not fancy. It is why many of us a miserable, living unfulfilling lives.

We are not actively intentional about what we want or do not want. In design, there is something called design thinking. Design thinking is an extremely hands-on approach to problem-solving favoring action over the discussion. Design thinking is both an ideology and a process that seeks to solve complex problems in a user-centric way. In essence, design thinking obsesses over the user as well as actions to solve the user’s problem.

Now, I am not a designer, and I know little about design thinking but look around you, and you will see how almost everything seems to be made especially for you. It was like they thought about you like you were in the picture. This is what design thinking involves.

To design your life means to make it functional for you just the way you want it. Functional will be both in terms of use and enjoyment. Let’s skip all the design talk and talk about how you can incorporate some of the tenets of design thinking.

First of all, it starts with asking yourself the difficult question of what you want. Now, note that this question is not necessarily a conclusive answer because in reality, what we want would always change. Moreso, your answer can be a bit broad like, I just want to be happy I want to have a successful career, or I want a happy marriage.

I would advise that you ask this question across the different aspects of your life like – Finance, Health, Spiritual, Emotional, etc. Once, you can determine these answers, you highlight the different things you can do to take you closer to these goals you have set.

These are not passive actions or going with the flow. This is taking active steps to ensure that you are a step closer to those goals. You can create a tracker to keep track of your progress or find a partner or community to be accountable.

Remember, these goals are not set in stone. For instance, if your priority was a successful career on day 1 if, by day 100, it changes to a happy marriage, then, change that goal and determine the steps needed to achieve that and work towards it.

Design thinking starts with problems and it requires designers to think through these problems to find a solution for their users. That is simply what you want to do with your life. Start from a desired end and find solutions that will take you a step closer to that end.

“Your life is not a thing, it is an experience. The fun that comes from designing and enjoying the experience.”

This way, you do not accept everything thrown at you. More so, you need to understand that your life is a blank canvas, you are to choose the outcome of the painting which will be a total of what colors to use, where to start, what to draw, what message to communicate, etc. Also, you can draw up multiple possibilities of the kind of life you want.

However, it is one thing to design your life, it is another thing to implement the designs. So, do the hard work of bringing to life that design.

Remember, it is not a sprint. It is a marathon. You have the whole of your life to do this. So, enjoy every bit of it. Go ahead to design your life.

to be continued…