Why you should prototype your life
Last year a student came to visit me during one of my office hours. He sat down and started telling me about his current job search and at one point during the discussion said to me “Who am I?” “Am I a designer?” “Am I a researcher?” I said I can’t tell you who you are — that you have to discover for yourself. In many ways, the world wants us to be vanilla. The world will push us to act and behave like everyone else. Because we only ever meet the same types of people, we live in these echo chambers — we don’t know what we don’t know.
From a designer/researcher point of view, the purpose of a prototype is to convey how something works — it could be to a client/stakeholder or to an end user. A prototype allows us to build an artifact that may or may not be used and see how someone interacts with it. It allows us to experiment and come up with multiple scenarios that could solve a problem. We could all easily be living several different lives depending on which path we choose. The people who are “winning” in life are simply knocking on more doors more often. We typically only try one new thing a year and then say it didn’t work. Instead, try one new thing a week or two things a month and see how you feel. If you haven’t tried everything, you can’t truly say that it didn’t work.
It’s almost like a game of odds — the more doors you knock on and experiment with, the more likely more doors will open for you. We spend a lot of time thinking about what we want but in life but it’s just as important to know what you don’t want because at least then you can juggle less balls and focus in on a few areas as opposed to having too many options that can become overwhelming and daunting. If I hadn’t taken a chance on teaching part time and experimenting with that world, I wouldn’t be where I am today teaching full time at a college.
As you experiment and prototype new experiences for yourself, think about how you feel during those times. Do you lose track of time? Do you feel happy? Do you feel fulfilled? Would you want to do what you’re doing more often? Ask yourself how you would spend an entire day if you had it to yourself? Ideally you want to feel in a state of flow (total engagement). Flow is when you are totally immersed in an activity or challenge that matches your skill level. If you’re finding that the challenge is greater than your skill then you know you need to increase your learning. If your skill is greater than your challenge then you have to upscale to a greater challenge that matches your skill level.
Flow is one of those things that you know it when you’re in it — it can be hard to describe. Having a journal can be a great way to log your day and activities to see when you feel you were in flow. Each day whenever you’re doing something as part of your day to day routine or when trying something new, make note of moments when you feel energized and engaged. It can be hard to remember all of this information over time so having a journal will remind you of particular moments when you felt you were energized and engaged.
For me, I feel energized and engaged when I’m sharing stories/experiences and helping students figure out what they want to do in their careers post-graduation. For anyone that knows me well knows that I’m a big believer in passion and purpose. We all have a purpose in this world — a unique gift that we were meant to share. There is something special inside of you and you can use your purpose in any number of ways for the betterment of this world. But to do that, you first have to figure out what your purpose is. Some people are blessed to know early on what their purpose is but for many others, this can only come from experimenting and trying different things more often. Sometimes the best way to discover your purpose is by being in service to others.
There is a quote I like that says “we are successful by what we get and are happy by what we give.” One thing I always tell my students is that if you have to make a decision based on money or happiness (assuming you aren’t in a specific financial situation), choose happiness. Whatever path you choose to pursue, choose something that makes you happy. One of the worst feelings in this world is to wake up dreading the day and living for the weekends. I know the feeling of waking up and not looking forward to the day. To look forward to 5pm and Fridays — that’s not elevated living.
The last thing I’ll leave you with is something I came across a few years ago. It’s called the 3E’s — Element, Environment and Energy. Each of us has an element that we thrive in. If you take that person out of their element, they won’t be the same. A famous example is Michael Jordan. Arguably the greatest basketball player ever (watch the Last Ride on Netflix if you’re a basketball fan!). For a few years, Michael Jordan tried his hand at baseball but never got to the heights he achieved as a basketball player. Basketball was his element — you have to figure out what your element is so that you can thrive in it.
Your environment is the environment around you e.g. you can take a fish out of a river and put it in a mansion with all the money in the world but it will die. A fish’s environment is in the water. We have to craft our environment and create an environment in which we thrive. No one is going to ask us what types of environments we thrive in — we have to craft and curate that for ourselves.
And then there is energy. Some of us excel in high energy, high pressure environments and some of us excel in low energy, low pressure environments. Neither is wrong but knowing the frequency that you best operate on will help you make decisions about what type of work you are best suited for and that you will thrive in. Working in an agency for a period of time, I quickly realized that high pressure and high energy wasn’t the right fit for me. You figure these things out by trying.
When you feel like things in life aren’t going in the right direction, ask yourself is my element, environment or energy out of alignment? Chances are one or more of these are and putting them back in alignment will help you feel more fulfilled and aligned to your goals.
Remember that a puzzle unassembled is just pieces but as you start piecing the parts of the puzzle, the picture becomes clear. The puzzle is never clear as pieces. You know the overall vision but you just have to start and try. That’s how you figure it out.
