9 Steps – How To Find Clarity About Your Life And Future, Starting Today

1. Take Some Time To Dream

All too often in life, people don’t give themselves time to dream. 

They don’t give themselves an opportunity to think about what they’d like for the future. 

They don’t slow down and think to themselves:

“What would I actually like to do? What would I like to have and achieve in the world?” 

If you’ve ever been to this website before, you probably know that I’m a huge proponent of dreaming big dreams, turning those dreams into goals, and writing those goals down to create a roadmap to success. 

Well, give yourself a chance to start this process by sitting down over a cup of coffee and a sandwich, and just think to yourself:

“What would I like for my future?”

Do you need some help starting your own goal-setting process?

Sign up for my email list to get a free copy of my Goal Setting Essentials Starter Kit, and get started on the journey today.

2. Examine Your Talents

When you’re striving to find clarity about your life and future, it’s always a good idea to take your talents, skills, and gifts into account. 

All too often, people neglect this. 

But you can actually learn a lot about what your purpose is, and what your strengths in life could be, by examining the things you’re good at and figuring out how you could leverage those things to help you create a clear vision for your future.

3. Figure Out What You Enjoy

Life is far too short to not enjoy what you’re doing. 

Of course, there are always going to be situations where you’re going to need to grind through the tough stuff. 

But overall, you should always take stock of how much you’re enjoying the path you’re on. 

And if you’re starting to realize that you don’t really enjoy anything about the life you’re building, it may be time to just stop and ask yourself:

“Am I even on the right path?”

4. Identify What You’re Passionate About

When you’re on a journey to find clarity about your future, you should always take your passions into account. 

Sometimes this is easier said than done. 

First, you may need to figure out what your passion in life is. 

The good news is that there’s a method for this—and a lot of people don’t realize exactly how important it is to identify this crucial area of your life. 

When you engage your passion to help you find clarity about your future, you help to create a more honest version of what you want your life to be. 

And this is massively important.

5. Decide How You Want To Make A Difference In The World

A lot of people do too much thinking about what they want to get in life, and not nearly enough thinking about how they’d like to contribute. 

And sometimes, this can actually lend a great deal to a lack of clarity.

See, there are several parts to the puzzle of figuring out what you want your future to look like.

And figuring out how you want to contribute and make the world a better place is a crucial part of that picture. 

So take some time and brainstorm the different ways in which you could contribute. 

You may start this process by volunteering for a nonprofit, starting your own business, or even just taking action at your local church or school. 

Sometimes, this process starts out small—and that’s awesome. 

This can give you a lot of insight into how you’ll actually decide to build a bigger, broader future for yourself. 

6. Ask Yourself: “What Do I Want In Life?”

Figuring out how you want to contribute is a crucial part of the puzzle. 

But it’s also important to do some thinking about what you actually want. 

• Is there a particular lifestyle you’d like to achieve for yourself?
• Are there things you’d like to acquire for your family, to give them a better life? 
• Do you picture spending your days doing certain types of tasks or work?

This is a very open-ended and creative question—and answering it as specifically as possible can really help you to find clarity about your future and figure out exactly what you want for yourself. 

It’s just a really important thing to think about.

7. Start Writing Things Down

Alright. 

At this point, I’ve already given you several different specific things to think about and ponder as you seek to find clarity about your future. 

But now, it’s time to take action. 

Get out your goal planner, your journal, or even a blank notebook or a piece of paper—and start writing down your ideas. 

You should write down:

• Your dreams for the future
• A list of your talents
• A list of things that you’d enjoy doing in the future
• A description of how you want to make a difference in the world
• A list of the things you’d like to have and achieve in your life

Once you get these things written down and you start to brainstorm with them, you can start piecing together a picture of what your life might look like if you started organizing these things, making a plan of action, and really setting some goals for yourself. 

The key here is to get as specific as possible, and to develop a consistent goal setting habit. 

You’d be amazed at how much of a difference it can make to start writing down your goals and just exploring this newfound clarity you’re trying to develop for yourself.

So go ahead: 

Grab a pen and some kind of notebook, journal, or planner to write in—and start writing down your goals. 

I’ve often said that where you choose to write your goals isn’t nearly as important as just making sure that you write them down. 

You can even double down on this by turning your more specific goals into SMART goals.

8. Sleep On It And See How You Feel

Once you write down a bunch of the stuff listed above, an interesting thing will start to happen. 

See, when you write things down, what you’re actually doing is taking hopes and dreams out of the realm of your imagination and beginning the process of manifesting them in the real world. 

You can even double down on this by creating a vision board, and by writing yourself one or more personal goal statements for your future life. 

Once you start this process, and then you let it sit and you sleep on it—when you wake up, you’ll tend to have a much better idea of which elements of your new plan feel good, and which ones don’t feel quite right. 

This is your instinct coming into the picture to help you figure out a path to find clarity for your future. 

And you should always trust your instinct. 

See what your instincts are telling you, and keep honing those goals and writing them down as you adjust them and tweak them to fit a life vision that feels right to you.

9. Review And Revise As Needed

It’s really important to understand that your vision for your life and your plan for the future will probably change a bit over time. 

This happens for many reasons. 

Sometimes, when you get started on a path, you learn things that give you new information. 

And this can help you to develop an even better picture of how you want your life to look. 

But the key to all of this is to be willing to continue to revise your goals, and to be adaptable as you move forward on your journey. 

See, when it comes to creating the life you really want—a successful life filled with joy and fulfillment—it’s important to stick to the goal-setting process, and to continue to be adaptable as you write down your goals. 

If you try to stick to a framework that isn’t right for you, you’re going to struggle to stay motivated. 

But if you fail to write down your goals at all—well, you’re going to run the risk of not having any structure or direction in your life. 

This can lead to a situation where you may tend to drift around a bit, with an overall lack of direction—and this won’t help you to find clarity about your goals either.

Writing down your goals on a consistent basis—and being willing to review and revise those goals as needed over time—is really the key to achieving the things you want in life.

FAQs

What is a lack of clarity?

A lack of clarity is basically the feeling of not knowing, understanding, or being able to visualize what you want for your future and where you want to go in your life’s journey.

How do you find clarity and purpose?

The best way to find clarity and purpose is to take stock of what your life looks like right now, and to figure out how you’d like it to change to better reflect the life you’d love to be living in the future. 

Hey, we only get one shot at this life. 

And believe it or not, we all have the power to make it amazing. 

So the key is to figure out how you’d like your life to be different, and then to start writing down your goals to begin the process of making the small adjustments required on a daily basis to help you change and adjust it from where it is now, to what you want it to be in the future.

How do you find clarity when confused?

If you feel confused about your future and you’re not sure exactly what you want in life, then you may need to stop, take stock of your current situation, and spend some time really thinking about what you want. 

If you can identify what you want, and if you can find the drive within yourself to just start setting goals and moving forward in that direction, then you can start achieving the things you actually desire. 

However, it’s really important that you stay consistent with your goal-setting habits—because this will really make the difference between sticking with the plan and dropping off of it to go back to the way your life was before. 

It takes quite a bit of work and focus to transform your life. 

But it’s completely doable.

Why clarity is so important

Clarity is important because it’s how you create a vivid picture of how you want your life to look in the future. 

Here’s the thing. 

If you can visualize it, you can make it real. 

However, without clarity (and without a vivid vision of what your future should look like), you’re going to struggle to actually manifest the destiny you want for yourself. 

Conclusion

Hopefully, this post has given you some information about how to find clarity in life—and hopefully, these tips will help you in your goal-setting journey. 

Of course, at the end of the day, this is just another part of the larger, overarching process of turning your dreams into goals, and writing those goals down to create a roadmap for success in your life.

This is how you begin your journey to success and crush it.

Need some help? Download my weekly goal-setting sheet, print out a few, and give it a try.

And don’t forget—you can also sign up for my email list to get a free copy of my Goal Setting Essentials Starter Kit. 

You’ve got this. I believe in you.

Now it’s time to get to work.

Best wishes…

Jay O’Donnell