The Wheel of Life

Success isn’t just getting rich and having nice things around you – lots of stuff! It’s a lot more than that – a whole lot more!

I spent most of my life working hard to be successful at work and never really looked at my life as a whole. There are so many more areas that are critical to a happy and fulfilled life than just money and stuff. The wheel of life is something I use when I am coaching my executive clients and it covers 8 areas.

These key areas are: Career, Finance, Personal Growth, Health, Family, Relationships, Social Life and Attitude. There are various versions of these out there but they generally contain around 8 key areas of life which need to be addressed. The way it works is that you rate yourself out of 10 for each of the key areas and plot them on a line.

A smooth circle

When you have plotted each of the eight areas you join the dots to form what should be a nice smooth circle. However it is very rare that I’ve ever seen a nice circle (or Wheel) when these are completed. There are usually two or three high scores of 8 or 9 then some 5 or 6’s then some 1’s and 2’s. So when you look at the shape it is all jagged and irregular.

This irregular shape reflects their life and if there are jagged edges on the Wheel of Life then there will be unhappiness and frustration in their lives. When I came across this a few years ago it made me think deeply about what living a happy and fulfilled life was all about. No longer could I just be happy with a good career and money.

I looked at my life

I looked at my life and my failed marriages, unhealthy lifestyle and lack of a good relationship and vowed that I would start to work on the whole of me. I worked on my health, relationships, attitude, spiritual life, personal growth, social life, finance, family and my career. Once I got this into my psyche, it changed the way I thought and acted.

Over the past 3 years I have made more time for heathy eating, personal development and relationships both with my friends and finding my life partner. I made room in my life for a lady to appear and Julie did just over 2 years ago and we are now very happily married. We make time to meet people on a regular basis even though we may be a little busy or tired.

Work on your marriage

This has led to us eat with many couples who we have got to know really well and have a great relationship with. Julie and I work on our marriage with the words we speak and our actions. We also have a date night once a week and we continually encourage each other with words of love. I believe that a marriage has to be worked on and we intend to be happily married for many years to come.

We are eating much healthier and I feel better than I have for many years. I am now sleeping 8 hours a day and feel energised and on fire for my business which helps people grow. I am privileged to be in the business of helping people and when I witness the impact I have on people’s lives it is very humbling.

Take time out to celebrate

This week Julie and I went away for a couple of days to celebrate our birthdays which are 7 days apart and we had a wonderful time together. As a business owner I could have thought that my business was more important, but I don’t do that any more. I know that the ‘Wheel’ needs to be round and if I ignore one of the key areas for long enough it will wobble – as will my life.

This week also saw me travelling to Essex to deliver a workshop on Stress Management and also meeting an MD of an organisation who may be interested in me helping them with Mental Resilience. Today I am picking Julie up at 5.30pm and we are off to Sheffield to have dinner with my best mate Barry and his wife Linda – I can’t wait!

Multi-millionaires aren’t always happy

On a sombre note I have read more than once where a multi-millionaire has committed suicide even though they don’t have money problems. The problems they do have is that their Wheel of Life has been so jagged that they can’t live with the damage they have done to themselves and other people as they have driven themselves for financial success.

Then when they have that financial success they can’t handle the fact that it isn’t enough and it hasn’t brought them the happiness they expected. They think about who they have hurt and lost along the way, and in an alcohol or drug induced state; they make a terrible decision to take their own lives.

The Wheel of life can really help to live a fulfilled and happy life. You don’t have to be a millionaire to be happy as long as you have all the key areas of the Wheel near the 7 or 8 mark.

Thoughts for the week:
1. Have a think about the key areas of your life and score each out of 10
2. The objective is to have each area at least 8 out of 10 or above
3. Look at any of these areas which score the lowest
4. See what you can do to get the scores of these areas up
5. If you can see movement in any of these areas you are improving your life
6. Work on the low scores and move them up – this can be done quickly
7. As you do this watch what happens to your overall happiness

Well that’s it for this week – have a great weekend and keep positive.

Warm regards

John