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Marissa LevinMay 9, 2016Culture Engagement Entrepreneurship Featured Posts goals Growth Leadership Mindset Success Successful Culture

Three Steps to Living Audaciously: Setting Your Lifetime Legacy Mission

My lifetime legacy mission (LLM) is to educate, equip, & empower 100 million entrepreneurs & leaders worldwide to reach their greatest personal & organizational potential.

In my last two speaking engagements, I watched the audience’s reactions as the conference coordinator read my bio aloud. People were taken aback. They raised their eyebrows and smiled in surprise.

During my remarks, I put my lifetime legacy mission into perspective:

There are approximately 400 million entrepreneurs in the world, so my goal only reflects 25% of that population.
I’m only 48, so I estimate I have another 40 years ahead of me to make my impact.
There are so many ways to reach people globally today. Between my writing, speaking, online products (in development), merchandising line (in development), and consulting, I should be able to touch a lot of people.
Even if I achieve only 50% of my goal, I’m still impacting 50 million people, which isn’t so shabby.

Here is what I know for sure: If I don’t envision it, and put it out there, it will never happen.

Elon Musk (Founder of PayPal, SpaceX, and Tesla)
Jeff Bezos (CEO of Amazon)
Mark Zuckerberg (Founder of Facebook)
Steve Case & Ted Leonsis (Founders of AOL)

These are just a few audacious thinkers who have committed to changing the world.

Why shouldn’t you think big? Because someone else may find your idea to be grandiose? Because you sound unrealistic? Are those really reasons to limit our thinking?

“Thinking realistically is the quickest path to mediocrity.” ~Will Smith

I can’t remember the exact day when I committed to my LLM, but I do know this: everything changed the day I committed.

When I start to get tired, I remind myself of why the little things matter. When I doubt myself, or question why I am doing what I am doing, I reach back to my LLM, and the possibility of helping so many others live up to their potential.

You can set an LLM too, and here is how you do it.

Think about what fuels you. What creates a fire inside of you? When an opportunity presents itself, or when you have achieved a specific result, how does that impact you emotionally, physically, and spiritually?
Think about your success without limits. If you had absolutely no constraints (money, time, resources, energy), what would success look like for you? Think BIG. Think audaciously.
Craft your LLM using this format:

My lifetime legacy mission is to:

1: Insert Verb

2: Follow that with the number of people you want to impact

3: Follow that with the target population you will impact

4: Follow that with how you will impact them

Your LLM should be connected to what you are doing every day. If it’s not, you need to re-evaluate what you are doing every day, and how you are spending your valuable time.

As a Melanoma survivor, I have a very healthy respect for mortality. Our lives pass by in the blink of an eye. Every day you should LOVE what you are doing. If you don’t, what is holding you back?

Your LLM begins with the mindset that you are capable and worthy of living a life that delivers joy, fulfillment, and impact to yourself and everyone you touch.

“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? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. 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.” ~Marianne Williamson

Your LLM is inside of your heart & spirit right now. “Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? Your playing small does not serve the world.”

My hope is that as I let my own light shine, I am unconsciously giving you permission to do the same. As I am liberated from my own fears of failure, loss, and disappointment, my hope is that my presence automatically liberates you.

Today, commit to developing your LLM. I would love to hear your mission. Please email me your LLM at [email protected] and indicate if I have permission to share.

The world needs your light!

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About Successful Culture
We work with business owners, CEOs, and leadership teams that want to achieve their greatest personal & organizational potential. Through coaching, strategic consulting, retreat facilitation, and workshops, we equip leaders & emerging leaders with the mindset, tools, strategies, and processes they need to excel.

Ready to move forward? Email us today at [email protected]

Connect with me on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. Engage with me during my morning Periscope sessions as well (@marissalevin).

Please check out my Inc. Magazine columns on my Author Page too.

~Marissa Levin
CEO, Successful Culture
“Taking Leaders from Triage to Transformation.”

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Marissa LevinMay 2, 2016#zenhabits accountability Culture Featured Posts goal-setting Growth Leadership Success Successful Culture

Three Ways to Find Peace in Your Personal Choices & Priorities

In today’s self-promotional, often grandiose, rose-colored online society, it’s easy to feel that you never do enough, that you’re not at the right places with the right people at the right times, and that you can never catch up. It’s a self-sabotaging mindset that can dash our hopes and deflate our spirits.

How do we find peace with where we are at this precise moment in time, and with the choices we make for ourselves? How do we not feel as if we are missing out?

I live in multiple universes. For the last 20+ years, I’ve been a driven entrepreneur as I’ve built two companies while developing my writing and speaking careers. However, for the last 18+ years, I’ve also been a full-time, hands-on mother to two sons (now 18 and 15) with my husband of 23 years. During that time, I’ve also juggled elder care and loss during my mother’s grave illness and eventual death.

I speak frequently about the elusive holy grail of work-life balance, and the myths that one can have it all. I’ve spoken with and counseled hundreds of women about juggling my dual-careers of business- building and home-building.

Microsoft selected me last Fall as one of eight entrepreneurs to participate in a discussion with other industry experts about the future of women’s entrepreneurship. In my interview, I stressed the importance of “Leaning Out,” and of being OK with passing up opportunities that don’t align with where you are in life at a specific moment in time.

After performing this non-stop juggling act for almost two decades, I’ve finally learned the secret to knowing and celebrating your personal priorities:

You alone must make peace with your choices, with no regard for anyone else’s opinion, understanding, or approval.

This inner peace results from acknowledgement of three truths:

1: Your knowledge of your personal core value system, and how it drives where you are at this point in time;

2: Your courage to live your values and reach back to them when you are challenged to depart from them;

3: Your awareness that where you are today will shift. All is impermanent, including your priorities, at any given moment in time.

Prioritization is a pyramid.

While we may think we have “competing priorities,” we can only have one priority at any given moment. To be thinking of other commitments while we are physically engaged in a single priority only prevents us from being present in any priority.

I’ve created a Prioritization Pyramid that shows the correlation between prioritization and clarity. When we fully commit to our priorities, we achieve clarity. Clarity leads to renewed focus and a sense of calm.

When we are confused and conflicted, our path to clarity is through our core values. What matters most to us at this precise moment in time?

I was recently presented with several incredible opportunities that seemed like prioritization conflicts but through deeper analysis, I realized they were not conflicts at all. In the end, my choice of where to be at this precise moment in time manifested from my core value of “family first.”

My mother used to say, “We can’t be tall and short at the same time.” I think of this often as I continue to be presented with wonderful opportunities that may challenge my “family first” value.

When we are presented with “opportunities” no matter how big or small, we will miss something else if we choose to accept the opportunity. There are no “right” or “wrong” choices; there are only choices that do or don’t work for your specific life, at this moment in time.

Your choices don’t have to please others. They must simply work for you.

Knowledge of your core values.
Your courage to live your values and reach back to them when you are challenged to depart from them.
Awareness and acceptance of the fact that where you are today will shift and that everything is impermanent.

These three truths will allow you to celebrate your personal priorities without second-guessing your choices, and achieve clarity & peace along your journey of both realized and missed opportunities.

Wishing you peace and clarity as you step into your personal power of prioritization.

PS: I wrote about the path to clarity in our businesses in a previous blog here. I also share my three integrated strategies (time management, energy management, and prioritization) for Peak Productivity here.

I work one-on-one with CEOs to help them clarify their priorities in both their personal and professional lives, so that they achieve maximum clarity, productivity, peace, and joy. Through my proprietary toolkit and highly targeted coaching sessions, we clear away the clutter. Email me at [email protected] if you can benefit from greater clarity of your priorities and more effective time management.