Doing you – Not being somebody special!

3. Mai 2016 by jasmin

Doing you – Not being somebody special!

Do you know Les Brown, Will Smith or Jay Shetty?

Probably the most of you now say: “Yeah right, will Smith, I saw a lot of movies of him!” We hear about this 16 years old kiddo, launching his newest app and already had two exits by now – a visionary self-made millionaire. And there we go. When we go out in our lives and see all this hype about being famous, pretend to be someone special, the fanatic people who chase after their idols like Steve Jobs, Elon Musk or Mark Zuckerberg, we think there is this ONE way, this ONE solution.

HANGING IN THE MIDDLE OF…

And then we are standing there in the middle of our lives and totally getting lost – we are stuck in a crisis – quarter, middle,… just to name some.

Do you know that feeling of lacking something – the feeling of missing out? Me too! It feels like fall back behind your values, behind others, behind the next trend… harder, faster, better, stronger… We have the feeling, that we are not good enough and we lose track.

There is a whole focus group named after this Fear of Missing Out – the FOMOs. They need to be have all the social platforms, all the apps and they spend most the time making fotos or posts of things they never did, never will have or might even not be real. What’s on your mind? describes it a bit. We make a shiny new world a new reality and we miss out, to actually DO something, not only PRETEND to do.

STEP FORWARD – I NEED YOU

It is the fear in us, to step forward, to get things done. Instead we are doing nothing. We think, all will come to us – the risk would be to high to lose. “BUT losing what?” – You even may didn’t try to step forward. We always have the opportunity to decide how we want to be. It is not about the who, it is about the how. The who is deeply linked in us- it is our nature our talents. However the how we can define, we can shape, we can decide on – So better you ask yourself how you want to be and not who or what you want to be.

For their entire careers, they were focused on the doing, not the being.

– John Westenberg

HOW TO DOING YOU

STOP! Before we continue, I would like to ask you one question: “Do you want to tackle this obstacle and want to be a part of something bigger than just living day by day?” If the answer is yes…

… welcome YOUrself!

“Doing you” is a long and never ending road, and I will not handing you some key to happiness or so… I just try to give something back I learned via my journey through design, gamification and interaction and sure it is not always that easy.

Get to know a little of my own story.

START NOW!

1. START EASY – BUT START

It is so important to just start doing something! And not just always say “tomorrow”, or “next day, when I feel more powerful or more engaged”. So go and get yourself a sketch, note or how I call it a blackbook. I myself have a lot of them and they help me to write down my ideas, my goals, what I loved, what I hate and they as well help me to reflect on the past and where I want get in the future.

2. TAKE IT WITH YOU

Take the blackbook with you every day. You never will know when thoughts will come to your mind and practice to write the stuff down. I know, that this is not easy at the beginning, but trust me it is worth trying it. As well you can draw in it, or use it for all kind of stuff, like use it as well for To-Do lists or addresses.

3. WRITE IT DOWN

It is important, that you write down, what you experienced, or what is in your mind. For example you can start to write down, what you loved or didn’t enjoy during the day.

4. GET TO KNOW YOU

When you keep a blackbook it is like keeping track of who you are and it gives you the opportunity to shape how you want to be.

5. SET YOURSELF AIMS

When you think you know who you are, then it is time to make how you want to be. It is time to set yourself aims and for that little goals. STEP-BY-STEP.

6. SET DEADLINES

For every goal you should set yourself deadlines. WHY? The reason is, that we nedd deadlines to see it as a target, to know where the end is. And as well if something should not work out as wanted, it is the “mark” to drop or redefine the challenges or even what you want to aim.

7. MAKE LITTLE STEPS

Do not try to make the challenges as easy as pie, like, tying up your shoes, however as well don’t make them to hard to reach, like getting the next CEO of Apple by tomorrow 8:00 am. So write down our aim and split it up in more detailed goals (challenges). For every challenge set yourself a reward. Like what I am now doing to motivate myself for sport – I love to have a extraordinary Handbag, so everyday I practice, I will spend an amount of money.

8. MEASURE YOUR PROGRESS

For your motivation it is important, to keep track of your progress to give yourself feedback what you reached so far.

AND NEVER FORGET TO WRITE ALL OF THAT DOWN 🙂

So you beginn the cycle of the DOING YOU.

START THE GAME – LET’S PLAY!

Thanks for reading — I’m Jasmin Deniz Karatas. I’m a Strategic Designer & Gamifier.

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Also published on Medium.