Anyone who knows me can attest that I tread a bizarrely balanced line between loathing schedules and loving anything that has to do with goal-setting, habit-tracking, life-planning, and anything else that caters to my organizational obsessions. I adore a good day planner. Notion (to be introduced more fully at a later date) is one of my first true loves. And if you give me a blank Moleskin journal, it will be filled with notes and ideas by the end of the week. These might strike you as the vain attempts of a desperate woman to try and get her life together, but the simply truth is, I enjoy, almost to the point of it being a hobby, putting my life and dreams on paper. (Science, it just so happens, also backs me up on this one.)

One key, transformative tool underpins this apparent mania: the life handbook. To my surprise, the life handbook is almost unheard of in the self-development world, and to date I’ve heard no author, speaker, or coach, despite all their talk about goal-setting and dream manifesting, discuss this powerful tool in any detail—or at all, really. Somehow it has been overlooked, to our collective detriment.

I first crafted my life handbook around five years ago, about halfway through my Master’s degree, in an attempt to gain clarity on my next steps. I felt mildly disoriented and set adrift, like I was going through the daily motions with no clear direction or purpose. This was primarily because the goal that had been my obsession since I was an undergraduate freshman—studying at the University of Oxford—had not only been realized, but was halfway through to completion. What next, I wondered? Where does one go after Oxford? (The answer to this, I now realize, is nowhere. A girl can leave Oxford, but Oxford never leaves the girl.)

Still, developing my life handbook forced my to hone in on what was truly important to me, beyond mere academic accomplishment. It hasn’t, like a magic elixir, made every decision crystal clear. It has, however, established a firm enough foundation that I am now more comfortable with the unknown. Once I was clear on who I was and who I wanted to become, I could examine open doors and exciting paths with a level of transcendent detachment. Does this bring me closer to where I want to go? Does it align with who I am—who I really am? 

Since then my life handbook has become indispensable. Most recently, it has led me to execute a sharp about-face on opportunity I was, for six months, completely sold on pursuing. My plan of action, to be executed over the course of five years, would have been brilliant—but perhaps not for me, or perhaps not at this time. When the thrill of the idea came careening into uncertainty, my life handbook helped me evaluate whether my discomfort was due to fear or due to an intuitive knowledge that it was not the right path for me. In the end, my intuition won the day, supported by an evaluation of my values, vision, and long-term goals.

So, what is a life handbook? 

A life handbook establishes the foundation upon which every other planning and habit tool stands, much like a guidebook or business plan for your life. It answers the why that underlies your quarterly, monthly, and weekly goals, and orients the direction for your daily actions. In the self-help miasma of attempting to get our days together (which is important), we’ve somehow missed the more holistic picture of life mission, vision, and legacy. We’ve become so obsessed with reaching our goals that, at times, we’re prone to forgetting ourselves in the process. 

The life handbook exists to recenter you on what matters most, not just for your days, but for your life. It’s a handbook (virtual or analog) in which you sketch the picture of who you are, who you want to be, and how, in the broadest of brushstrokes, you want to get there. Consider it the compass that orients your life and aligns your actions with your dreams. 

What’s in a life handbook? 

My own life handbook opens with my vision statement, a list of my personal values, a portrait of my dream life written in the form of a letter from my future self, a five-year plan broken down by category, and lists of yearly and financial goals. These are the key, non-negotiable elements of every life handbook, dedicated to answering the questions: Where am I going? Why do I want to go there? How am I going to get there? They also serve as the basis for setting your monthly, daily, and weekly priorities. 

In addition to these are all manner of miscellany: a vision board, lists of symphonies I love, an outline of PhD programs I’m considering (along with entry requirements), a record of the books I’ve read each year, a list of autumnal activities I want to enjoy, poems I’ve written, quotes that inspire me, and other such musings. 

While there are no hard and fast rules as to what does or does not get added my life handbook, I try to maintain a threshold of continuity. Ten year plan: important, enduring, will be relevant for at least ten years—gets added. Daily to-do list: transient, irrelevant 24 hours from now—doesn’t get added. What does or doesn’t belong in a life handbook is a matter of discretion. Add what you want. Remove what doesn’t fit. Cut, paste, and curate to your heart’s content. 

Here are some things you can start with: 

What does a life handbook look like?

Originally, my own life handbook started in a simple Word document, printed out once a quarter, with each section indexed and organized by topic. Eventually, this became somewhat cumbersome. Although I still reference this early life handbook version often, I’ve begun to move elements of my life handbook into Notion, the application I also use to organize my academics, my work, my other projects, and half of my brain. The relocation has been hard, because I’d grown so accustomed to my Word document, but ultimately it has given me better access to and organization of the most important parts of my handbook. Even more game changing: it has enabled me to sync my goals into my calendar, which means key goals—and the tasks connected to them—no longer get overlooked or forgotten. 

More of an analog person? Paper absolutely works too. I’m generally part of the analog club, but the complexity of my life handbook necessitated using an application that made sections easier access, edit, and move. If you do decide to craft an analog life handbook, my recommendation is that you use a binder—not the tacky plastic binders you used in elementary school, but a beautiful linen or leather binder worthy of holding your life plans. The reason for this is simple: like Notion, binders allow you to conveniently edit, insert, and remove pages. Your like handbook is a living document and it will change over time—in fact, its supposed to; it it’s not changing, are you? And change is really the point of all this, isn’t it. So use something that can grow and change alongside you. 

Will having a life handbook change my life? 

Only you can put in the work necessary to change your life. But a life handbook provides a powerful foundation upon which future transformation can be based. Your vision and mission will guide your long-term goals, your long-term goals will focus your short-term goals, your short-term goals will steer your habits, and your habits will dictate your life. The challenge is turning planning, ostensibly an action, into doing, a far more important action. If, like I suggested above, your life handbook is like a business plan for your life, it can provide clarity, but in order to execute the plan you must in fact do the work. But with a clear vision and mission to drive you, putting in the work becomes all the more easy.