THE LIFESTYLE ENTREPRENEUR

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Plan your fun

I’m sure it’s because of the company I keep on LinkedIn - and the fact that me and all my colleagues help companies do their strategic planning - but the past week it seems everyone I know has shared their nuggets around planning, new year’s resolutions, journaling, and every permutation of the concept.

And I’m here for it all - as someone who never did much personal planning, and always kept myself too busy to give myself dedicated thinking time - I’ve become a huge believer in the power of planning to give us the lives we want.

I write regularly about planning and the processes I use.

But today I want to lay out a specific area of planning that’s become valuable for me - planning out my year of fun experiences with family and friends.

As part of that planning process, it’s important for me to plan out the bigger events, trips, and activities each month that I’m really going to look forward to. It’s also important for me to plan out plan 1:1 time with my partner and all my kids.

The Misogi

This japanese term is becoming very popular in the self-help/coaching sphere - and it has been evolved to mean periodically participating in an extremely difficult activity that will force personal growth.

The misogi can be physical, mental, emotional, spiritual - anything that is going to be really challenging to do, and will require you to grow as a person in order to complete it.

Last year I ran the Twin Cities Marathon for the first time in 10 years. Since I hadn’t ran more than a mile in at least 2 years, it definitely fit into that category for me.

I don’t know my 2025 misogi yet - but it will likely be a simple physically challenging endeavor - like a long hike in a cool destination. I’m having a baby in a month, and also laser focused on filling up my business coaching practice this year, so I don’t want my misogi to be something that requires anything over and above my general fitness work.

The fun experience calendar

Jesse Itzler is one of my favorite influencers - he’s awesome and I highly recommend following.

He likes to lay out 6 fun experiences per year - meaning he does something every sixty days.

This is a good number as they’re far apart enough to feel special, and also close enough together that you always have something to look forward to.

Last year I found calling out the highlight of each month was more appropriate for me - I actually had something every month and it was fun to look at regularly.

This year I’ll probably be closer to 6 in the year.

Either way - laying out the year according to what fun experiences you’re going to plan and prioritize is a great tool for making life better - and also for ensuring you actually prioritize having fun.

1:1 time

I mentioned earlier that I didn’t really start planning my life out on paper until a few years ago. I wish I started earlier, and planning 1:1 time with my important people is definitely something I wish I did earlier.

The concept here is simple. While I spend plenty of time with my family, the demands of life make it very difficult to get 1:1 time with all my kids and my partner. And without planning, it’s easy to go months without any quality 1:1 time with everyone.

So I’ve started planning out a 1:1 date with each kid per quarter. The rules are simple:

1. Half day minimum

2. Kid gets to decide what we do

3. No technology while we’re together

Once a quarter is perfect here - when I first heard about the concept I thought to myself it should be more frequent - just trust me it doesn’t need to be.

Pulling it all together

All my planning is based on a year, with four quarterly periods in that year. The above items fit perfectly within that structure, and I simply lay out the above to the best of my ability, and tweak it as the year goes on and new events come up. For example - I have 4 events planned out already, with some gaps for a few months where I know I want to plan out a fun experience.

For 1:1 time, unless there’s a trip involved, I don’t worry about planning anything out past a quarter.

Planning these events out, sharing them with my family, and committing to them, has made for a richer life experience for me. I hope some or all of them will make a richer experience for you!

Talk to you next week,

Mike