You’re probably thinking I mean Most Valuable Player attitude, right? Well, in a way. But where do the passion, drive, and fun of an MVP champion come from? I suggest that it comes from deep within, not just years of training. It comes from a deeper MVP: Mission, Vision, & Purpose. Champions know why they are on the field and what they are there to do. It seems effortless for them. If you want to be a champion in your own life then you’ll want to know your MVP too!
The words Mission, Vision, and Purpose are often tossed about but there’s a real neurological importance to each that can make them real for us. Together, they act as a rudder, guiding us more directly towards joy in our lives. Let’s look at each and how you can discover them. A great way to understand each is through our five senses, which we use to interact with the world. Mainly feeling, hearing, and seeing.
Purpose: A result or effect that is intended or desired; an intention.
Your purpose is the state you most want to experience. Purpose is mainly a “feeling” state (kinesthetic). It’s in your body, not your head. Purpose also reflects our values (which also give us feelings). For example, one may realized: “My purpose is to … experience passion, joy, learning, love and fun.” They could then realize there is one key word, like a feeling, that drives them most. The writer Deepak Chopra share that his purpose is simply “healing”. Where being an M.D., teaching, or writing a book, it’s an expression of healing.
Everything in the universe has a purpose. Indeed, the invisible intelligence that flows through everything in a purposeful fashion is also flowing through you. — Dr. Wayne W. Dyer |
Mission: A special assignment given to a person or group.
This is the reason you are here on earth and the assignment always is in relation to others and the planet. A great metaphor for discovering our mission is to imagine that we came here from another place and we are simply “remembering” the mission we chose originally. A say “chose”, because I don’t think our mission is hidden “out there” somewhere. Mission is a mostly auditory (it’s a sentence that doesn’t translate into a specific picture). We used to use the word “calling”, which was a better description. Calling implied there is a “caller”. You can “listen” for it and remember it, as if someone once whispered it in your ear. A fun example of this is “Field of Dreams” where the hero hears, “If you build it, they will come.” His mission is to build. What he builds is more than a baseball field. (Funny trivia: Costner has built his own baseball field on his property where he can play baseball with friends.)
Finally, it’s about what we will do for others and with others. I believe each of us has a mission because it gets us in relation to others. For example: “My mission is to… remind people of the beauty and power they are so they can live life with passion, joy, and fun.” Which begins to lead us to a picture, what we call…
Vision: The manner in which one sees or conceives of something.
Vision is how we “see” (visual) our purpose and mission carried out. In “Field of Dreams”, he starts to SEE a baseball field. He keeps getting clues, impulses, images, that make a picture out of the mission. Notice that purpose and mission are fairly vague, which is wonderful! That vagueness allows for many visions, many places, people, opportunities to live with purpose and mission. Vision is the picture(s) we make about them. We will have visions in many areas. Maybe several pictures in our career, relationships, adventures, etc. Vision is where words like “clarity” show up. For example, someone realizes: “One of my visions is to… write a book that reminds people of their gifts so they can create joy in every area of their life.” Or, “One of my visions is to… create a loving relationship where we are playful and learn from each other which inspires others do the same.” For Elon Musk, one of his visions many people drive today was a sexy, fast car that was ALSO electric and modern, even futurist.
You’ll notice that in my model, each part of our MVP is represented mainly in a different sensory system (visual, auditory, kinesthetic). Together they form a mutli-sense guidance system that makes it easy to determine priorities, manage time, choose careers, and more. Burnout is simply dream deprivation or giving up on ones dream. MVP moves our dreams from mere fantasies to inevitable outcomes. When a laser is used with MVP it can cut through steel like butter and make amazing art. Without MVP, the laser sits in a closet, no different than any other unused item waiting to be thrown out.
An Exercise
Get a piece of paper out, take 5 minutes, right now, and complete each of the following sentences:
- My purpose is to experience…
- My mission is to…
- One of my visions is…
(write one for each area of your life. i.e. money, business, relationship, etc.)
Just put something down, anything. Part of this exercise is to drop the seriousness with “getting it perfect”. Sit back and look up and too the right. Just write the first words that come out. Do it fast and from your heart. It’s a work in progress, like sketching a new bridge to the future. It will never be “perfect” since it will continue to grow with you. MVP is art, iteration and experience, not science.
Keep this paper around and play with it. You can ask yourself if the things you do in the day support your purpose and mission. If they don’t, how could they?
Using your Inherent Excellence
I believe that our MVP comes from within us and is as unique as our fingerprint. As children, we had great dreams of possibility that had not yet been stifled by limiting beliefs. You dream because what you imagine is possible. Remember that every one of your trillion cells has a strand of DNA just like the others, yet unlike anyone else’s! Each strand has coded in it everything about you, including your MVP. Trusting yourself is the first step to remembering your MVP and taking each step forward on your journey.
It’s all “in-here” – it’s Inherent Excellence!