Are you in charge of your life? Do you have a direction you are moving in and a process to get you to your destination? If not, then you may not be a leader in your own life.

If you are not leading your own life, then I suggest you change direction and become a self-directed leader. But what does it mean to be a self-directed leader and how do you change from a life with no direction to a life with direction and purpose?

To lead yourself, there are five key strategies that you can follow. These strategies include creating a vision for your life, setting goals, scheduling appointments with yourself, using focus blocks, and following a time budget.

The first two strategies, creating a vision and setting goals, provide you with a direction for your life. The remaining three strategies are techniques for getting you to your destination. Adopt all five strategies and you will be a leader in your own life.

Creating a Vision for Your Life

What direction are you moving towards in your life? Are you consciously choosing that direction, or are circumstances in life dictating where you are going?

To be a self-directed leader you can start by choosing which direction you are going in. You do this by creating a vision for your life and writing out a vision statement that captures what you want to achieve.

My vision is to be the owner and operator of a software development company. This is a compelling vision for me that provides a direction for me to move towards in life and it shapes and directs the goals I set for myself.

What about you? What do you want out of life? Think carefully and decide what it is you most want to achieve in life, then write it down as a vision statement. If you do this right, it will be a compelling vision that excites and motivates you to take action to fulfill your dreams.

Goal Setting

Having a vision for your life is important. It gives you a direction to move towards and can motivate you to take action towards fulfilling that vision. Part of taking action towards bringing your vision to life includes goal setting. Goal setting gives you further direction in life and you can set targeted goals to help you achieve your vision. This leads to results when you act on those goals, and this can bring your vision for your life to fruition.

When you set goals, make them specific, measurable, realistic, and time based. This will ensure that your goals are achievable. If you don’t follow these guidelines, then you may find that you don’t achieve your goals, and this can be frustrating and demotivating.

When a goal is specific, you will know what you need to do to achieve it. If it is vague or unclear, it will be much harder to achieve. For example, if you set the goal to start a new company, this may motivate you, but a goal to start a company is not very specific. Instead, why not set a goal to find 4 clients for your new company. This goal is specific and you can work towards achieving this goal because you will know when it is completed after you find your company’s first four clients.

Another important aspect of goal setting is setting goals that are measurable. This allows you to track how close you are to achieving a goal. For example, I have been striving to lose weight and I can track my progress towards achieving this goal by recording my weight every day. If I set a specific target weight as my weight loss goal I will know how close I am to achieving that goal and I can measure my progress over time as I actively take steps to lose weight.

Another important aspect of making goals achievable is being sure to set goals that are realistic and achievable. For example, my vision for my life is be the owner of a software development company. If I set the goal to earn one million dollars in my first year of business, that would not be very realistic or achievable. I need to find clients and hire employees first, and realistically it may take several years before my company earns enough revenue to make one million dollars in a given year.

Finally, make your goals time based. If you don’t have a deadline or a time frame for your goals, there is no pressure to get them done. If instead you set a deadline, you will be motivated to complete your goal by that time. You can also plan your work around your deadlines for each of your goals.

Scheduling Appointments With Yourself

Once a self-directed leader has identified her goals, she needs to find time to work on them. This is where the third strategy used by self-directed leaders comes into play, and that strategy is scheduling appointments with yourself.

Chances are, when you have work to do in your professional life you spend time getting it done because that is how you earn a living and get paid. However, in your personal life it can be harder to make progress on your goals. There are many demands on our time and attention outside of work, including family commitments as well as needing time to relax and have fun when we are not working.

So how do you find time to work on your goals? The answer is to schedule appointments with yourself. This means taking out your calendar and setting aside some time during the week to work on your goals. You could schedule blocks of time in the evenings during the week as well as some time on the weekends.

Treat these appointments the same as you would an appointment with other people. Show up for these appointments on time and do the work you planned for that appointment.

For example, if you have the goal to start your own company, you could schedule appointments with yourself to write a business plan and appointments to search for potential clients. The important thing to do is to keep your vision and goals in mind, and to then schedule times during the week to work on completing your goals and bringing your vision to fruition.

Focus Blocks

The fourth strategy used by self-directed leaders is using focus blocks. What is a focus block? It is a block of time where you work on one and only one task so that you are not distracted and so that you get more work done.

When you schedule appointments with yourself, make them focus blocks. During these appointments don’t multitask, check email, or browse social media. Instead, focus on working on the one task you scheduled for that appointment, and you will be amazed at how much progress you can make.

For example, if you are starting a new company and you want to find new clients, schedule a focus block for researching potential clients. During that block of time focus on browsing the internet and looking up potential clients. Keep detailed notes about any potential clients you find and create a plan for how you will reach out to them. At the end of your focus block you will have made progress towards finding potential clients for your business.

Time Budgets

The fifth strategy used by self-directed leaders is to follow a time budget. What is a time budget? It is budgeting your time so you have time for everything you want to do in life.

Robert C. Martin, author of the book “The Clean Coder”, recommends working 60 hours a week. What he suggests is that you spend 40 hours working for your employer and 20 hours working for yourself. Accounting for time when you are sleeping, this still leaves you with 52 hours a week for everything else in life.

If you are a self-directed leader, you spend time working on your goals and time working to improve yourself. This is time outside of work that you dedicate to using effectively, and 20 hours a week working for yourself sounds reasonable to me.

What do you do during these 20 hours? You work on your goals. You also spend time dedicated to learning and growing. This makes you more effective in life and it makes you a leader in life.

Conclusion

These five strategies will help you to be a self-directed leader. Someone who consciously chooses which direction you are moving towards in life. Someone who takes action to not only identify goals, but who works on achieving them as well.

As a self-directed leader you will have a vision for your life and goals to bring that vision to fruition. You will achieve those goals by scheduling appointments with yourself, using focus blocks, and following a time budget. You will be actively leading yourself and making progress to achieving what you most want in life.

I encourage you to be a self-directed leader and to apply these strategies to your life. Who knows what you will achieve?