Wednesday, August 11, 2010

The Book of Lenses

Your answer is personal, but the right question can help get you there...
  • Lens of No History: Would you let this continue if you could only remember the last 8 minutes?
  • Lens of Infinite Time: How would being an immortal affect your choices?
  • Lens of the Future Badass: What would your future self do if your future self was a very wise badass.
  • Lens of Novelty: How much of this is truly sustainable?  Would you still keep going at this once the novelty wears off and daily life settles back in?
  • Lens of Limited Time: If you only had three months to live, would you be doing this, right now?
  • Lens of Utility: Does doing this yield benefits equal to or greater than the cost of not doing this?
  • Lens of Androgyny: Would the situation still be perceived the same way if the gender were different?  Why would gender be a factor, and is that a rational line of thought?
  • Lens of Opportunity: If it makes you feel bad, then what can you do instead that would be a better use of your time?
  • Lens of Verbs: Strip away every noun label and every adjective modifier... Look only at the verbs.  Do you still want this in your life?
  • Lens of Maslow: For the effort you are about to spend time on, which level of Maslow's Hierarchy are you addressing? Are lower levels of the pyramid sufficiently fulfilled for you to be prioritizing this level, right now?
  • Lens of Three: Pick the three most important things to you in life... health, money, love?  Will this serve or work against those three highest priorities?
These are the questions that have worked for me so far.