Writing Your Life Resume

We all have created resumes in our life, it includes our education and work experience and sometimes we include the clubs and organizations we belong to. It is a must to get a new job. Our résumé is our foot in the door, it opens up the opportunities to a better job for ourselves. It is our work life history. But is it our history, does it truly represent us?

 

Leonardo’s résumé

Leonardo sent the following letter to Ludovico Sforza, the ruler of Milan, in 1482:

Most Illustrious Lord: Having now sufficiently seen and considered the proofs of all those who count themselves masters and inventors in the instruments of war, and finding that their invention and use does not differ in any respect from those in common practice, I am emboldened… to put myself in communication with your Excellency, in order to acquaint you with my secrets. I can construct bridges which are very light and strong and very portable with which to pursue and defeat an enemy… I can also make a kind of cannon, which is light and easy of transport, with which to hurl small stones like hail… I can noiselessly construct to any prescribed point subterranean passages — either straight or winding — passing if necessary under trenches or a river… I can make armored wagons carrying artillery, which can break through the most serried ranks of the enemy. In time of peace, I believe I can give you as complete satisfaction as anyone else in the construction of buildings, both public and private, and in conducting water from one place to another. I can execute sculpture in bronze, marble or clay. Also, in painting, I can do as much as anyone, whoever he may be. If any of the aforesaid things should seem impossible or impractical to anyone, I offer myself as ready to make a trial of them in your park or in whatever place shall please your Excellency, to whom I commend myself with all possible humility.

 

Our resumes tell our potential employer all about our work life, who we are, what we have accomplished, normally resumes are short, one to two pages and direct, to the point, leaving out the fluff. How often do you update your résumé, this exercise is in valuable, something that we should do yearly. refresh it, refine it and redefine our work life.

We should be doing the same with our personal life as well, create a Life Resume, listing our accomplishments and our goals, defining ourselves in short and concise statements, leaving out all the fluff.  What would your personal Life Resume look like? Would it include lots of personal development or social activities or would it be more traditional education and institutional? Would your Life resume include diverse hobbies or more mundane tasks?

Our life is an ever-changing series of events, we are not the same person today as we were yesterday, our life experiences shape us, change us and help us to grow. By sitting down and creating a Life resume, we will see the changes, see the growth, by organizing our life in to sections, categories, we will learn how we define ourselves.

Life Resume Outline:

Profile:

This heading would include your description of yourself, weight, sex, age, birth date and other vital statistics. Use this section as a starting point, include the current date.

Professional Experience:

In this section include all your work experiences, from paperboy to CEO. List your accomplishments and responsibilities. Include your starting age and ending age.

Life Experience:

In this section include life events, Baptism, Conformation Graduation from High School, Wedding, birth of Children etc.… Any milestone event in your life.

Education:

This section should include only formal education, completed or not completed. Indicate your age at time of completion or age when you took courses

Personal Development:

This section would include seminars, Continuing education courses or just for the fun of it courses offered at your local community centers. Indicate your age at the time of taking

Hobbies:

Include all hobbies from past to present, indicate your age of start and end From stamp collecting to master crafts maker.

Goals:

This section should include all your goals, from a young person up till now. Indicate your age at the time of the goal. Include everything from wanting to be a cowboy to taking over the world.

Achievements:

This section should list all your life achievements, from winning the spelling bee to closing that major deal. Include your age at the time of the achievement.

Completion of the Life resume may take you some time, and in truth, you are never finished with your Life Resume, it is a living breathing document. But the first “draft” should include as much past history as possible. Why include events that have already gone by, to show you how much you have already accomplished. We have done more than we often times give ourselves credit for, Why include your age, to show a progression of thoughts and growth. For example, if I stated that in 1976 I wanted to be a cowboy, I would have to do the math to figure out how old I was and in truth, it seems to far in the past, but stating that when I was 10 I wanted to be a cowboy, the year does not matter, but the age places my goal in the right context. I can clearly see a growth for Cowboy at 10 to owning my own company at 20. Simple is better, the less math I have to do, the better.

Creating and maintaining your Life Resume will help you bring clarity to your life, showing you how you have grown and evolved, and were you may be stuck. You will start to see patterns develop in your life and you will learn to appreciate and celebrate the little life achievements as much as you do the big life achievements.

Make a point to review your Life resume at least once a month, and when you edit it, include the date of edit, create a history of your Life Resume. Never remove information, only add, if information was incorrect, correct it, but leave the incorrect information intact, use Microsoft editing tools, to use the cross-out tool to remove the unwanted information, (example)

Goal: I want to be a cowboy Spy, age 10

Why keep the old or incorrect information, to show your progression, your thought process. As we continue to edit our Life Resume, we will begin to remember facts. As we begin to remember Life facts, we will start to gain a more clear picture of our past, as our past becomes more clear, we may need to correct our facts. And understanding our past, gaining a clearer picture of our past will help us define our future.

Good luck with this project, and I will post mine on this site and on the Guided Insight Life Coach website soon. You may want to consider using a Life Coach to help you create and define your Life Resume, they can help you add clarity to your visions and goals.

God Bless

Paul Sposite

Guided Insight Life Coach