Fulfillment Intent Xperiment

You’ve got one life. Yes, everyone says this, and you know this, but have you really REALLY thought about it deeply? This means your time is finite. Death is not just something that happens to someone else. It will happen to you too. That’s a guarantee. Let that sink in.

There’s also a guarantee that up until this point, what’s already happened in your life will NOT change, but guess what, there is no guarantee around how your future may unfold. There’s a little magic to that, don’t you think?

Get something to write down some thoughts. Remove all distractions. Clear your mind. Take a deep breath.

Imagine a someone extremely close to you dies suddenly. This was someone who forgave your past, loved you in the present, and supported your future. Regardless of your faults, this was someone who loved you despite what they knew about your secrets, your dreams, your insecurities, your passions. This was the first person you turned to when you wanted to talk about life. What do you feel? What thoughts run through your head? Write it down.

Now, it’s your turn. You were just given a terminal diagnosis. How do you feel? What thoughts run through your head? Was your life fulfilling? If so, in what ways, if not, why not? Do you have regrets? Who and what did you value and why? Did you allocate enough time in your life to both the who and the what? How else would you have liked to spend your time? What did you wish you had tried? Why didn’t you? What held you back? Write it down.

Ask yourself, “How do I prioritize my time more intentionally in a manner more authentic to me?”

As someone who never made it a goal to become work optional in my early 40s, the decision to leave my golden handcuffs was made within a matter of months. It became clear to me that this option may have only been available to me as a result of the below three ever-evolving and interdependent pillars I lived by through the years. Although I had never made any time during the years prior to articulate it in such a manner, I am doing so in hindsight now. Hopefully, this may help you navigate life earlier, and even more intentionally, than I had. See my short intro here.

The Three Interdependent “FI” Pillars

Fulfillment Intent

This is identifying who and what fills your heart and mind with fulfillment, when and why. This will ebb and flow throughout various stages of your life, but its best to carve out time to periodically define what fulfillment looks like to you by assessing your core values, the who, the what, the when and the why. Are you living the life you want or living the life someone else expects of you? Sometimes, it may not be clear, sometimes, it strikes you with intensity. Other times, you knew it all along but for one reason or another, never executed. Never forget that time is a gift that can be taken away without notice. Will you have regrets on your death bed? Your time is limited. When, how and with whom, do you want to spend it?

Financial Independence

This is learning as much as you can around personal finance and taking action towards creating financial security. It involves getting a handle around your spending, saving, investing, and earning strategies. Doing so will prepare you for various points in your life where you may lose a steady source of income, incur unexpected costs, or maybe just want some freedom with your time to step away. Some day, you may be asked to retire, whether you want to or not. True financial independence will mean that you should be able to stand on your own two feet when this happens. Recognizing these events might occur down the road earlier vs later will allow time for you to digest financial knowledge, plan, and execute strategies to leverage the miracle of compound growth. Along the way, you might enjoy the fruits of your labor or you might experience set backs, but if you are consciously working on creating financial security, you should be able to cover or recover from these costs with more ease.

Your timeline to financial independence must be tailored specific to you. It depends on what your fulfillment intent may be at various stages of your life and its associated cost as well as what foundational investments you decide to make in yourself along the way. Heed caution though as financial independence does not equate fulfillment intent but rather, gives you options to explore the possibilities.

Foundational Investments

This is understanding who you were, who you are, who you wish to become and incrementally and consistently investing on yourself. You will need to be self-aware and recognize your strengths and where you want to improve. This can be for any magnitude of things, large or small, from managing relationships, time, priorities, and distractions, to bettering your mindset and overall self-care, to learning or improving on a range of daily life habits, technical skills, soft skills, and personal finances, etc. The key is to nurture your strengths and areas of improvement bit by bit, and your growth will stack over time.

As time progresses, you will establish a habit of building knowledge, experience, courage, confidence and character. The longest relationship you will ever have with anyone will be with yourself so decide to invest into that person in the mirror. Doing so will lay a foundation on which you can build towards a more intentional and authentic life. The best investment in life is not the compound effect of investment growth from time in the market (albeit a close second), but the compound effect from investing in YOURSELF throughout your life’s journey.

“I truly believe that with incremental and consistent Foundational Investments in yourself, knowledge and steps made towards Financial Independence, and a purpose driven ongoing refinement of your life’s Fulfillment Intent, anyone can experiment with their limited time on this Earth more intentionally. It’s why I named this site “FI Xperiment”. What’s your fulfillment intent xperiment?”

Stay curious and develop the courage to experiment. Knowledge is not power without action. Get your FI^x. Freedom, amplified.

Yours truly,
Jean