In prior exercises you’ve established what’s important to you (Core Values) and looked back to the high and low points of your past (Lifetime Chronology). In this exercise, you’ll examine yourself in context to the world around you to determine what makes you unique and special.
You can establish criteria for uniqueness any way you’d like. A common and worthy goal is to be in the top ten percent of something you’re doing. For example, serving on a ten-person board of directors in a 100-person organization achieves that goal. The top ten percent of income earners in the United States of America are the 34 million people with adjusted gross income over $100,000.
I like setting stretch targets. Therefore, my uniqueness goals strive to achieve the top 1%. That requires being President of a 100-person organization, or among the 3.4 million people in America with AGIs over $575,000.
Your uniqueness can take the form of special knowledge and skills, personal and business achievements, uncommon experiences, people you know, or anything else that separates you from the masses in society. More specifically, it’s the things that differentiate you inside the groups, spheres of influence, organizations, and demographics that are most important and meaningful to you.
Because this exercise is a comparison or evaluation of you, relative to a group of peers, start by making a list of groups you identify with, from very broad to the most narrow.
Here are some of the groups I identify with…
U.S. Citizens
Male U.S. citizens
Parents
Homeowners
Entrepreneurs
People who’d like to write a book
Business professionals
Professionals who engage in business networking
Service providers to business owners
People offering financial advice to individuals
MBA graduates
People in my age group
Dallas/Fort Worth residents
Hockey fans
Long-distance runners
Family (relatives and ancestors)
Next, extract a list of the highly-rated activities, achievements, and experiences from Your Lifetime Chronology. Then, for each entry on your list, ask yourself the following questions:
What made this entry highly-rated in my life?
Is this occurrence uncommon among a group of people I identify with?
Can the uniqueness of this occurrence be quantified.
Below is an example from my Lifetime Chronology. I used my accumulated education, professional designations, and career experience to find my uniqueness among DFW financial advisors:
Dallas/Fort Worth Residents – 8,100,037
People licensed to offer financial planning and investment advice to individuals = 24,000
Certified Financial Planner™ practitioners (CFP®) = 1,670
Who are also Certified Exit Planning Advisors™ (CEPA®) = 250 (estimated)
…and have at least 30 years of industry experience = 2
along with an MBA in Finance = 1
These are my credentials, and after an exhaustive search, I believe I’m the only financial advisor in Dallas/Fort Worth that fits these criteria.
You might say, “That’s a bit of a stretch,” but it is unique and differentiating.
Amazon’s methodology for determining its best-selling books sets a precedent for this type of micro-categorization. They’ve created over 16,000 best seller categories and sub-categories, including “several hundred” on investing and personal finance. Therefore, an author of a book on “Managing Your Cash Flow and Investing for Major Purchases,” who sells 200 copies, can likely claim “Best Seller” status in multiple categories.
That’s unique, but so is the act of simply completing a book. While some sources claim that 81% of Americans say they’d like to “write a book, someday,” fewer than 1% actually follow that desire through to a finished manuscript and a published book.
If the thing that makes you unique is truly world-class and elite, your peers will be the very small group that are performing at the highest levels. For the rest of us, defining our peer group narrowly, and as a specific niche, is a perfectly acceptable approach to this exercise.
As you consider your life and what makes you unique, use these prompts to jog your memory:
Where have you lived?
What negative circumstances have you overcome?
What has your career path been?
Have you changed careers? Why?
What have been your biggest professional achievements?
Is there a secret sauce for your business success?
What professional designations have you earned?
How do people describe you?
Where did you attend college?
What degrees have you earned?
Do you have significant achievements in sports, academia, arts & sciences?
What are your interests, hobbies, and special skills?
What is something great that most people don’t know about you?
Who do you know?
Are you well-connected?
People completing this exercise commonly identify 3-5 legitimate differentiators in their life. These “things that make you unique” will become very important when we pull all seven exercises together to create your Relevant Living™ framework.