Are You a High-Achiever? The Simplest Way to Tell

The 1sfa definition of a high-achiever usually means someone who has an abundance of:

• money, wealth

• degrees, awards

• position, title

“Your measure of achievement depends largely on your definition of success or your vision of ‘happily ever after’.”

— 'Are You A High Achiever?' www.kishasolomon.com

While these are certainly indicators of a person who has achieved a great deal, they aren’t the only ones. Unfortunately, many people who are very high-achievers are overlooked or uncelebrated (even by themselves) because they don’t have any of these indicators to ‘prove’ it.

In my opinion, the simplest and most reliable way to tell if you are a high achiever is to ask yourself (and at least 1 other trusted person) to honestly answer these questions about you.

Do you regularly:

1. set out to do big things?

2. do those big things?

Bonus points if you learn from or use those big things to do even bigger things.

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Your measure of achievement depends largely on your definition of success or your vision of ‘happily ever after’. If you don’t have your own vision, you will likely adopt the one-size-fits-all version that says you have to have a lot of money, degrees or title to be considered a high-achiever. And nothing else but that matters.

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Beware the 1SFA: The Trap of One-Size-Fits-All

Alright, kids. Here’s a little analogy that explains what I think of as,

‘The 2 Basic Approaches to Living Life’.

Imagine life starts out in a large department store. It’s big and brightly lit with rows and rows of fully stocked racks of the exact same garment. Made of the exact same material. In the exact same size. In the exact same color. There are large posters of attractive models wearing the one-size-fits-all garment hanging all around the store. If you choose one of these garments, you’ll also get a lifetime membership to a 1SFA club that gives you access to an array of perks & benefits, as long as you’re wearing your 1sFA garment.

There’s also a section off to the side of the store. In this section, are several tables full of well-preserved but previously-owned items heaped into piles. Some of the items are rack, many are designer. It’s a mixed bag. You can choose as many of these items as you like for one price, and you’ll also be given sewing materials for customizing or tailoring them.

Each of us has a choice… will we select the one-size-fits-all-garment or put something together from the pile of used clothes?

Approach #1 - One-Size-Fits-All, aka, 1SFA

get lifetime membership with your purchase

Join the club. Get perks, benefits & premium access.

The first, and by far, the most popular option is the 1SFA (pronounced: ‘once-fuh’). For many, the 1SFA just happens to fit them perfectly. They are the right size and shape for the garment to look on them like it does on the attractive models in the store. The color agrees with them, and the material feels just right.

For many others, it’s simply the easier option. There’s plenty available, I can just go and grab one and be on my way. Plus, if the models look great in them, I’m sure I will too. Besides, everyone else looks like they’re choosing these. I don’t want to be the only weirdo wearing something different. And… used clothes? Ugh. I could never. I don’t care how designer they are. I want to be the first and only to wear the garment that everyone else is wearing. That free lifetime membership deal is definitely for me. I like perks!

Approach #2 - Create Your Own Look

everything must go

Designer closeouts. Gently-used. All sales final.

This option is less popular primarily because it’s less attractive. A pile of used clothes isn’t much of a match against brightly lit, well-organized racks of clothes with hot models wearing them. So why would anyone choose this option at all? The short answer: because they have to. Perhaps they’re deathly allergic to the 1SFA garment’s material. Maybe they’re just too big to even try to fit into a single-sized garment. Maybe they tried the 1SFA for a while and realized they didn’t like it or that they wanted to try the other approach for a while before making a final decision. Maybe none of the attractive models looked like them. Maybe the perks weren’t perkin’ enough. Any number of reasons could compel someone to opt out of the 1SFA option. And opting out really wouldn’t be that much of a problem if….

The Twist

it’s what everyone who’s anyone is wearing

The New 1SFA Collection

Now available everywhere

Let’s say that the store owner earns way more profit off of the 1SFA outfits than the used ones. The 1SFA garments sell at a pretty high price and they are always in high demand. Since there’s more money to be made, the store owner promotes the 1SFA garments more, maybe even suggesting that 1SFA-wearers are better than the bespoke crowd.

The idea takes hold, then takes form. Some 1SFA-wearers believe that there’s probably something wrong with the bespoke crowd - it’s their fault they’re so big. And if all of us 1SFAs aren’t allergic to the material and we’re perfectly normal, than the allergic must be dysfunctional or disturbed. Those who used to wear 1SFA? Oh, they’re just confused or off the path. We have ways of converting them back.

Now, the bespoke crowd have a problem.

If they continue to wear their self-created looks, they may become targets. Of shame, ridicule, discrimination, violence. The price of the bespoke garment just got a lot higher. Even if they are allergic, even if they’re too big, would it not be less risky to just fit in to the 1SFA garment? ‘Maybe I can just wear the 1SFA in public,’ they reason. ‘I can wear whatever I want behind closed doors.’ For some, it’s a compromise worth making. For others, not so much.

Out of all this confusion around size and style and structure of garment, come all sorts of mis-fits and allergic reactions like:

• imposter syndrome

• masking

• identity crisis

• negative self talk

Those for whom the 1SFA doesn’t naturally fit will have to contend with one or all of these regardless of if they choose to fit in or not. This is the case for many so-called marginalized people - the indigenous, the queer, the neurodivergent, the immigrant… anyone who is made to feel like an ‘outsider’ or ‘other’.

For them, the double-sided trap of the 1SFA is this:

Either force yourself into a garment that doesn’t fit or change yourself to fit the garment.

This typically means a literal or figurative modification or ‘cutting off’ of things that are essential to the shape and size of you, including your:

• language

• name

• hair

• clothing

• behavior

• practices of cultural significance

The often-missed irony in this choice is that in doing so, it can become more difficult for you to stand out when you want to. In short, when you fall into the 1SFA trap, you may lose your most strategic advantage.

poor little mermaid

now in theaters

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how do i know what my purpose is?

Audio Transcript:

I used to feel like, 'Oh, my purpose is something that I need to really clearly delineate and get exactly right. This statement that's 100% correct. And, I feel like this is it. It's unchanged. I've defined it, it's finite, it's in stone. This is what I'm about.'

And that's not it. I don't think that's what purpose is. I think the very fact of having a big why is in itself the big why. The desire to find purpose is in itself a purpose. So I think this need to wanna get it just right is this sort of old way we're used to relating with ideas of highest self or higher beings, or religion or callings or all of this is that there's a right way and a wrong way and you gotta get it right or else you're wasting your time or you're not gonna reach enlightenment or whatever it is.

But I think when you really look at any of the ways of living, the religions, the philosophies, whatever. They are, just that. They are ways of living. So when we're even thinking about purpose or something like that, that is also a driving force, a guiding North star in our lives, it's not so much about what you're doing, it's about how you're doing. It's about how you're living. Not 'am I doing the right things', but, 'am I having the right experience?' Am I doing these things in a way that represents all of my values, my goals, my role models? Am I doing my life in a way that aligns with whatever the tenets of my innermost religion are?

So I think when it comes to the 'big why', resist the temptation to get hung up on clearly and precisely defining it to the Nth degree or with a very specific set of words. Now, if you're able to do that, hallelujah. That's great!, But also be open to that, changing every 5, 7, 10, however many years. It may not stay the same for the entire of your story, and that is fine because that would suggest that you are still an organic living, volatile evolutionary being.

easter 2022 - which sins did jesus die for? (podcast)

I woke up early during Holy Week, thinking of the Easter story, and I had questions.

Namely, which of the sins in ‘Jesus died for our sins’ did Jesus die for?

Listen as I explore - from a different perspective - what ‘sinful’ actions led to the death of Jesus, and how those same sins may be pushing you toward a life-changing transformation as well.

CLICK BELOW TO LISTEN TO THE PODCAST (17 MINS)

Listen on Anchor.FM

Watch on YouTube

20 insights about work and relationships

Obvious observations about how we work and how we engage in relationships with friends, family and significant others.

1. Life is about relationships.

2. Work is one of them.

3. Relationships are where we learn about ourselves and how we interact with the environment and people around us.

4. Relationships are a form of energy exchange.

5. Most people (but specifically, black women) approach work and relationships from the role of supplicant.

6. The majority of our life from childhood to adulthood is focused on either: getting a job or a pursuing a romantic relationship.

7. Your identity is deeply connected to what you do for work or your relationship status.

8. Money is the least important factor to consider when looking for a job. Love is the least important factor to consider when looking for a life partner.

9. We tolerate things in our work or romantic relationships that we would never tolerate in our friendships.

10. Friendships are more likely to be self-defined vs. defined by culture, society or tradition.

11. Friendships are often our most authentic relationships.

12. We are also in relationship with ourselves.

13. The quality of our self-relationship determines the quality of our other relationships.

14. The quality of our self-relationship is determined by the quality of our relationships with our parents.

15. Our relationships with our parents serve as templates for our romantic relationships.

16. Our parents didn’t share much with us about their work experiences or romantic relationships.

17. Quitting a job or quitting a relationship can be more powerful than staying.

18. Healthy relationships are characterized by individual sovereignty and mutual interdependence.

19. Stories, symbols and images help us record and encode information about our environment and our relationships.

20. The stories we tell ourselves about ourselves define our reality.

I’ll be delving into each of these insights about work and relationships over the coming weeks. Get ready for some thought-provoking topics and some life-changing mindset shifts. 

Declaration of Self: How to Create Your Personal Manifesto

I recently completed a 5-day self-directed, self-clarity exercise.

Each day, I took one of the following self-assessments designed to reveal insights about my personality and natural talents:

• Natal chart

• Typefinder

• Enneagram

• Life Values Inventory

• StrengthsFinder

On the 6th day, I did a final self-clarity exercise where I perused the Ultimate list of Archetypes and selected the top 3 archetypes that fit me best.

On the 7th day… I rested. :)

Mainly because at the end of all of that self assessing, I was swimming in self-information.

And… I’m not that strong of a swimmer.

So - I set out to create something that would let me assemble all of this self-information into a statement I could actually USE to keep myself focused and afloat in times of uncertainty, difficulty or great change.

The result: My Declaration of Self.

It’s like my personal manifesto or mission statement - a declaration to myself and to the world of WHO I AM and WHY I’M HERE.

Here’s how I crafted it.

How I Created My Personal Manifesto, aka, MY Declaration of Self

Based on what I know of each of the self-assessments and what they were designed to tell me about myself - for instance, the Enneagram tells me about my ego and how I face challenges; the ascendant sign in my natal chart tells me what role others usually see me as playing - I drafted the template below.

Each self-assessment provided a result that was very similar to an archetype or that could be translated into an archetype.

WHAT IS AN ARCHETYPE?

I like to think of an archetype as a symbol or a character. Archetypes represent known patterns of behavior, a set of personal characteristics that can be summed up in a single word.

Watch MY IGTV VIDEO on ‘Defining Yourself with Archetypes’ for more on how I define and use archetypes.

By translating my assessment results into corresponding archetypes, I was able to come up with a list of words that could be plugged into my templated statement, mad-libs style.

Finding the Archetypes  for my natal chart signs and houses

To get the zodiac sign archetypes for my Sun, Ascendant, North Node, South Node and Moon signs, I relied on Kathryn Hocking’s 12 Archetypes of the Zodiac. You can find it here: https://kathrynhocking.com/the-12-archetypes-of-the-zodiac/

 

To get the house meanings for my North and South Nodes, I used the Zodiac House meanings from Labyrinthos. You can find them here: https://labyrinthos.co/blogs/astrology-horoscope-zodiac-signs/tagged/houses

The final outcome was my personal Declaration of Self:

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create Your Own personal manifesto

The 5 Self-Assessments I Do Before Goal-Setting

Every wise explorer carries something to navigate by.

Especially if what you’re exploring is yourself. 

Whenever I’m planning to make a major shift or a significant life change, I carve out time for a little self-exploration beforehand.

Why?

When I’m do something that doesn’t look like it makes sense to others, I have to be pretty sure of myself and the ‘big whys’ behind my big leap or big shift.

A few of the ‘senseless’ things I’ve done in the past:

• Quit my ‘good corporate job’ as a management consultant to invest in real estate

• Quit my ‘good corporate job’ as an IT project manager to become a freelance writer

• Quit my ‘good corporate job’ as a content strategist to move to Spain and teach English

And I recently quit my ‘good corporate job’ to start following my purpose.

After 4 years of working in an environment that tested my self-confidence and my commitment to my personal values, I knew I needed to spend some time getting reacquainted with myself without the constant stress and anxiety that comes with being in a situation or environment that is just not the right fit.

I turned to several personality assessments - some I’d taken before, some I hadn’t - to help me dig deep and really put some effort into my answers to the questions: 

‘Who Am I?’

 and,

‘Why Am I Here?’

Answering these questions allow me to enter my life planning or goal-setting process with clarity. Not just clarity about what I want - i.e., what I want to accomplish, what I want to have more of, what I want to have less of - but clarity about who I am now, who I am becoming, and what will help me bridge the gap between the two.

Having the answers to these questions gives me the essential ingredients I need to begin writing my life story. To assume the role of the hero in my own story. To stop waiting for external achievement, relationship or reward to make me feel complete or valued.

I believe that each of us was sent to the world at the exact time we were born because we have a mission to complete. Some call that mission destiny, others call it purpose. But whatever you call it, it’s this driving force that will really help us feel fulfilled in life versus only feeling accomplished.

To make sure I get the maximum value out of these personality assessments, I developed a process of extracting the most meaningful bits of each assessment and using them as inputs to:

1. Defining my life story’s main character

2. Creating the outline for my life story

As with life, it’s not just about the results of the test, but what you do with those results that matters most.

Below are the 5 personality assessments I use before I begin life planning or goal-setting. For more details on how I use each assessment, and how I create my Declaration of Self and my Life Value Map from the results, click each link to explore further.

My 5 Go-To Self-Assessments:

1. Natal chart

2. Typefinder (aka, Meyers-Briggs Type Indicator)

3. Enneagram

4. Life Values Inventory

5. StrengthsFinder

The Life Planning Outputs I Create from My Self-Assessments:

• Declaration of Self

• Life Value Map

Using Stories for Goal-Setting and Life Planning: Write, Then Edit

Writing Your Life story isn’t just about being inspired.

Crafting your life story chapter by chapter takes commitment to a process, or at least, to a set of guiding principles or habits. Much of story-writing or storytelling involves following a process that transforms the artist into a craftsman.

I’m writing the story of my life each and every day. The quality of my life story will largely be determined by the guiding principles I follow and the habits I develop. These principles and habits should be organic enough to allow me to respond to what’s happening in the moment, but also structured enough to make sure I don’t lose sight of my story.

Some of My Guiding Life Principles

·       Flexibility

·       Experimentation

·       Experiences over possessions

·       Belonging is better than fitting in

Some of My Life Habits

·       Regular self-reflection

·       Time spent in nature

·       Travel

Editing My Story

You can’t edit a story while you’re writing it.

Writing requires you to be present in the moment. Editing is when you have time to analyze, critique, review and adjust. Editing helps refine the initial draft of your life story into a finished product that has greater clarity and meaning.

When I take time out for self-reflection and self-development, I’m editing my life story. As I’m writing my story – living each day, going on adventures, encountering success and failure – I’m in the middle of it all, I’m too close, too emotionally involved in the events that are unfolding to assess them accurately in the moment.

I have to occasionally pause and reflect on everything that’s happened to put it in context, and determine what adjustments need to be made. Regular self-reflection allows me to mine the newly-written parts of my life story for jewels that I can use to keep creating better and better storylines.

My Daily Self-Reflection Practices

I use some combination of the following on a daily basis:

• writing,

• voice notes,

• meditation,

• quiet thinking,

• listening to self-development podcasts

• reading an essay or listening to speeches (e.g., Ted talks)] 

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So, let’s recap the steps to taking a story-based approach to goal-setting:

1. Define Your Main Character

2. Understand the Backstory

3. Outline the Plot

4. Write, Then Edit

While it’s a bit more detailed than traditional goal-setting, I think that the outcome of the story-based approach is much more meaningful and makes me way more excited to pursue my goals.

Next, I’ll share the steps I use to turn my Life Value Map into a ‘neverending story’ that makes me feel like an overachiever even when I don’t accomplish any of the goals I originally set.

Using Stories for Goal-Setting and Life Planning: Outlining the Plot

Now, it’s finally time to begin plotting the story – what is the quest that the main character will go on? What will she encounter on her journey? What dangers and perils await her?

This step is similar to traditional goal-setting, but it’s placed within the context of an overarching life story.

To begin outlining my life story’s plot, I start by asking myself the following questions.

Questions for Outlining My Life Story

What do I want?

•  Who do I want to be?

•  What change do I want to see in myself? In the world?

•  Who do I want to help?

•  What problem(s) do I want to solve / fix? What wrongs do I want to right?

•  What do I want to leave behind?

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The Powerful Woman Wheel

I created the Powerful Woman Wheel as a way to define the areas of life that a powerful black woman (versus a strong black woman) would focus on. Since, ‘becoming a powerful woman’ is one of the key quests of my life story, I use the Powerful Woman Wheel to help define the main categories of my life story.

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Who / what is going to help me?

• Mentors, role modes

• Right associations

• Centering practices / beliefs (big why)

Who / what is going to stop me?

• Shadow self

• Vices

• Unresolved trauma responses; attachment issues

• Wrong associations

What lesson(s) do I want to learn?

Before my story is finished, I want to be able to say:

• I’ve mastered…

• I’ve studied…

• I’ve learned…

• I know something about…

How far can I go?

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A MORE SIMPLE METHOD: Instead of answering all of the questions above, I can draft a pretty good life story outline by asking myself, ‘How do I feed my ‘X'-factors’ ?’ My X-factors are the personal archetypes that I uncovered while defining my main character. They are also included in my Declaration of Self.

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The Life Value Map

I wanted a way to keep my answers to the life story outline questions close at hand. Something that would act as a living ‘map’ that I could refer to regularly and that I could quickly and easily add new quests, adventures and story elements to over time.

Borrowing from agile project management, the Life Value Map is like a backlog of all the things I want to do in life - a running list of my goals, dreams and visions - organized in a kanban board layout.

I use the categories from the Powerful Woman Wheel as my column headers and I add the answers to the life story outline questions under the relevant column(s).

I prefer to keep my life value map in a digital project management tool like Trello or Asana. This makes it accessible anytime and anywhere. Which means I can always use it to add new items to my life story outline.

Next: Write, then Edit

Using Stories for Goal-Setting and Life Planning: Understanding the Backstory

After defining my story’s main character – her traits, qualities, strengths and struggles, the next step to crafting my personal story is to define my main character’s backstory.

That is, what are the most recent and / or the most relevant events that have occurred in my main character’s life? What brought the main character to this moment, to the current situation or state of affairs?

For this, I took a day over winter break and did my own year-end-review. I made a written list of all of the major or meaningful moments from the past year that I could remember. I scrolled through social media posts and pictures on my phone to help me recall some of the moments I’d forgotten.

I probably could have done this exercise in less than a day, but I allowed extra time for sentimentality and emotional segues and side roads I tend to wander down when reflecting on the past.

Storytelling and Letter-Writing as Backstory Exercises

Earlier in the year, I’d also done a couple of storytelling exercises that helped me clarify my backstory.

One was a series of recorded interviews with my grandmother. By listening to her stories, I could see how my own life story was a continuation of hers and how much I could draw from her story to help shape my own.

[NEW YORK TIMES Article: Record and Share Your Family History in 5 Steps ]

The second was a letter-writing exercise in the book, ‘Write Yourself Into Your Dreams’. The book guides its readers through a process for unpacking unhealed trauma and unresolved inner conflict with one’s parents.

Though I was initially skeptical of the process, it was surprisingly impactful and helped me to offload some emotional baggage that the main character of my soon-to-be-written life story did not need to be carrying around.

[PSYCHOLOGY TODAY Article: Transactional Writing: Letters That Heal]

[SNAILED WITH LOVE: Letter Writing to Create Connections]

Next: Outlining the Plot

Using Stories for Goal-Setting and Life Planning: Defining The Main Character

Whether I’m working on a project or writing a story, the first thing I do is identify the key players, aka, the main character(s).

Before I began this year’s goal-setting, I spent several days (5, to be exact) doing some self-assessment. For this, I relied on a few personality assessments, a values inventory exercise, and an in-depth review of my natal chart.

Even though I’d taken most of these self-assessments previously, I still found it extremely useful to review and remind myself of the natural gifts and talents that I’m working with before I began writing my story.

Learn More About Each of The Self-Assessments

• Natal Chart

• Typefinder (MBTI)

• Enneagram

• Life Values Inventory

• StrengthsFinder

Since each of these assessments provides a lot of information to wade through, I came up with a way to condense the key insights from all of them into a mini-manifesto. I call it my ‘Declaration of Self’.

The Declaration of Self acts as a sort of over-arching intention that drives and motivates my life story’s main character. Regularly reviewing and reciting this intention statement will help re-energize my main character and keep her focused when the journey gets rough or there’s a lack of clarity.

In a future post, I’ll share the exact method I use to turn the results of my self-assessment into my Declaration of Self - so you can create your own!

Next: Understanding My Backstory

How I Use Stories for Personal Goal-Setting and Life Planning

I don’t know about you, but goals haven’t been working for me lately.

To be honest, goals haven’t been working for me… ever.

In the past, my personal goal-setting pattern has looked something like:

• set a goal that’s ‘SMART’

• Start down the path of pursuing the goal

• Get some early wins and feel extremely motivated by my own commitment and initial action,

Then… life starts happening. Work gets crazy, or I have trouble in one of my primary relationships. Or, maybe my ‘shiny object syndrome’ kicks in and a new more exciting or more urgent goal pops up. I start losing momentum, promising myself that I’m going to get back on track. But weeks pass, maybe months, and I may completely forget about the original goal or decide that it wasn’t really that important to begin with.

So, this year, I decided to take a different approach. Instead of starting with goals (aka, the trees), I decided to start with a story (aka, the forest).

I’m a big picture thinker, so context and the larger story are always important to me. When solving problems at work, I usually start by getting an understanding of the systems, people, and structures surrounding the problem or challenge, because that’s… what a good consultant does.

So why not take the same approach for my personal life?

Next: Defining My Life Story’s Main Character

How to be more resilient

How do you build resilience?
The question came up in today’s leadership meeting. We were discussing overall team morale. The general feeling of anxiety at another pending org change was acknowledged by all, but so was the inevitable nature and frequency of change within the organization.

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“What can we do to help people deal better with this?”

“How can we help them to stop being worried about what’s going to happen in the future?”

“What if we bring in a speaker? I’ve heard of this guy who sailed around the world alone… it was a grueling challenge… he’s written about it. Maybe he could share his story.”

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I listen. More ideas come… a class, a series of articles, role models within the organization, cubicle posters.

I go within myself and ask… how did I learn resilience? How did the other leaders at this table learn it? 

From reading? From listening to a speech? From motivational posters?

No. 

From hitting a proverbial wall and pushing my way through until I found the light.

From realizing in that moment that if it was to be done, it was to be done by me.

From recognizing that the only way out, was through.

And most of those moments occurred outside of an office building. Outside of a classroom. Outside of a lecture hall.

Out in the real world. Sometimes in the literal wilderness. Others, while I was a stranger in a strange land. Most, when no one else was there to encourage or support. 

Some things can’t be taught.

If you aren’t intentionally placing yourself in uncomfortable, unfamiliar or undefined spaces in your real life, you probably aren’t developing the skills needed to deal with the uncomfortable, unfamiliar or undefined in your work life.

Anxiety often comes from a vague fear of what is not known. But how do you come to know the unknown if you avoid it entirely? 

Spoiler alert: the truth is, you will never come to know the unknown. But after repeated tussles with the unknown, you will come to know you.

You will come to know what you are capable of, not just what you’re used to or what you’ve done successfully in the past. You will know what you look like, how you behave when there is no easy way out. You will know what it feels like to grit your teeth, hunker your shoulders down and press forward – yes, even with doubt or anger swirling around in your head, with tears stinging your eyes, with the naysayers throwing jibes at you from the sidelines, with false friends showing you the broadside of their backs.

When you come through the unknown, you will – if you have been paying attention – recognize that you are in league with the Creator.

When you come through the unknown, you will – if you have been paying attention – recognize that you are in league with the Creator.

And whatever was broken or damaged in the coming through, can be recreated again and again in whatever image you desire.

And that is resilience.

Not knowing that the sailing will be smooth or that the storm will pass soon. But knowing that from the wreckage, you have the power, the endless power to say, ‘Let there be light’.

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Looking for proven ways to build greater resilience?

I’ve put together a Resilience Resource Guide - a collection of advice, exercises and motivational content gathered from top researchers and experts in psychology and alternative wellness. 

It’s 100% FREE and available for immediate download.

Get yours below!