Write for the future program

Initially it was exciting as I was forming goals and imagining possible futures. But then, as the difficult process of making concrete plans wore on, my progress began to slow. Not only was it difficult to come up with solutions to my problems, but I was also having to take a hard look a the areas of my life I had been avoiding and neglecting. That was challenging to say the least. Looking into the future is hard. As Jordan Peterson often reminds people , the unknown is full of dragons: the mythological embodiment of threat and opportunity.

But it also holds the promise of everything that truly inspires you. When doing the exercise, the twin emotions of fear and excitement are always present. In that way, embarking on the adventure of Future Authoring is not for the faint of heart…. Here are some of the experiences most often reported by people undertaking the Future Authoring program:.

I worked on the Future Authoring program under two very different types of conditions. In the beginning I just threw myself into it. Finally I just gave up…. Some time later I decided I needed to take another crack at it. The plan was pretty unambitious — I only committed to doing 5 minutes a day — but I knew I could manage to stick to it. And I did. As I made progress, I realized that I could actually write for much more than 5 minutes, once the pressure to do so was gone.

This is actually one of the behaviorist strategies that Jordan Peterson has himself recommended:. There are constant discussions there about both problems with completing the program, and their potential solutions. Here are the 3 biggest problems people seem to face when attempting to completing the program, and some solutions that might help you avoid them.

Like me, many people have the experience of starting the program with the best intentions and then slowly fizzling out due to poor planning, falling behind and losing motivation, or burning out. People tend to lose steam when they realize there may be actual hard work that goes into the completion process and their enthusiasm dries up. Solution : What people have found most helpful in combating the False Start problems, is twofold:.

Without a plan, you will not make progress. Without committing to your plan, in a public way, you will be less likely to hold yourself accountable to that plan. These indispensable rules for making progress are outlined in much greater detail in this blog post. This free planner for the Future Authoring program provides a detailed outline of the exercise, estimates of how long each section takes, and several possible schedules for completing it.

You can also Join the Self Authoring Collaboration Group to work with other folks who are also committed to completing the program. A second problem people seem to run into is the desire to formulate perfectly complete answers their first time through the course, causing them to get stuck when that proves difficult.

The Future Authoring program has you come up with very specific high value goals for the future, and some people may have a strong need to have the entire thing figured out before they reach the end. Solution: The best advice for this problem comes from Dr. Peterson himself see the video below : besides having a plan, try to do the exercise badly the first time.

You can go back at any time to change, or clarify answers from previous sections. What often seems to happen is that people gain more clarity on earlier sections as they move through the exercise. By: Phillip Bader. A month after finishing, I pitched an article to Reason magazine, where I now work full-time. The DC-based fellowship typically meets in-person on Wednesday evenings from pm ET for six weeks and features prominent writers and editors from the DC area.

The state-based fellowship is held virtually via webcam on Tuesday evenings from pm ET for six weeks and is designed for writers outside the DC-area. Jordan B. Peterson, professor of Psychology at the University of Toronto, decided to ask his students to sit down and write about their ideal future. They were asked to specifically describe the type of person they wanted to be, the skills they wanted to attain, and the relationships they wanted to have, among other things.

Simply through this guided contemplation, Dr. Reset password Please enter your email address to request a password reset. Log In. This information is used to create your account First Name Please enter your name. Email Please provide a valid email. Phone Please provide a valid phone number.

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