Archetype Based Living

Steve Pavlina doesn't use this phrase, but it's a handle I find handy (hah) for a couple of his ideas.

In the past I used to set goals (Goal Setting) with a focus on covering the different areas of my life (Area-balanced living). I'd set goals for my health, work/business, contribution, finances, social life, relationships, personal growth, spiritual path, etc... However, as I continued using this approach I often felt myself getting stuck or sidetracked. Sometimes I'd look at my goals, and while they seemed pretty intelligent on the surface, I felt like something was missing. I didn't feel as motivated as I expected.

I experimented by letting go of goals (No Goals) for a while and just going with the flow, but that produced even worse results. I know some people are fans of that style, but it hasn't worked well for me. I make much better progress - and I'm generally happier and more fulfilled - when I wield greater conscious control over the direction of my life.

Instead of thinking of goals as specific accomplishments I want to rack up in each part of my life, I began thinking of goals as a means of self-expression. Some part of my personality wants to be expressed, and a strong goal can help me focus that desire for self-expression... I began thinking of simple labels I could use for these different Aspects of my personality where I seem to have a strong need for self-expression.

One advantage to this approach is that you won’t ignore significant aspects of your personality, which is easy to do with the classical coverage-based approach.

Your first stab at a list of personality Attributes probably won’t be your final list. This is very much an iterative process. Once you create your first list, you’ll be able to see it in front of you and think more deeply about it, and you’ll have the opportunity to work with your list for a few days to see how it measures up.

For each of his "final" 6 Archetype-s/Aspects, he has a bunch of "keywords". These seem related to his earlier exploration of Value-based Life-Purpose definition. He separately provides a list of 418 Value-s which you could use as a bottom-up source of material. On the other hand, he says he chooses to emphasize a subset of his Values over a given period based on the Goals he sets during that time! So there's a bit of OODA-loop there.