The Why and How of Everyday Legacies (Part 1)
by Robert Hackman
Photography by Eneida Hoti on Unsplash
Every path you take, you’re leaving your Legacy
Lyric from the song ‘HIStory’
By Michael Jackson
You count in more ways than you understand. You affect more people than you will ever comprehend. Consequently, you create a more significant impact and leave more behind with others and your environment than you realize.
Appreciating your mattering represents one of the many gifts of adopting the Mindset of Everyday Legacies. It attunes you to the myriad interactions in which you influence others and your surroundings. They are endless.
These exchanges represent opportunities for you to leave the Legacies you intend in every one of them.
My assertion that we create Legacies all the time – whether we acknowledge them or not – can be challenging for people to recognize, appreciate, and adopt. The only choice we have is the quality of what we leave.
Most people do not consider Legacy. I acknowledge the lack of awareness, confusion, and resistance.
I hear it from people consistently:
‘I associate Legacy with death.’
‘I am not wealthy and do not have kids, so Legacy is not for me.’
‘I correlate Legacy with self-aggrandizement, which turns me off – I want to make a difference.’
Or I am focused on making more money. Or I struggle to get through the day and keep my family safe and my business on track. Legacy is too far off. I do not have time for Legacy – at least not right now.
It can seem like adding something else to an already burgeoning set of priorities, responsibilities, and obligations.
These are all legitimate thoughts, feelings, and perspectives.
However, what if Everyday Legacies embody a way to make everything you do more meaningful? What if they represent your pathway to a more fulfilling and rewarding life – one that amplifies your mattering? One filled with fewer regrets. Would they make sense, then?
No one seeks more regrets. Do they?
That is what I want for you. That is what I wish for the world. It needs more people deliberately living their Everyday Legacies—the ones they want.
Like jokes, crucial messages lose their intended effect when they need to be explained.
My antidote is to add words describing the present, such as Everyday and moment-by-moment, to change the timing of Legacy from distant to immediate. The here and now is the sole timeframe in which Legacies can be created.
When do you believe your Legacies are made? At what point in your life does your mattering begin? I claim it is now.
I fervently maintain there is nothing more essential for you than living and leading with fewer regrets. You will feel more energized, more purposeful, and connected to yourself and others. The world would be a much better place. Isn’t that what you want?
If so, are you willing to pursue what matters most to you? Are you open to putting yourself on a pathway to get you there?
Let’s slow down to make sure we share a common meaning of Legacy and Mindset.
Legacy Misunderstandings and New Delineation
Meriam Webster’s dictionary chiefly defines Legacy as a gift by will of money or personal property and something transmitted by or received from an ancestor or predecessor or from the past.
I find these descriptions to be too exclusionary. I do not believe you need to be part of the ‘landed gentry’ to leave a Legacy. They also feel too far removed from the present for me.
I never found imagining what I want others to say at my funeral to be a compelling way of altering my perspective or changing my behavior. It felt too detached from my current realities to make a difference.
I need meaning that relates closely to my immediate circumstances because that is the only time I can affect it.
I request you take on my definition of Legacy, which is the impact you have on others with whom you and your environment and what you leave behind.
Thus, you cannot refrain from leaving a Legacy. Your words, behaviors, energy, and intentions have an influence – in each moment, everywhere you go
These effects are contagious and ripple out in degrees you will never know. Again, I emphasize that you matter.
Mindset
Webster explains Mindset as a mental attitude or inclination.
I define a Mindset as a collection of thoughts and beliefs that inform how you make sense of the world. It shapes your perspectives and orients how you handle things. Habits of thought translate into your actions and how you relate.
Legacy Mindsets
Therefore, a Legacy Mindset consists of inclinations and beliefs centered around your impact on others, your environment, and what you leave behind. It brings them to the forefront of your approach.
Legacy Mindsets create a lens through which you view your relationship with yourself, others, and the world and the differences you seek to make.
The Five Ps of Legacy Mindsets
These five elements combine to formulate the foundation of Legacy Mindsets.
Purpose – A leader, a team, and an organization centered around its purpose is significantly more compelling. It represents your ‘why.’
Principles – Principles are your primary values. They represent your ‘how.’
Personal – Uniqueness differentiates your desired Legacies from others’. The more authentically you live it, the more likely you, your team, and your company will fulfill it.
Present – Legacies get created in the present – in the now. How can it be any other way? They represent your ‘when.’
Perspectives – Legacy Mindsets induce you to take on multiple perspectives, both the here and now, with an eye toward the future.
These elements generate the sixth P, Potency. The combination and integration give Legacy Mindsets their force.
You will find much in future additions to this article detailing the significance of each of the five Ps of Everyday Legacies.
Worthy Considerations:
- What are the implications of ignoring your accountability for your Everyday Legacies?
- How would adopting the idea of Everyday Legacies change your Mindset and impact your outcomes?
- What does the realization that you live and leave your Legacies moment-by-moment mean to you?
- What do you think would happen if everyone understood and adopted Legacy Mindsets? In your team, company, family, community, and society?
- What do you make of the 5 Ps of Legacy Mindsets? Are you curious to learn more about the impact of the Five Ps of Legacy Mindsets and what they can do for you?
Please get in touch with me to integrate the Mindset of Everyday Legacies to benefit your family, your teams, and your organization. I welcome the conversation.
Robert Hackman, Principal, 4C Consulting and Coaching, helps people live and lead with fewer regrets. He grows and develops leaders through executive coaching consulting, facilitation, and training individuals, teams, and organizations. He is committed to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. He facilitates trusting environments that promote uncommonly candid conversations. Rob is also passionate about the power of developing Legacy Mindsets and has conducted over 50 Legacy interviews with people to date.
A serious man with a dry sense of humor who loves absurdity can often be found hiking rocky elevations or making music playlists. His mixes, including Pandemic Playlists and Music About Men, can be found on Spotify.
Bravely bring your curiosity to a conversation with Rob, schedule via voice or text @ 484.800.2203 or rhackman@4cconsulting.net.