I've been using 2 Week Sprints in my Personal Life for 20 Weeks

Summary

In this video, Stepan introduces the concept of two-week sprints for personal life improvement, inspired by professional project management. He begins by explaining the Wheel of Life, a tool for assessing life satisfaction across categories like work, health, and relationships. Stepan then demonstrates how to set annual and quarterly goals using this tool and breaks them down into actionable two-week sprints. Each sprint involves setting specific goals, reviewing progress, and adjusting strategies for improvement. The video encourages viewers to experiment with this method to enhance personal growth and goal achievement.

Takeaways

• 🔑 Two-week sprints can be a beneficial method for personal life planning, not just professional.
• 🌐 The Wheel of Life is a tool used to assess satisfaction in various life categories like work, health, and relationships.
• 🎯 Life can be divided into nine categories: work, growth, finances, health, fitness, emotional well-being, spiritual purpose, friends, family, and romantic relationships.
• 📊 Assigning a satisfaction rating to each category helps visualize areas of life that may need improvement.
• 📆 Yearly goals should be broad and can be broken down into quarterly and then two-week sprint goals.
• 🔄 The process of setting goals involves identifying areas for improvement from the Wheel of Life assessment.
• 🔄 Two-week sprints help maintain consistency in habit formation and provide regular check-ins for progress.
• 🔄 Sprint planning involves reviewing past goals, identifying what worked and what didn't, and planning for the next two weeks.
• 📝 Having clear tasks for each day based on the two-week sprint goals helps in achieving them.
• 🔄 Regularly reassessing and adjusting goals based on the outcomes of each sprint is crucial for personal growth and development.

Q & A

What is the main topic of the video?

The main topic of the video is the concept of using two-week sprints in personal life, not just professional life, to improve various aspects of life.

What is the Wheel of Life?

The Wheel of Life is a coaching tool used to assess one's current satisfaction with different areas of life, such as work, health, and relationships.

How many categories does the Wheel of Life consist of in the video?

The Wheel of Life in the video consists of three main categories: work, health, and relationships, which are further divided into nine subcategories.

What are the three main categories of the Wheel of Life?

The three main categories of the Wheel of Life are work, health, and relationships.

How does one use the Wheel of Life to set goals?

After assessing one's current satisfaction in the Wheel of Life, one sets yearly and quarterly goals based on areas they want to improve.

What is the purpose of setting yearly and quarterly goals?

The purpose of setting yearly and quarterly goals is to have a clear direction for improvement and to break down larger goals into manageable sprints.

What is the significance of two-week sprints in personal life?

Two-week sprints help in forming habits, checking progress, and making adjustments to achieve personal goals more effectively.

Why is it important to review and retrospect after each sprint?

Reviewing and retrospecting after each sprint help in understanding what went well and what didn't, allowing for adjustments and personal growth.

How does the process of tasking work in the two-week sprints?

Tasking involves transferring the goals from the sprint planning into a to-do list app, creating clear tasks for different days to ensure the goals are met.

What is the advice for someone who wants to start using two-week sprints?

The advice is to start with a sprint, decide on a few things to implement, and see how it goes. It's more important to see what needs to be tweaked for success than to follow a big overarching goal.

What is the role of personal goals in the two-week sprints?

Personal goals in the two-week sprints provide specific, time-bound objectives to work towards, which can include anything from career advancement to personal well-being.

Outlines

00:00

🚀 Introduction to Two-Week Sprints and The Wheel of Life

The speaker, Stepan, introduces the concept of two-week sprints, a method to enhance personal life similar to its use in professional settings. He proposes using this technique beyond work to improve various aspects of daily life. Stepan begins by discussing the 'Wheel of Life,' a tool used in coaching to assess life satisfaction across different categories. He explains that the wheel is divided into three main categories: work, health, and relationships, each further divided into three subcategories, resulting in nine areas to evaluate. The speaker illustrates how to draw the wheel and emphasizes the importance of assessing satisfaction in each area to identify potential improvements.

05:01

🌟 Assessing Life Satisfaction with The Wheel of Life

In this paragraph, Stepan explains how to use The Wheel of Life by assigning a satisfaction rating to each of the nine categories, ranging from 1 (lowest) to 10 (highest). He provides examples of how to rate different aspects, such as work, personal growth, finances, health, emotional well-being, and relationships. The visual representation of these ratings helps to identify areas of life that might need improvement. Stepan then transitions into discussing the importance of setting yearly and quarterly goals, which are derived from the current life assessment provided by the wheel.

10:04

📈 Setting Annual and Quarterly Goals

Stepan discusses the process of setting annual and quarterly goals based on the assessment from The Wheel of Life. He suggests starting with broad yearly goals and breaking them down into smaller, more manageable quarterly objectives. As an example, he mentions increasing annual compensation by 5% and improving emotional well-being by meditating for at least 300 days in a year. He differentiates between outcome-oriented goals, like earning more money, and process-oriented goals, like meditating regularly. The paragraph emphasizes the importance of having clear goals to guide the two-week sprints.

15:06

🔄 The Power of Two-Week Sprints for Personal Growth

Stepan explains the rationale behind using two-week sprints for personal development. He highlights the common issue of starting habits and then gradually losing momentum, leading to complete cessation without realizing it. Two-week sprints provide a structured approach with regular check-ins to assess progress and identify obstacles. The speaker stresses the importance of understanding the reasons behind any failures in order to grow and adjust strategies accordingly. He outlines the steps involved in sprint planning, including reviewing past performance and preparing for future goals.

20:09

📝 Implementing Two-Week Sprints in Daily Life

In the final paragraph, Stepan details the process of implementing two-week sprints into daily life. He describes the steps of reviewing past goals, conducting a retrospective to understand what worked and what didn't, and planning for the upcoming sprint with specific tasks. He emphasizes the importance of translating goals into actionable tasks and using a to-do list app for better tracking and execution. The speaker shares his personal approach to tasking, which includes breaking down goals into daily actions and tracking progress through check boxes. He concludes by encouraging viewers to give the two-week sprint method a try and to share their experiences and suggestions.

Keywords

💡Two-week Sprints

Two-week Sprints refer to a time management technique where goals are set and evaluated over a two-week period. This concept, borrowed from agile project management, is used in the video to discuss personal goal setting and habit formation. The video suggests using two-week sprints to regularly check-in on personal progress, making adjustments as necessary to achieve goals.

💡Wheel of Life

The Wheel of Life is a coaching tool used to assess one's satisfaction with various aspects of life. In the video, it is used to categorize life into three main areas: work, health, and relationships, each further divided into three subcategories. This tool helps in identifying areas of life that might need improvement and sets the stage for setting goals for the year and the quarter.

💡Personal Growth

Personal growth is a central theme in the video, referring to the process of improving oneself in various aspects such as career, emotional well-being, and physical health. The video emphasizes that the process of setting and reviewing two-week sprints is a tool for personal growth, allowing individuals to identify areas of struggle and make necessary adjustments.

💡Habit Formation

Habit formation is the process of consistently performing a task or behavior until it becomes automatic. The video discusses the challenge of forming habits and how two-week sprints can help maintain consistency and identify obstacles to habit formation, such as lack of a clear plan or insufficient motivation.

💡Yearly Goals

Yearly goals are broad objectives set for a year, which are then broken down into more manageable quarterly and bi-weekly goals. The video uses the Wheel of Life assessment to derive yearly goals, such as increasing income or improving emotional well-being, which are then used to guide the setting of two-week sprints.

💡Quarterly Goals

Quarterly goals are intermediate objectives that help achieve yearly goals. These are derived from the yearly goals and are meant to be more specific and actionable. The video explains how to break down yearly goals, like meditating for 300 days in a year, into quarterly goals, such as meditating 75 times in a quarter.

💡Retrospective

A retrospective, in the context of the video, is a review process where one reflects on the past two-week sprint to assess what went well and what didn't. It is part of the two-week sprint cycle and is used to identify reasons for not achieving goals and to plan improvements for the next sprint.

💡Tasking

Tasking is the process of translating goals into actionable tasks, which are then organized into a to-do list. The video suggests using a to-do list app to manage daily tasks derived from the two-week sprint goals. This helps in keeping track of the daily actions needed to achieve the set goals.

💡Check-in Point

A check-in point, as discussed in the video, is a定期的时间点用来评估进度和调整计划. In the context of two-week sprints, it is the end of each sprint cycle where one reflects on their performance and makes necessary adjustments for the next cycle.

💡Agile Thinking

Agile thinking is a methodology that emphasizes flexibility, iterative progress, and regular evaluation. The video adopts agile principles, such as setting short-term goals, conducting retrospectives, and adjusting plans based on feedback, to manage personal development and goal achievement.

Highlights

Introduction to the concept of two-week sprints for personal life

Explanation of the Wheel of Life coaching tool

How to split life into three big categories: work, health, and relationships

Assessing satisfaction with current life in different aspects

Linking Wheel of Life to yearly goals and objectives

Creating a visual representation of life satisfaction

Setting yearly goals based on the Wheel of Life assessment

Deriving quarterly goals from yearly goals

Importance of two-week sprints for habit formation and personal growth

Process of reviewing the last sprint and setting new goals

Agile thinking applied to personal life for continuous improvement

How to conduct a retrospective to understand what went well and what didn't

Creating a task list from two-week sprint goals

Using a to-do list app to track daily tasks aligned with sprint goals

The value of regular check-ins for assessing progress and making adjustments

Encouragement to start a sprint without a clear goal to discover areas for improvement

Invitation for viewers to share their experiences and suggestions for improvement

Transcripts

hey everybody in this video I want to

talk to you about two weeks prints and

how we can use them in our personal life

uh instead of just our professional life

that work and everything my name is

stepan and on this channel we'll discuss

everything that makes my life easier

gadgets I use and tools that I love so

enjoy sit back relax let's dive in and

explore why two week Sprints might be

beneficial for you to use in your day

today life so before just going to the

two weeks prints I want to First briefly

discuss the topic of The Wheel of Life

The Wheel of Life um is a coaching tool

actually to um assess your current

standing your

satisfaction mostly um about your life

and this coaching tool um there are a

lot of different variations on this but

the one I will show you today will split

your life into three big categories this

is work health and relationship and in

these categories we'll assess a little

bit how we satisfi how satisfied we are

currently with um our life in those

regards and from there we're go into um

yearly goals objectives and how we can

use those for two weeks prints so The

Wheel of Life I will draw now also as

well in The Wheel of Life we basically

want to draw wheel first so let's do

this um we're going to do a big wheelie

wheel and we'll um split this into three

different categories so we take this and

this and each category we can then again

split into three parts so we have nine

total categories we will assess our Al

currently as we are so we go here first

and the first category that we will look

at is um work and in work I actually

like to split this in again three so we

have

um

Korean we have growth or personal growth

and the third part is

finances and in the categories we'll

discuss every these a little bit work

related as a big objective is so and

career it's about how satisfied are you

with your career right now growth is

with a personal growth how satisfied you

are this can closely relate to Career

but not necessarily and in finances

you'll give yourself a writing on how

satisfied you are with your

finances the next big three to not spend

too much time on this now is health so

let's draw three what um District here

as well so we

have

health

and fitness is the first one this is I

think very um self-explanatory what in

health and fitness is we have

um

emotional

well-being and sorry and the third part

is

um

spiritual and purpose so in these

categories we have on the first part our

physical health and how well we're

feeling then we have our emotional

health and then we have everything

spiritual Purpose Driven stuff this is

usually for example the part where I

struggle the most with to give me high

rating

um our third category is the relation

category relationships category again

three parts let's draw them

in uh okay these

are not that nice looking but you get

the idea and in here we

have friends

and community so this is all your

friendships and community and how you

feel a belonging then we have

family this of course is uh your family

and how satisfied you are with your

family and the last part is um let's

call

it romantic this is um if you are in

relationship for example if you were a

partner this would be the Romantic part

to stand besides community friends and

family so if you look at this now you

have a wheel which has nine different

categories and now you can give yourself

a rating in each category it doesn't

really depend how high you can you can

go from 1 to 10 one being the lowest 10

being the highest you can do one to five

you can do 1 to 100 it really doesn't

matter you just start filling out each

category um regarding how satisfied you

are I'll do some examples so I can say

I'm pretty satisfied with work so you

color in the work part uh with growth

maybe a little bit less so you do this

finances you may I could do way much

money way more money so you'll give

yourself just a little bit of Finance

Health maybe you're very very healthy

and so on and so forth and in the end

you have a visual

representation of how satisfied you are

with your life and this actually quite

powerful because not only is this just a

snapshot of your current situation but

also it allows you to um see where you

want may want to improve so for example

in the part that I've now um drawn out

here I may think okay finances is the

category where I want to improve and

health and fitness is very good I don't

need to do that much to improve so with

that out of the way so we have our will

of life now let's let talk about

objectives for the year in the quarter

so we'll do this um and what are we what

are we talking about right here now when

you know that you have a current

standing with your will of Life the next

big thing is that you actually think

about what do you want to achieve for me

it makes sense to have just very broad

goals for the year and for the quarter

the quarterly goals basically just

derive from the yearly goals and the

yearly goals I have a rough idea where I

want to make progress and my Wheel of

Life actually helps me so if we come

back to the wheel of life that we had

earlier we could see for example that I

would want I would have wanted to do

some progress in my finances by the end

of the year or by the next time um this

year uh this time next year so I would

think about okay what do I want to have

in 12 month and from there I can go

ahead and derive actually

um yeah go so we could have let's draw

that out as well just very briefly um

let's call

this uh annual goals and I would call

these annual goals for example number

one make

more money the more specific you can be

the better um but for me it also works

to just identify where I want to work so

if you want to be specific you could for

example say Okay I want to grow the

amount of my annual compensation or how

much I make by let's say 5% maybe that's

reasonable to just start

so um

whoops so we would

go plus 5

% and I say okay that would be the first

part to increase actually what I make of

course you could do 10 15 20 whatever

it's actually you you decide how much

you want to make and how to approach and

actually get there but let's say we have

this 5% from there on um I could maybe

have a second goal in here um let's say

um my um if we come back let's say my

emotional well-being would be at half

but it could be way better right I mean

everybody uh can have or would benefit

from more emotional wellbeing so from

here on I could maybe say Okay

um

um

meditate daily or as meditate daily is

not that specific I could have an annual

goal for me to if the year has 365 days

I could maybe set myself a goal to

meditate for let's say 300 days over the

span of a year so I cut myself some SL I

don't need to do it every day but most

of the days so let's do it this and

have

300

meditation in um this actually is these

are two different kind of goals so the

first goal is um outcome oriented

so we basically say I don't care how I

get there I just want to have 5% more

money while the second goal is actually

process oriented where I don't specify

specify what my exact outcome is but I

specify how I want to approach this goal

uh quantifiably both of these work for

me I use them depending on what I want

to achieve for example uh also for

Fitness I could either do that I want to

increase my weights drop my weight or

something like this I could also instead

of that have a goal to um just hit the

gym four times a week over the span of a

year and Trust the process that that

this and itself will sort out my health

for me so just being consistent is

enough to actually improve my health two

different um approaches to actually hit

my goal your mileage my worry and you

most likely will need to decide where

you want to go from there

so let's say we have the annual goals

and from there we can derive quarterly

goals um how would that work for example

if we have four quarters for 300

meditations that would be easy 75

meditations a quarter so let's say a

quarter could be January through March

right so three month and um for making

more money this could be a little bit um

more uh project oriented so for example

you could either say I want to make like

plus one 1.5% each of the quarters um to

get there or you could more say in the

first quart I just want to identify how

I can make more money apply myself maybe

change a job or uh start a new business

or anything and in the second quarter I

go on from there and after four quarters

doing different stuff I have these 5%

established um these are obviously a

little bit different to implement so we

can't go too much into detail on how

each quarter looks this is very

dependent on the goals that you have but

you get the rough idea of how it works

so you derive from here

on

quarterly

goals and these quarterly goals actually

dictate how you will do your two weeks

prints so the quarterly goals go

into two

we Sprints and these for me are the

important ones so before going in why am

I actually doing two weeks sprs why do I

need to

um make my life to a project of course

you don't need to do this you don't need

to have personal goals you can just live

into your day and in your life and enjoy

life and you can also without personal

goals just decide to go to the gym more

regularly and Etc what I for myself

found two important things the first one

being is that if you decide to form a

habit um you maybe continue doing it for

a while maybe a week two weeks a month

or something and then you slack a bit

you don't continue doing this so much

and you don't even notice really that

you completely stopped doing the habit

and after 3 or 5 months in maybe someone

asked you how did that thing go with um

meditation yeah I actually I stopped

doing the meditation I don't know why

really I just stopped and I haven't

started since yeah I should really start

again so you didn't really realize that

you actually stopped meditating and why

that was it it just happened in life um

this the first part and the second part

is that there could be valid reasons uh

that you struggle with uh the task that

you want to achieve maybe habit that you

want to form and

while it's important to realize how and

why you struggle and by doing this two

week Sprints you basically go ahead and

have every two weeks a check-in point

where you ask yourself do a little um

inspection and ask yourself how did I do

and why my may I not reached my goal and

from there on you actually would um

maybe just a little bit what you do in

order to make it more fitting for you

let's walk through how I do Sprint

planning in a very um in a very broken

down fashion here so usually our whole

cycle would go through

this we start

with um our last week's inspection our

last Sprints inspection more or less so

part one would be let's go a little bit

further part one would be um we would

call

it a review and in review questions

would be

um did

I

reach my

goals and um how how how did I do

basically and for me the most important

part in here is to realize that it's

okay to fail it's not like that you have

to be perfect or that you need to lie to

yourself it's way more important that

you actually realize oh okay I did not

hit my gym goals or my meditation goals

and in the next step we want to figure

out why that is because this why is

super crucial in order to actually grow

so this is a tool for personal growth as

well so in part two and we're

borrowing a little bit from agile uh

thinking would be a retro and in this

retro we basically ask what went well

what didn't went well and why very

specifically so

um what

went

well what can

we improve

why and also how so why Let's do let's

call it

why

and how so these are super important so

for me I actually um have uh gone

through now uh nearly 10

Sprints no this is actually the end of

the 10th print and um in this 10th print

I found myself myself in various

situations where I tried to stick with

it and could not for example I tried to

do a strength training at home and I

struggled with this because I didn't

know really how to approach it um and in

the end I did not commit as much as I

wanted and when I looked at the why I

noticed I was too tired or I had not

enough of a program or did not know when

exactly do I wanted to do so I needed a

little bit more I needed to be a little

bit more specific in order um to go in

now the review and the Retro you can

only do this after you've done your

first initial Sprint so these two you

would not do at your very first planning

but after that you would just go on and

from there on you would have your

planning and your

planning could have a lot of different

uh Styles how you want to do that how I

actually do it is I use my three Wheel

of Life categories so if we draw it very

uh small in

here we have

work

health and relations and I would try to

for myself give me goals for the next

two weeks and no no longer than this

just just try to do something for the

next two week uh for each of those

categories one or many it doesn't really

matter you could also add some per

personal goals like for example I don't

know

um kind I don't know Boog a trip and you

could have Boog a trip as well that's

totally fine but basically you would

have these personal goals as well and um

you would start now um

work let's

say apply for

three jobs I do this handwritten and for

my handwritten I like to have these

little um check boxes just be uh behind

those so I can then go ah hand in the

later on and just check one two three

and I know okay I've have done three

applications I could have

health if I want to let's

say meditate and I want to meditate

let's say five out of seven times a week

so um after two weeks we would have 10

sessions of meditation so I would do a

bigger checkbox like this and would have

one two three four one two three 4 five

yeah something like this so we have 10

checkboxes for 2 weeks and I could just

go ahead and start checking off whenever

I do something so I have my health stuff

and for meditation I could I don't know

do whatever take my partner out for a

date um try to um reach out to a friend

I haven't reached out to in a while and

for this have some kind of gold and we

want would go on in here and from this

planning here I would then start my week

and what I like to do when I starting

this after the planning this would be

part four this would be something that I

call tasking and in

tasking I personally would go ahead and

um bring this all to a

to-do list

app so what I want to have is I want to

have clear to-dos for different days so

from there on I know if I just follow my

to-do list app then I actually reach my

goals this is super powerful for me so I

don't have to look in my written goals

here all the time um but way more I can

just look oh what needs to be done today

okay check I need to do strength

training today perfect let's do the

strength training I need to I don't know

read in my stoic book to today so I do

this and if I've done all of these then

in the end I know with confidence my

twoe goals are met and after 2 weeks I

can assess what worked well what what

has not worked that well and how can we

improve

so having talked about all of this uh

summary start knowing what you want to

improve if you don't know what you want

to do that's it's not a problem just

start with a Sprint just decide on a few

things that you want to implement and

see how you did the part is way more

that you see what you might need to

tweak for you to actually achieve your

goals and stick with something than to

just follow Big overarching Goal the Big

overarching Goal just gives you the

opportunity to improve to work on

something and to try something new so

give it a shot and let me know in the

comments if you've maybe done this if

you want to improve any of this uh if

you have any ideas what I could do

better better actually if if you want to

watch what I actually do in one planning

and have the camera somehow look into my

notebook while I do this this will also

be kind kind of interesting to see how

it works and um yeah like the video if

you liked it if you had any value out of

this subscribe if you haven't I try to

post one one video each week um see here

somehow okay let's do it like this here

will be a new video of one of my latest

uploads maybe the video of out of my um

Travelers notebook and thank you guys

for watching and see you in the next one

goodbye