The "Why" drives everything

Understanding why we set goals and why we do things to reach that goal should drive everything.

The "why" should be the north star for all we do.

In an organization, you can equate this to values or mission. Whatever you want to call it, it's important to understand and focus on why you're doing things.

For instance, Spirit Airlines' goal is to be the ultra-low cost airline.

So they don't make you pay for anything you don't want to pay for, unbundling all of the services that other airlines offer as a package.

Carry-on and checked bags aren't included in your fare. Drinks and peanuts aren't handed out for "free." There aren't any TVs on the plane.

Why? Because Spirit wants to be the ultra-low cost airline and offer you the lowest fares. Everything they do is aligned with this "why."

If you're paying a higher fare that includes checked bags but you don't check any bags, you're paying more than you need to. If you don't drink any drinks or eat any peanuts, you're paying more than you need to. TVs weigh down the plane and make it less efficient, so you're paying more than you need to.

You might not like the model, but Spirit Airlines is driven by "why."

My goal for this experiment is to blog for 30 consecutive days. Why am I doing this? To see if blogging and writing can become an everyday habit for me.

So everything I do while blogging for 30 these days lends itself to making this a habit.

I've discovered what I don't like about blogging - finding images, doing research, linking to other articles and resources, reading and re-reading my posts for grammatical and punctuation errors) - and I'm minimizing the time I spend doing those things.

If I did these things, I still might achieve my goal of blogging for 30 consecutive days, but it's less likely to become a habit.

Think about all that you do and why you do them. It can be really powerful to find that true "why."

This is day 6 of my experiment to blog for 30 consecutive days.