Most people struggle with this fundamental question: What do you really want? Brand strategist Bonnie Wan offers a concrete answer through her “Life Brief” methodology—a strategic framework that distills your authentic desires into five bold statements and an actionable plan, much like the creative briefs she uses with Fortune 500 companies.
After applying corporate strategy techniques to overcome her own personal crisis, Wan developed this three-step system that helps you clear mental clutter, craft your personal mission, and take decisive action. Keep reading for a full book overview of The Life Brief by Bonnie Wan.
The Life Brief: A Playbook for No Regrets Living
True happiness starts with a deceptively simple question that most of us struggle to answer honestly: What do you really want? In The Life Brief, brand strategist Bonnie Wan uses that question as the foundation for designing a document that outlines your personal goals and strategies—the titular “Life Brief,” modeled after the creative briefs that Wan uses in her professional career.
Wan is a partner and former head of brand strategy at Goodby Silverstein & Partners, where she helped some of the world’s largest companies distill complex issues into clear and actionable strategies. After experiencing a crisis in her marriage and career, she applied the same strategic frameworks she uses professionally to her own life, developing the Life Brief methodology as a way to achieve clarity about what mattered most to her. This combination of professional and personal experience helps Wan to translate corporate strategy techniques into a practical framework for personal transformation.
This guide will take you through Wan’s three steps of creating a Life Brief:
- Sort through your mental clutter to find what you really want from your life.
- Write your Life Brief by condensing what you’ve found into five bold statements and a catchy hook.
- Put your Life Brief into practice.
We’ll provide additional information from the field of neurology to further explain how and why Wan’s principles work. We’ll also compare her ideas with those of other self-help books, such as Tony Robbins’s Awaken the Giant Within and Danielle LaPorte’s The Desire Map. Finally, we’ll suggest some strategies to help you make and follow your unique Life Brief.
Step 1: Clear Your Mental Clutter
To find the answer to Wan’s fundamental question (“What do I want?”), you must first sift through the confusion and conflicting feelings cluttering up your mind. This is a messy and uncomfortable process, but a necessary one.
In this section, we’ll explain how a daily journaling practice helps turn your jumbled thoughts into clear, actionable ideas. We’ll then explore ways to find and overcome your self-sabotaging thoughts and beliefs. Finally, we’ll discuss how you can learn more about yourself by talking with the people who know you best.
Move the Mess From Your Head to a Page
Wan warns that you won’t be able to organize and fix your mental chaos just by deciding to do so (after all, if it were that simple, you’d have done it already). Instead, she recommends daily journaling as a way to purge those messy, chaotic thoughts from your mind and turn them into something concrete.
To do this, set aside 10 minutes each day to write down every thought that crosses your mind. No matter how ugly those thoughts are, or how strong your feelings get, it’s crucial to express yourself fully and authentically; judgment, self-censorship, and worries about what other people would think will sabotage this exercise. For instance, you might need to acknowledge feelings of anger, jealousy, or resentment you’ve been suppressing, or finally face up to some embarrassing—even shocking—desires that you’ve buried.
Throughout this journaling process, be on the lookout for a particular question or wish that crops up again and again, no matter how much you suppress or ignore it in your daily life. Wan explains that this powerful, persistent thought represents a key part of yourself that you’ve neglected. Some common examples include persistent doubts about your career path, a longing for a different kind of relationship with your family or romantic partner, or a creative dream that you’ve dismissed as impractical.
Whatever that thought is, it will eventually become the focal point around which you build your Life Brief.
Find Your Limiting Beliefs
Once you get a clear look at your messy thoughts and problems, you’ll likely discover that certain beliefs and fears are keeping you from reaching your full potential. Wan calls these internalized obstacles “enemies” because they oppose you and stop you from getting what you want. A few common examples include self-doubt, perfectionism, and the fear of failure.
She adds that these beliefs are deeply ingrained, often originating from your upbringing and cultural background. As such, you never consciously choose these beliefs, but they still shape your decisions and your life. For instance, if your parents only praised you when you got straight A’s in school, you might grow up to become a perfectionist, since you were raised to believe that your value as a person comes from your accomplishments.
Identifying your limiting beliefs requires honest self-examination. To that end, Wan suggests you think deeply about which core beliefs might be holding you back, then ask yourself three questions to test each idea’s validity:
- Is this belief true?
- What evidence do I have that it’s true?
- Who would I be, or how would my life be different, if I didn’t believe this?
Sometimes you’ll find that a limiting belief is simply false: Upon examination, you’ll realize that what you thought was an objective fact is really just a story you’ve been telling yourself. In this case, you can reject that idea outright. For example, women in traditional societies are often raised to believe that they’re only suited to be homemakers. However, women have excelled in all kinds of roles all over the world, which firmly refutes this limiting belief.
On the other hand, if your limiting belief does have some basis in fact—or is too deeply ingrained for you to just decide not to believe it anymore—it’s crucial to reframe that idea in an empowering way. In other words, look for new ways to interpret your experiences or your current situation. For instance, people who struggle in school may grow up believing that they’re not intelligent. Wan might urge those people to consider that maybe they struggled with formal schooling, but have great intelligence in other areas like handiwork or leadership.
See Your Strengths Through Other People’s Eyes
It’s easy to see your weaknesses and limiting beliefs—we’re often our own harshest critics, after all—but it can be much harder to see your strengths and potential. That’s why Wan encourages you to seek some outside perspectives to better understand yourself and your current situation.
To start, think of some people who know you well and are genuinely invested in your success: Family members, close friends, and people you’ve worked with for a long time are all good options. Ask those people to share their thoughts about your most positive traits, such as what roles you perform best in, or which personality quirks make you uniquely yourself. By doing so, you’re likely to discover things about yourself that you’ve overlooked or undervalued—you could gain new insights into things like your greatest strengths, your rarest talents, and what situations (or people) really get you energized.
For example, suppose you’re in a teaching or coaching role. You might believe your greatest strength in that role is your outgoing personality, but a long-time colleague points out that you’re uniquely gifted at breaking down complex topics into simple, digestible ideas. With that in mind, you could find that you excel at teaching difficult subjects that others struggle to explain.
Step 2: Write Your Life Brief
The first step of Wan’s system had you generate many pages of messy writing, identify your limiting beliefs, and gather new perspectives from the people who know you best. Next, you must filter through the raw material you’ve collected and condense it into a clear, actionable Life Brief.
In this section we’ll go over the two parts of a Life Brief: 1) five statements that describe your deepest, most genuine desires, and 2) a catchy hook to help those statements stick in your mind.
Summarize What You Want in Five Statements
Wan explains that the majority of your Life Brief should consist of five statements about what you want—she chose the number five because it strikes a balance between keeping your Brief concise and fully exploring your real life goals. These statements are bold commitments that you make to yourself, not just tentative hopes or vague wishes. For example, “I want to be happy” is too vague to be useful; “I want to laugh out loud every day of my life” is a much stronger and more concrete statement.
The author also says each of your five statements should spark excitement, but also a sense of nervousness. That combination of emotions suggests you’ve come up with something that deeply resonates with you, and that will inspire you to keep growing as a person. Conversely, if something in your Life Brief feels comfortable and achievable, you probably haven’t pushed yourself far enough.
Finally, says Wan, note that your five statements can change over time. It’s therefore important to review and revise your Life Brief on a regular basis. Doing so will ensure that it continues to serve your deepest needs and doesn’t just become another rigid set of rules for you to follow.
Such changes might happen when you fulfill one of your needs and a new one takes its place, when you experience a major life change that alters what you want, or when you realize that you’ve grown as a person. For instance, a statement about career success might, over time, change to one about job satisfaction. In this case, you’ve recognized that you no longer feel a driving need for accomplishments or accolades—you just want to keep doing what you love.
Write a Catchy Hook
Along with your five statements, Wan says you’ll need to write a hook: a short, evocative phrase that reminds you of your core values and goals. When you have to quickly make a decision, or when you feel yourself drifting away from your goals, you can think of this phrase and instantly reconnect with what’s most important to you.
Note that the hook actually goes at the beginning of your Life Brief. However, it’s better to craft your statements first so you know exactly what ideas the hook will encapsulate.
Wan also gives some advice to help make your hook memorable and meaningful. One suggestion is to imagine your hook on a hoodie or a sticker—come up with something that you’d want to buy if you saw it in a store, just because it’s so perfect for you. This approach will ensure that your hook is simple and concise, but still emotionally powerful.
Another tip Wan gives is to intentionally write your hook with awkward phrasing or incorrect grammar. Unusual and unexpected wording will make the phrase memorable. For example, instead of “What brings me joy comes first; what others think I should do comes later,” you might just write “Joy first; ‘should’ later.”
Finally, your hook doesn’t have to be completely original. Feel free to draw from song lyrics, your favorite book or movie, a famous quote, or whatever else you want. All that matters is that it sticks in your mind and motivates you.
Step 3: Take Action
So far, we’ve discussed Wan’s methods for sifting through the chaos in your mind and coming up with a concise, actionable Life Brief. In this final section, we’ll show how to use your Brief effectively.
We’ll start by explaining your Life Brief’s dual purpose: guiding you toward the life you want and away from distractions that might hinder your progress. Next, we’ll discuss your Life Brief’s key limitation, which is that it only guides your personal decisions—there’s no guarantee that anyone else will do what you want them to. We’ll conclude with a word of caution from the author: You’ll face periods of fear and doubt as you live your Brief. It’s crucial not to give up during those hard times, but instead to push through and keep working toward the life you want.
How to Use Your Life Brief
Wan explains that your Life Brief serves two complementary purposes: It guides you toward decisions and opportunities that support your true values, and helps you avoid activities that don’t serve your goals.
One effective way to use your Brief in your daily life is to arrange your tasks into three categories, using your five statements as a guide. Plan your day around what’s most important to you, rather than devoting your limited time to unimportant distractions or other people’s demands.
Tasks that directly align with your Life Brief, or that you need to handle as soon as possible, are things you need to do. Tasks that indirectly support your goals or that you just enjoy doing are things you’d like to do. Finally, tasks that don’t align with any of your five statements, aren’t urgent, and aren’t particularly enjoyable are things you can do later.
With that said, it’s impossible to plan out every moment of every day, and Wan doesn’t expect you to try. In fact, she says one of the Life Brief’s greatest benefits is that it helps you take advantage of unexpected opportunities. When life presents you with something you didn’t plan for—such as a job offer, a party invitation, or even just the chance to take a day off from work—think about how it aligns with your five statements. You can then accept or turn down that opportunity with confidence, because you’ll know you’ve made the decision that best serves you.
Focus on Internal Agency, Not External Desires
While your Life Brief can guide you toward the kind of life you really want, Wan also reminds you that it only affects your decisions—you can’t control what other people do or how they treat you. Therefore, she urges you to shift your focus from external desires (what you want from other people and circumstances outside your control) to internal agency: how you want to act, what you want to prioritize, and what kind of impact you want to make on the world.
Because of your limited sphere of influence, major life changes must happen through a complex process of give-and-take with the world around you. When you change the way you live, you invite others to change how they respond to you. However, people may not always respond the way you hope, and you can’t “Brief” them into behaving differently. All you can do is trust in yourself and your Brief, and keep working toward the life you want to live.
For example, suppose you’re unhappy with your current job and have decided that a career change is right for you. In this situation, you can’t force anyone to give you the job you want (your external desire)—all you can do is prioritize your job search and strive to act like the kind of person a potential employer would want to hire.
Be Prepared for Doubt and Grief
No matter how well you write your Life Brief and how closely you follow it, your progress won’t be as fast or as steady as you might hope. In fact, Wan warns that you’ll face moments when you feel like you aren’t making progress at all: Your goals might seem unreachable, obstacles might look insurmountable, or you might wonder if you made terrible mistakes with what you chose to prioritize and discard.
However, the author says these periods of self-doubt and resistance are normal parts of the Life Brief process, and that such feelings often signal that you’re on the verge of a major breakthrough—you just need to work through the natural discomfort that comes with big changes (your life’s “growing pains”).
Alternatively, you may need to pause and mourn what you’re losing before you can fully embrace what comes next. Even things that aren’t really what you want can feel important, especially if they’ve been part of your life for a long time, and it’s normal to regret leaving those things behind. When feelings of resistance or grief arise, Wan says you should go back to the journaling exercise from Step 1: Identify the emotion, seek out the thoughts or ideas attached to it, and write them down as they come to you. Give yourself permission to fully and genuinely experience whatever you’re feeling for however long you need to. When it passes, you’ll be ready for the next step of your new life.
