Life Mapping - Roles, Goals and Habits

Liam Hughes, founder of Biggerplate, shares his annual “Life Mapping” process — a practical, reflective method for planning the year ahead through roles, goals, and habits. Speaking from his experience balancing travel, leadership, and personal development, he demonstrates how to use mind maps to connect reflection with realistic planning, creating a living guide for growth and focus in the coming year. Key Themes & Topics (Timestamped) [0:00] Introduction and context – Liam opens from Lima, Peru, explaining how travel altered his live presentation plans and sets the scene for reflecting and planning at year’s end. [1:17] Personal background and process – Describes his 10-day reflection window between Christmas, New Year, and his early-January birthday as an annual pause for goal alignment. [2:30] Avoiding reactive resolutions – Critiques impulsive “New Year’s resolutions” and advocates a slower, more thoughtful mapping process across several days. [3:49] Three-step framework – Introduces his structure: defining roles, setting goals, and shaping habits that enable sustainable progress throughout the year. [5:04] Role mapping – Demonstrates identifying current and aspirational roles (e.g., family, founder, friend, traveler) as the foundation for life balance. [7:40] Prioritising roles – Explains clockwise mapping to visually rank roles by importance, ensuring key life areas take precedence. [8:48] Reflecting on the past year – Uses “positives, negatives, next time” to assess performance and experiences in each role, focusing on learning rather than criticism. [12:48] Action thinking for next year – Applies the prompts “stop, start, do more, do less, maintain” to translate reflection into forward action principles. [17:51] Setting goals through aspirations – Reframes traditional OKRs into “AKRs” (Aspirations and Key Results), blending ambition with measurability. [23:18] Defining measurable key results – Emphasises clear progress indicators (“as measured by what?”) and limiting each role to three quantifiable results. [29:48] Building habits and actions – Differentiates between repeating habits and one-time enabling actions, showing how each supports broader goals. [41:00] Staying flexible – Advises treating the map as a living reference, reviewing quarterly, and adapting as circumstances evolve. [44:49] Non-mapping life tips – Ends with two practical suggestions for better habits: use an alarm clock instead of a phone, and set realistic step goals for wellbeing. Featuring MindManager.