We All Have One Personality Trait That Defines Our Future. Google's Chief Innovation Evangelist Shares How to Identify Yours.

You may have heard this question before: "What advice would you give your 16-year-old self?"

I know this is a popular way to package the "wisdom" of someone with experience or success, and as Google's first chief innovation evangelist, people asked me this sometimes. But I never got it. Why would I ask my older self what my younger self should have known or done? The missteps I made or the odd turns I took back then are part of who I am now. Offering someone else a road map of my own pitfalls and speed bumps would give them a defensive strategy, at best. No one's gaining any yards by looking in my rearview mirror.

But I do think it's useful for people to do a retrospective on their own lives, noting meaningful milestones, because those moments tend to reveal something very important: a personality trait that I'll call your "Dimension X." This is your unique superpower — the lens through which you see the world — not as it is, but as you are (to gently paraphrase Anaïs Nin). Over time, your Dimension X becomes a signature reflex that plays an increasingly important role in shaping your future. It's your through-line response in events that move you forward. And if you cultivate it, it can act like a strong, confident hand on the rudder in your day-to-day decisions and in your overarching narrative.

So how do you know what your Dimension X is?

Here's what I suggest. Make a map of the milestones in your life, chronologically. Milestones can be momentous events — happy or devastating — that change our lives in an instant. But they can also take place over a longer period of time. What makes anything a milestone, positive or negative, is the extent to which it precipitated your forward motion. A quick sketch of my own milestones might look like the figure below.

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The first thing I notice when I look at these milestones is how neutrally I regard them now. As difficult as, say, my grandfather's death was for me, when I look at it in combination with other milestone events in my life, I can appreciate that it prompted me to let go of any excuse to move tentatively through my own life. It also triggered an intense need to see myself in the context of the whole world, not just the place where I grew up. When I consider the birth of my first child, I remember great happiness, of course, but also as a new and dynamic factor in my approach to my future. My choices became more complicated and interesting, as I was now thinking about a family instead of just myself. And throughout my milestones map, I can see a particular quality in me that has played a part in either bringing these events about or in coloring my responses to them. This quality — a strong bias for action — is my Dimension X.

It's a default setting to just go for it, without overthinking or overfocusing on consequences. I believe there's no such thing as a perfect decision, and most of the time, taking action helps me learn and adapt quickly. This bias toward action also allows me to identify and take advantage of opportunities immediately as they arise. You know the phrase "jump at the chance"? I'm the jumper. Almost every professional and educational opportunity I've ever had is a result of my bias toward action. I applied for more than 60 visiting researcher positions to secure a spot at Stanford. I built the Google Garage without asking anyone for permission. Early in my career, this quality landed me in far-flung parts of the world, doing jobs I'd never considered before. Combined with other dimensions (particularly openness and experimentation), my bias toward action has enabled me to move fast and make choices — often risky ones, and not always successful ones — that have caused me to grow as a person.

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So let's create your map.

Have a look at your highs and lows. Think about the moments that feel like significant junctures — individual events that caused you to have an emotionally intense response or longer-term developments that marked a turning point or profound learning or growth. These are often not the "big deal" moments you might think they'd be, like a graduation or marriage or promotion. Instead, they might be subtle realizations related to a personal relationship or an occurrence in your life.

On a blank, horizontal piece of paper, draw a line across the middle from side to side. The left edge of the page represents the earliest part of your life, and the right edge represents where you are today. Positive experiences will appear above the line and negative experiences will appear below the line. Graph five to 10 milestone events across the page and include a brief description under each event.

Now look at the events on your map and consider these questions: Do you recall your state of mind at the time of these events? What actions did you take as a result? Did you take action immediately or did your behavior change over time? What beliefs or assumptions informed these actions? Can you identify something you learned from one event that affected your approach to the next? What was the factor that most influenced your response to these events, or even prompted any to occur?

You will likely spot something like a synapse at the point of your milestones, a connection with a bit of energy around it that indicates the presence of this factor, your Dimension X. Maybe you remember how you made a decision at one of these times. Whether it was spontaneous or deliberate, you had clarity about your choice. It made sense because this factor was helping you express a truth about who you are and what you believe.

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Once you've identified your Dimension X, think of three people who play very different roles in your life — say, a partner or other family member, a colleague, and a friend. Ask them to tell you a story about you, in which they think your Dimension X had an impact. No matter how well you think you know yourself and your own narrative, you will always be surprised and enlightened by the way someone else describes you. You may even discover a milestone or two for your map that you hadn't thought of.

As you grow more aware of your Dimension X, you'll find that its power is increasingly accessible to you. It won't always lead to some dramatic breakthrough or giant success, and it may even lead to failures, but it will always move you forward.

The question I like a lot better than "What would I tell my younger self?" is, "What can I do today to create a new opportunity for myself tomorrow?" The answer is simple: Make just one brand-new choice. Your Dimension X will ensure that your choice is interesting, maybe even a little edgy, but it's right there with you all the time, ready to nudge you toward the future you're crafting. It's your signature, your fingerprint, the singular thing that's true about you. Use it to make big, bold moves. Use it to make quiet decisions that have far-reaching impact.