Goals . . . I Has Them

I've written about goals before, but I think it's something that I need to return to from time to time. Goals are important and help to give you focus and direction in your life. Goals can be the difference between whether or not you get out of bed in the morning. And for me, goals are this whole new concept, as odd as that may sound.

Throughout most of my life, I've never had many goals. Not real ones, anyway.  There were things I wanted and desired, but very rarely anything that I set in the form of a goal.  A lot of this had to do with some basic misconceptions I had about the term.

GOALS CAN NOT BE FAKED

You can say you want something or you are striving towards something, but that doesn't make it real. You can lie about a goal all day long, but unless you truly want it, it's probably not going to happen.

Why? Mostly because without true desire, you will lack motivation. When you really believe and want a goal, then you make time, a lot of time, to work on the achievement of that goal. Everyday.  Much of what you do in your life is centered, motivated, and directed by the goal. If you don't really want the goal, then you won't put in the effort.

At best, you'll put on a show when others are watching (or when you think they are) to make it look like you're working on the goal.  The rest of the time, you're going to be doing other stuff. Later, you'll wonder why you didn't achieve the goal and, instead of really being disappointed about it, you'll be more concerned about how others are going to see you now.

You have to be honest with yourself.  If you find that you're not putting out any effort towards the goal, then you need to figure out if this is what you really want . . . or just something you think you're supposed to want. If it's just a supposed to, end it. Stop wasting your time and being frustrated.

GOALS CAN NOT DEPEND ON OTHER PEOPLE

Do you want a safe and secure life where you don't have to worry about bills or unexpected events? Awesome. These are good goals to have . . . however, if your solution to achieving those goals is based on someone else, you're probably not going to end up happy.

We can only achieve our goals through our own means. It's nice if you have someone along to help you, but never depend on them to be the one to do all the goal accomplishing.  I realize this flies in the face of the way a lot of people view marriage, but it shouldn't. While marriage is a partnership, it is most stable when both parties have goals they individually wish to accomplish.

Whatever your goals are in life, you need to ask yourself who you see accomplishing them for you? Is it you or someone else? If it's someone else, you need to take a step back and make a new plan. How can you achieve your goals on your own? What changes do you need to make to allow that to happen?

Why? People die. People leave you. People decide they have other things in mind. People get sick or injured.  Beyond that, it's really not fair to place your goals on the back of someone else. By making them work on your goals, what are you forcing them to give up for themselves?

COMPLEX GOALS SHOULD BE VIEWED AS COMPLEX PUZZLES

One of the reasons why I've not lost weight is because it has always seemed impossible to me. I would work on it, but there was so much I needed to lose and it was going to take years to do. I've always allowed the complexity and length of the process to halt any progress. It never occurred to me to view my weight loss as a puzzle. A complicated problem with many activities, many alterations, and tons of obstacles.

When we view the issues and problems that keep us from our goals as puzzles, we begin to set ourselves up for success. Puzzles are difficult, but not impossible. Puzzles are best when challenging because the easy ones get boring.  Puzzles an be approached from many directions and when one direction doesn't work, it's not a failure, just an attempt that didn't achieve the goal. But even an unsuccessful attempt still allows us to learn.  It's one more step towards the goal, so still of value.

The important thing about this time of outlook is that it allows you to view your obstacles with rational thought instead of emotional opinion. "This is impossible" is almost always an opinion. "This is too hard," is usually a temporal value. It may be too hard at the moment, but that doesn't mean it will be too hard over time.

In conclusion, I have to say that having some direction in life is rather nice. I'm not just free floating in some confused mess, hoping that no one notices that is exactly what I'm doing. I have goals that I truly want to accomplish. I have goals that I am not depending on others to accomplish for me. Most importantly, I have goals that, while difficult, are still within my grasp.  And tomorrow, I'll be even closer to them than I am at this moment.