Month: May 2020

Everyone has goals, even if they don’t call them that. Any desired result that depends on your actions is a goal. Desired results that don’t depend on your actions are wishes. Those tend to not work out very well. So a goal has two parts, a vision of success, and a plan to get there.

There’s a lot to be said about making goals. But people always focus on where they want to end up. Lose ten pounds. Go on vacation. Retire. Get a six pack. Of course people focus on the outcomes. That’s literally what they want. But that’s not the best way to go about it.

Start with your vision

What do you want to do? If you’ve tried this before, why do you keep coming back to this goal? Don’t delude yourself. Accomplishing this will be difficult. Why is it worthwhile in spite of this?

Goals take a lot of determination even if things go according to plan, and things rarely go according to plan. Determination is joining present action with future motivation. This is impossible without a clear understanding of what you are getting in the future, and what you are giving up in the present.

Determine what actions will get you there

What actions will you need to take each week? How long will it take? How likely are you to fail? Once you understand the cost of reaching your goal, and what kind of results you can expect, then you have a plan.

Measure your progress infrequently

Now that you have your plan, focus on what you actually need to do. Measure the actions you are taking, where you can see results immediately. Are you trying to exercise three times a week? Then record each day you’ve exercised and you’ll see progress.

Check you progress infrequently enough to expect progress every time you check. If you want to lose weight, and you know that it takes about a week to lose a pound, don’t look at the scale every day. That moves over weeks and months. So, if you obsess about it every day, most days there will be no change. That’s incredibly disheartening. Once you see yourself making progress towards your goal, and you connect that progress to the actions that you are doing every day, then it gets a lot easier. This will take a while. You won’t know that following your plan will make you reach your goals for several check ins.

But what if it’s not working?

What if you are moving, but not as much as you want? Or what if you are moving, but it’s too damn hard to justify your progress? If something is working, keep at it. Generally things get easier as you do them more often. Try to keep going for a couple of weeks before making changes.

What if you are doing all of your actions, but you aren’t moving towards your goal?

Take a step back. How long have you been doing this for? Are you seeing any improvements? Have you taken a step towards your goal? Speak with a friend about your concerns. Are they reasonable?

Not all of your plans will work. Sometimes you’ll pick out some actions that won’t get you where you want to go. If that happens, check with your vision. Is it still worthwhile? If so, then make a new plan.

What about me?

I recently planned out two changes (one at work, and one personally). My personal goal is going very well, I’m taking actions and moving towards my goal. Not so much with my work one. I’m not performing the actions that my plan calls for, and I haven’t made much progress.

Today I gambled. And I lost big. I decided to bet my happiness. On a soccer game of all things. Why did I do that? Does my happiness need to be tied to victory?

I ran fast, and passed to whoever was open. I stole the ball on defense. Scored on offense. Yet it was not enough. So I ran faster. Played more physically. Still, it was not enough.

I grew frustrated. At my teammates, because they weren’t skilled enough. Because they made mistakes. I make mistakes too, but not nearly so many. They didn’t run quickly enough or often enough. They didn’t make enough passes to people who were open. And so, my time didn’t score enough goals.

We lost.

Why wasn’t it enough? Why did I tie my happiness to the skill of my teammates? Before the game I knew about how skilled they were. About how hard they worked. I knew which mistakes they would make. And yet, I made my happiness depend on skills that I knew they did not have. On effort that I knew they would not give.

Why wasn’t my effort enough for me? Perhaps not for victory, but for my happiness? I disliked the other team. They pulled down one of my team members who had a scoring chance. And they injured our player with that foul. And then argued with the referee until he called a foul on our team. I also disliked the referee. I wanted to win. Because I knew that the other team wanted to win, and didn’t want them to. Not after that cheap foul. My effort was not enough because a sign showed me the wrong numbers. Because I made it insufficient.

I could’ve been happy playing soccer because I enjoy running, value the company of my teammates, or love playing soccer. Instead I played soccer to win, but mostly to make the other team lose. And I made myself miserable.

What other things do I tie my happiness to?

Are these things truly important, or am I making a big deal out of them? What makes them important? Am I giving them the effort that they deserve, no more, no less?

Problems and inconveniences both cause stress, discomfort and even pain. So what’s the difference between the two? To me, a problem is something that can only be remedied by changing yourself. An inconvenience can be fixed by changing your environment.

But they aren’t really separate things. Instead, they are two sides to the same coin. For each situation that causes you pain, the inconvenience is the unpleasant part of your surroundings, and the problem is your improper reaction.

Problems often masquerade as inconveniences. Is your boss nit picking your work? Inconvenience. Or maybe you need to handle criticism more constructively. Problem. Is office noise distracting you? Inconvenience. Or maybe you need to improve your focus. Problem.

If your feet hurt, check your shoes for rocks

Every situation that you find upsetting or painful is one that you are reacting poorly to. Ok, not every situation. But it’s a reasonably safe assumption. That said, reacting poorly to a situation does not mean that situation is pleasant or reasonable. If your feet hurt, check your shoes for rocks.

It’s far easier to change your environment than yourself. And better yet, this will often help. So do it often. You’ll go through many poor situations. At times the best course of action will be to move to a better place. Do so. Don’t feel as though you need to stay. Challenges and personal growth can be found in other places too.

But that won’t solve any of your problems.

Given a similar situation, unless you become more than you are now, you’ll react in more or less the same way. And sometimes, you’ll keep running into an inconvenience again and again. When that happens, it’s because your actions are drawing the inconvenience out of your environment, or this type of thing is common.

Either way, you’ll need to look to yourself. You need to handle this differently. Better. Because problems are about you, not your environment. Problems are where your inconveniences rub against a bruise on your ego. They are deep, personal expressions of desire. Once examined, they’ll show you incredible insight into who you are.

Most people want the same things (to admittedly different degrees): money, respect, love. Our fears separate us far more clearly. And problems are the manifestation of our fears. Fear is where reality encroaches on our self image. You overreact because something you hold dear is threatened, your ideas about who you are. 

What are your problems? What fears do they depend on?

For me, I get distracted at work, and during longer personal projects. I start to push work away, because I am afraid of failure. I avoid working because that would mean finishing, and finishing would mean that my work would be judged. By others, and worst of all by myself. And I could fail. Because I’m afraid that would mean that I’m not good enough.

If you cannot fail, you cannot succeed. Both of these require the same thing. A way to judge your actions. Without a consistent way to do this, everything is just lumped together. None of your actions are better or worse than any others. But this is not true. Everyone has things that they want, and things they are striving for. And we judge our actions accordingly.

Most commonly, we place them against idealized versions of ourselves. I fall into this trap often. I criticize myself for every failing, however small. All of my hard work and success? Well that’s expected. But ideal me wouldn’t struggle with it, so why am I?

Sometimes we sometimes use goals.

What is a Goal?

A goal is not a destination. It does not represent the end of a journey. It’s more like a waypoint. A marker to acknowledge your efforts. Meant to be appreciated, not lived at. So don’t shy away from small goals. They will help you get started. And that’s an incredibly valuable thing.

A goal is not a map. It does not tell you how to achieve the things that you want. Although plans are valuable, goals should not contain that level of detail. Plans change to reflect new situations and methods. Goals should be more stable.

A goal is not motivation. Setting a goal does not make you want to do something. Try setting a goal for someone else if you want to test this. And yet, you need to understand exactly why you want to accomplish your goal. Your goal needs to have purpose.

A goal is direction. Or more accurately, it crystallizes all of your existing direction and motivation into a concise expression of intent.

Why is this important?

Goals are a means of communicating with your future self. They remind you of what you want to do and why. And you will need reminders, because goals require action. And they tend to need a lot of it. To take action, you need to remember your reasons for taking action.

Intentions are best conveyed through words. Properly stated, a goal can invoke all of the feelings behind it.

Today I took a vacation. With everything happening in the world, I felt like I would benefit from it. And it worked. I felt more relaxed and ready to work towards my goals.

It wasn’t a typical vacation.

I couldn’t exactly go out to some exotic location, or even to the movies. And more importantly, I was still working from home. I didn’t even take a day off of work (I’m currently working from home). Instead, I took a vacation from entertainment.

If that sounds odd, then let me tell you, it felt odd. Life felt like it had been about cramming in more and more entertainment. Every time I had spare time, I grasped for one of my favored activities. I didn’t let a single moment go unclaimed. And that had left me tired and strained. I’d made life about cramming in more books, more  movies, more outings.

I didn’t give myself a chance to relax. Funnily enough, trying to fill my time with entertainment was actually more stressful than my job. I tried to make myself happy through consuming media. And if I wasn’t happy? Consume more media! That fed on itself until it ate every spare minute.

But it didn’t make me happy. It was taking all of my time on some days. So I couldn’t watch any more shows. Aha! So I needed to watch better movies, or read better books. I tried that a few times.

And came up short. The movies were not the problem. I was expecting too much from entertainment. I couldn’t build a life around it. And that’s what I was trying to do.

So what did I do instead?

I worked. On my job. Towards my goals. I took care of myself, and my apartment. Spent time relaxing or taking a walk. Talked with others.

But the real change wasn’t about what I did. Instead it was about how I did it. I didn’t cram in my mundane task. Instead I was present. I allowed myself to experience everything that I did in its entirety.

In short, I dropped that constant nagging to do something else. That my life needed to be happier, or more fulfilling. And that what I was currently doing could not possibly get me there. Or even if it could, that would be far too slow.

So what about you?

Is there anything you are constantly telling yourself that prevents you from experiencing what life has to offer? How often do you slow down and be present in the things that you do?