Motivational Tip #4: Allow yourself to think about your true aspirations.
Sometimes, particularly curing challenging economic circumstances, we can get lost in thinking only about what we “should” do or what we “need” to do. I’ve been stuck in that kind of thinking pattern in my life more than once.
Two nights ago on a major television news show I heard a guy say emphatically we “should” – there’s that word again – make goals for helping other people. That sounds good, and I agree with it personally, which means I share that value with him. But without even realizing it, he wasn’t talking about goal setting. He was talking about his personal values.
An important thing to keep in mind is, for your goals to be about your values. You get to define what success is for you. Only you can determine what’s most important for you.
The things we think we “should” do, become obligations in our mind. However the power of “choice” is much more productive than obligation. The good news is, many obligations can become authentic personal choices when we understand the relationship between primary and secondary choices. Yes, we’re going to talk about this some more, because it is so very empowering.
One of my friends – I use my friends for examples about everything! – began chronically complaining about how much he disliked his job. Finally I just couldn’t take it anymore, so we had a discussion to help him consider what were his primary choices and what were his secondary choices in his life regarding his job. It quickly became clear he truly did not enjoy the work he was doing. But he had a good salary, excellent job security, and a really great health plan that included his wife and his two children.
During our discussion he realized going to his job every day was a secondary choice he was making to support a major primary choice he really cared about, which was providing financial stability and healthcare coverage for himself and his family. His complaining stopped right on the spot. And we spent another hour discussing a plan for evolving his work in possible directions he might really enjoy. He came up with lots of ideas, and is actively working to shape his job in another direction that will be good for him and good for his company.
It’s important to take the time to be with ourselves, to think about what we “truly want” to create and accomplish, how we truly want to develop our lives. This is easier once we understand the relationship between primary and secondary choices.
During your goal-setting, goal-structuring sessions, allow yourself to think about goals for the rest of this year, AND some goals for the next two years. Allow yourself to think about a few goals you really want to create and experience, even if you don’t currently know how you would ever accomplish them.
Allow yourself to choose and define the “What” of what you truly want, without having to initially know the “How” of how you would go about achieving it. You’ll surprise yourself with the action ideas you’ll come up with, to invent the path from where you are to where you want to go.
Continue to Motivational Tip #5 – Prioritizing Your Goals.
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