Whatever happened to that famous saying, if at first you don’t succeed try and try again. Yet how afraid are we of failing? We do not even start on a new adventure because we do not want to fail.
Posts Tagged ‘Goals’
During ages three to seven, interest begins to shift from wanting autonomy to concern for “Who am I (as a boy or a girl)?” Awareness of one’s sexual identity becomes important. Boys tend to seek their mother’s attention; girls may act to get their fathers to notice them. Parents are often confused by a son’s remark that “I’m going to marry Mama when I grow up” or a daughter’s remark that “I wish Mama would go away so I could have Daddy to myself.” Another difficult crisis exists for children who did not happen to be born the “right” sex to please their parents. They are in the constant process of deciding what kind of person to be and developing a sense of purpose for living.
When children’s efforts at self-understanding and goal setting are misunderstood, punished, or
I learned a valuable lesson from the life of a friend of mine, this story takes place about twelve years ago but I use his life as an example to me every day. At the time, he was in his early thirties, married, and extremely successful, at least by most people’s standards. But he wasn’t just married, he was married to an incredibly beautiful woman, an attorney who was top of her class at one of the country’s most prestigious law schools, she was brilliant. And it wasn’t that he was just successful, he was in a high profile business, dealing with celebrities and captains of industry, the people you read about in People magazine. He bought a big house, two Mercedes, and traveled the world. He was the envy of most everyone he knew, had set out with goals when he left college and for all intensive purposes met every single one of them by the time he was thirty three years old. And despite all he had achieved, he was an extremely unhappy person, the more this couple had the more they wanted, the more he made the more his wife spent to “keep up with the Jones’.” He felt on a daily basis that he was, for lack of a better term, emotionally out of breath, he was constantly chasing and never catching. It would be easy at this point to take you right to a cliffhanger, to say this person couldn’t take it anymore, that there is a tragic end, that he abused alcohol or drugs, that he hit rock bottom and turned his life around. But he was really no different than most people, and most people who are unhappy with their lot in life don’t commit suicide, and they don’t abuse alcohol or drugs, most people just continue on the path they are on, never make changes and remain unhappy.
One day my friend decided he didn’t want to be unhappy anymore. He didn’t just walk out on his business, but he knew he didn’t want to be in that business anymore, the pressure was to great, the stress was no longer worth it, so over the next two years he closed it down in an orderly fashion. He knew he was unhappy in his marriage but he just didn’t walk out. He talked to his wife about what didn’t work for him, she didn’t understand how he no longer liked their life, they tried therapy, and although he probably knew it was over from the beginning, he tried until he couldn’t try anymore.
At age thirty five he had given up life as he knew it, his work, his marriage, and set off on a new path, but this isn’t a fairytale. He was not instantly happy, he had spent thirteen years working and achieving everything he hoped for, achieved it all and was miserable, now he faced the hard part, he had to figure out why? Why he was so unhappy. Why his dream job and fairytale marriage did not make him a happy person. And how to move forward with his life.
It took years, but ten years later, he was remarried, still successful in an entirely new business and happy. It took him years to figure out what went wrong and how to try and put his life on the right path.He learned that his mistakes were the same that most people make, chasing things that don’t matter, going after material objects, being concerned what others think of you. He learned material objects are great, success is wonderful and an admirable goal, the respect and admiration and even envy of your peers is a wonderful thing to have, but if it defines who you are, if it is your life’s sole ambition, then unhappiness is sure to follow. Life is a constant journey of understanding who you are and what you need, and it constantly changes. If you are unhappy in your life or simply content, strive for more. Not all change needs to be radical like my friends, most often it is just simple adjustments in life, focusing on the things that are most important like family health, and knowing you are the best person you can be. Its about trying to live as stress free life as possible, and that the things are most important come from the inside.
Have you noticed that if you buy a watch or a new car, you will suddenly see those things everywhere you go? There will be more ads on TV for those things, you will notice other people with them. Everywhere you go, in magazines, on billboards, and other people, will have the same things or the same make, etc. This is not because there is a little man following you around and placing specific adverts everywhere to get your attention. These ads were there all along, it is just that they were not the focus of your attention before.
People who are successful have this ability even without something being brought to their attention like this. They have their goals and objectives in mind all the time and focus on achieving them. Because of this positive mental attitude, they are ready for all the opportunities as they arise and they are prepared. Unsuccessful people probably would not notice the opportunity because they are not completely in tune with what they want. The opportunities just pass them by because they just do not even notice them.
Maintaining this level of focus all the time is very hard. It can take up a lot of mental energy and leave you feeling tired and exhausted. Some people have this ability naturally. They are more goal-oriented and their brain analyzes everything it comes across to see if it is an opportunity that they could possibly use. They even file away things in their brain and if the chance or need arises, they recall that there was a chance they could take. This is increasingly more difficult in today’s world. There are many things around to diffuse our focus and which clamor for our attention.
Focus is just not popular in popular culture today. We watch the news and instead of just the news, they also show the weather and three other bits of news in tickers across the bottom of the screen. We want to be working and playing and living all at the same time. So those people who can master the technique of staying in focus and having their goals constantly at the front of their minds are going to do the best.
These people who are dedicated and committed to their goals, are those who eat, sleep and think about not much besides. In every conversation they have with people, in every news story they read, they have one objective in mind, whether it is to make more money, or to discover something through research, or their art. And these are exactly the people who seem to be luckier than others because they suddenly find a rich sponsor, or just the right materials they need, or a mote of brilliance.
It is not that they are luckier. They are just more alert to opportunities and know that every new encounter is not a problem but a possible solution to something. Try it in your own life. Imagine that you have a highly important goal in life and look out for chances in your day to day life which could help you to achieve that goal. Explore things with an open mind and you might just get the luck to achieve your goals too.
Sometimes, we get stuck in a rut and carry on with our lives when we are unhappy. The goals and dreams of childhood have been set aside. They do get worn down with the daily grind. Everyday falls into a routine and we do not even have time to sit and think, let alone plan or remember anything that we were supposed to be doing. This happens especially when you have a family. The everyday tasks of looking after their needs take over – and probably rightly, take priority in your life while your own hopes and ambitions lie forgotten.
But what if you yearn to break free? It may be that when you first started your job you had a very different role or different surroundings and now you have become bogged down with administrative tasks and the job is nothing like it was when you started. Or it could be that you have just lost interest in what was once a fascinating subject and now you have extreme problems dragging yourself out of bed in the morning to go and face the awfulness of the day ahead. Or, it could be that you want to break free and work for yourself. Maybe you have had an idea, or your skills have now developed enough and you think you can face it alone. You can no longer get yourself satisfied and don’t need to keep others happy all the time.
Whatever the cause, one very good way to accomplish this – let’s face it – terrifying decision is to cut off your means of retreat. There is a famous historical precedent in that Cortez, the famous conquistador, burned his ships upon landing in Mexico to make sure that his men fought as hard as they could and had no way of returning to Spain until they had either won or died trying. In the same way, once you have made that decision, if there is absolutely no way of going back then you will not have any choice but to keep moving forward.
This, by its very nature, can not be a spur of the moment impulsive decision. It must be done with careful planning and lots of forethought. You must ask yourself some serious questions before burning any ships! If you quit your job today, how will you pay your bills? How will you and your family eat? Will you still be able to have a roof over head? Can you cut back and still live the same life or will you all have to tighten your belts for a while? These are highly individual and personal decisions and only you and your family know the answers here. But, if it all falls into place, then the next step is to brace yourself and just do it!
There are so many ways that this is the best policy. If you have a bad habit for example, having the policy to ‘just do it’ can break you of that habit for good. Just stop! Don’t even think about it any more. Burn those ships! You may find that it is the best thing you ever did!
