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Journal Entry - Thoughts and Ruminations on Goals.
I've been thinking about this topic a lot over the past week. Weight loss is a great platform for some critical thinking about goals and goal setting in general. My discovery is that I have some controversial feelings about the topic of "realistic" goals. Honestly, I'm dissatisfied with what seems to be an evolution toward common or average performance. That is, setting attainable/realistic goals has come to be simply "hitting the mean." When did this happen and how did we get so afraid of failure that we can no longer underpin our goals with the unparalleled energy of truly remarkable achievement?
Let me be clear what I am not saying here. I am not criticizing anyone who believes in taking it slow, or the idea that it is good to avoid grave disappointments associated with setting goals that are completely beyond us. I don't mean to challenge anyone in particular, I'm just challenging the overall thinking that I've observed as a collective. It's everywhere. In schools, at the workplace, on Dr. Phil. So when did we become so delicate that we can't take a risk failure from time to time?
It seems that we're set to avoid failure at all costs, so we've simply adjusted the bar and the definition of success. We've elected to use words like attainable and realistic to basically mean "hit the average or common performance." But this is not what it means to set an attainable goal. Attainable means that it is physically possible, but not necessarily that it is probable or easy. And overall we've come to accept this slide as "ok" because progress is progress, and chipping away as we become actualized is definitely allowed :)
But on a more general level I worry. I wonder what is to come of us as we get further and further away from the pursuit of excellence steering our goal-setting process. I worry mostly because the by-product of common goals is common performance, and of course the dilution of the heady feelings of achievement. There are benefits to kids feeling good about themselves, but I'm not sure the right solution is to rob them of the sweetness of knowing they've exhibited truly exceptional performance. I don't have the answer, only the observation.
By my lexicon, hitting a goal is a remarkable accomplishment because you have surpassed what is common or average (relative to others or your own past performance). A goal is different from a mere requirement or objective. For instance, I have a goal to lose 18 pounds by the end of October. I've had three people now at least caution me (gently or otherwise) about this; indicating that goals are great but they shoudl be achievable. I even had someone indicate I could hit the goal if I chop off a few fingers...lol. But what I can't seem to grasp is, why the unified terror on my behalf that I won't hit it? I mean, so what if I don't? I'm not going to jump of a bridge. I'm going to do exactly what I'll teach my son to do -- I will analyze, adjust, and keep going. Part of my duty as a leader and role model for my child is to model failure. I've learned to deal with disappointment from time to time, and so will my son.
Back to my goal for a moment. Is it attainable? Yes. Individuals in history have lost 18 pounds, in a healthful manner, in a month. Is it common? No. That's ok. It's a goal, not a requirement. My requirement is 10 lbs and that is quite achievable based on what is average and my past performance. And I firmly believe that there is everything right with setting aggressive goals that you might not hit from time to time.
I do understand that one can become discouraged if he/she is constantly setting unrealistic goals and then failing to meet them. But part of the evolution into maturity is understanding the beauty and necessity of failure from time to time. It is the best way to improve, in many ways. This is not to say that I plan to fail :)
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