Goals

"It is a paradoxical but profoundly true and important principle of life that the most likely way to reach a goal is to be aiming not at that goal itself but at some more ambitious goal beyond it. "
Arnold Toynbee, English historian & historical philosopher (1889 - 1975)


Another week flies by, and I have one more week to go before I start my travels. The great thing is that the blitz moments are becoming more regular. That feeling of "clock slowing" that arises at high speed is occurring more often. Albert Einstein's concept of relativity seems more tangible. A new time paradigm is emerging.

We spoke last week about what it was all for, the purpose of activity and achievement. This week, I want to delve into some specifics. So, we have a gift and we have a purpose. Now what? We need to crystallize and actualize our gifts through setting some goals. Conventional wisdom advises that we make goals specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and timely(http://www.topachievement.com/smart.html). This works and can lead to good results - it is the basis of most personal development and coaching initiatives. But how about an alternative possibility - the possibility that by aiming for the stars, you can end up on the moon?

We have already discussed blitz at some length, but the concept of driving very fast and subsequently slowing down conveys this point. Legal considerations aside (this is purely theoretical), imagine that you want to be able to feel comfortable at 150 miles an hour. What if you were to be driven at 200 miles an hour for a while. Initially you would be very uncomfortable, perhaps even hysterical. Your breathing would be disrupted and your heart would be pounding. This could be fear or it could be thrill. With time, you might feel slightly better albeit still uncomfortable. The point is this. When the speed is reduced to 150 miles an hour, IT FEELS SLOW. I propose that the same applies to goals.

If you aim beyond the goal that you are striving for, you raise your game accordingly. Your mindset and perceptions change in the same way that they change in the speeding car or in a blitz chess match with 20 seconds left on your clock. If there is a piece of work to be completed in three hours and you aim for that, you might achieve it within the three hours; but it is possible that you may overrun slightly. However, what if you aimed to complete the work within two hours or perhaps even one hour?!

Parkinson's Law (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parkinson's_law) states that "work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion." Are our goals potential victims of Parkinson's Law? "Limitation expands so as to fill the space left by your goals". We have all experienced a simple form of this phenomenon when we are about to go away on holiday. On that last day, we often accomplish much more than we normally would. The same might apply to the last day of a big deadline. Why? Well, because we set more ambitious goals in these situations.

So, in summary, we need to set clear goals but we might more likely attain them if we actually aim beyond them and so tap into more of our power. The alternative is to leave space in our lives that limitation and procrastination may readily fill...

"In the absence of clearly-defined goals, we become strangely loyal to performing daily trivia until ultimately we become enslaved by it. "
Robert Heinlein, US science fiction author (1907 - 1988)