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Saturday 14 January 2017

Move posts, keep goals

This is a post I drafted in 2012, and forgot to publish. It is still a good thought that I'm glad I came across again. I want to also blog again. Let's see how that goes!

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I caught an advertising slogan out of the corner of my eye this morning: something about moving posts but not goals.  It's very apt: my goals are the things I want to achieve - those are not going to change whatever else happens, - but it is the posts that can be moved, uprooted and re-set.

I don't have to rigidly stick with 'the plan' that I hoped would get me there.  I can be flexible and reconsider when things enter tough-going terrain and I begin to fear that I am giving up on a cherished hope.  I tend to run out of steam somewhere along the way and feel utterly frustrated and discouraged when that happens.

Thinking about this posts versus the actual goal thing: the discouragement has nothing to do with the goal being 'too tough', my goal is still the same thing: something I would love to be able to do or to get to.  Whether it's an activity (like dressmaking or heck yes even dating), or something I want to get to (like slimming down and getting fitter), or what I want to be (more optimistic; living in a more 'aware' manner; becoming more confidant about achieving my goals even).  Whether it's tough or easy to achieve, the goal remains the same.

But the posts I set to get there, those can be anything and anywhere.  I see them as both the measurements I use to decide success or failure as well as my overall strategy in itself.

I've often made the mistake of going very over-the-top in what I expect from myself in terms of a specific goal.  When I think about wanting to be slimmer I get totally carried away and start to think that a couple of kilos just won't do and it's got to be at least a stone that I want or need to lose, and while I'm at it, why not two stone or, heck, even three?

Where does that rubbish thinking come from?  Why on earth would I heap this monumental burden on top of my hopes and inflate expectations and standards to  unachievable proportions?  Am I trying to set myself up for a lack of success?  Am I trying to make sure that I'll fail?  What the hell is going on?

This is ridiculous.

My goal hasn't changed: I still want to slim down and get fitter.  Feel better within myself.  Be proud of the way I look and the way I carry myself.  But it seems that I've done something with the posts that almost guarantees that the goal remains at an unreachable distance from my grasp.  The initial expectation and hope of perhaps a couple of kilos, maybe three, - that's achievable.  Is it that I'm scared that I won't achieve the low-expectation objective?  Is that why I ratchet up my expectation so I can tell myself: oh well, it was too difficult, no wonder that I didn't succeed.  Is that it?