Goals vs guides - or how I want to be like River in Firefly/Serenity.

Goals are supposed to be s.m.a.r.t - if you set a goal it must be specific, measurable, achievable, time-based and realistic. I seem to remember an oft-quoted longitudinal study of college students that found that those who set goals were much more successful than their take-life-as-it-comes peers. Apparently US President John F Kennedy was a participant - and if memory serves, he was in the goal-setting group.

But thanks to the parameters of the study, nobody seems to talk about whether they were happy. Success as the world measures it is usually in terms of finance or status (or both!) but has only recently turned (returned?) to happiness as a measure.  

Let me explain in terms that make sense to me. I wish that I were as flexible as River*, played by Summer Glau in Firefly and Serenity. Flexibilty is good because it helps to prevent incidence of injury, essentially a body is more resilient if the muscles and joints are more flexible. 

I could set that as a goal during my gym training. But I know me. Goals pall after a while. And if I move the goalposts (huh, see what I did there) to make it more achievable or break it further into shorter time-spans, I just get fatigued at the administration required. I already do enough paper-work, I don't need more. It'll make me unhappy.

I also know, from a biokineticist's assessment, that I have significantly poor flexibility so I have to do something to prevent injury. Injury would make me unhappy. 

I have decided instead to set a guideline. Becoming as flexible as River would be great (because I could do all the Yoga poses easily) but it will not be my main focus. I will be happier to work toward achieving a less-injury-prone state because it will be something I will have to keep doing. I will have to continually try to maintain any flexibility I achieve.

If I feel that I conquered the issue, I run the risk of lapsing into bad habits. Witness the healthy-eating plan of many people. They stick to it for a month and then when they see results, they celebrate with a reward of a slice of chocolate cake and lapse into guilt and despair. This is similar to people who put on weight after losing a lot, because the goal had to change and they didn't know how to adapt. They become unhappy.

I want to be happy, and if there is a guideline, then there is never really a fixed goal. I'll keep working to the guideline on the basis of continual improvement. (And don't tell me that continual improvement is a Quality Management idea and requires objectives to be measurable. I know that, but this is my blog and I say that I am not measuring.)

What about you - are you a goal setter? Has it worked for you? Do you follow the s.m.a.r.t formula? Do you not? Do you think you'd be more successful if you used the the s.m.a.r.t. formula?

*I choose the character over the actor/ess because I can play with the Firefly universe in my mind. If I choose the actor, they reside in my existing universe. Not as much fun. ;-)

------

Gratitude

I joined an ongoing philosophy class yesterday, I'd only been once before and you can join in or not as you are able. It was exactly part of what I needed and it was fun too. Met great people and connected with a few I'd met previously.

Afterwards went out with a friend, stopped over at her house and met her nephews and niece. The one boy was 8 months old yesterday and he let me pick him up and carry him. I thanked him for liking me, which made the 7-and-a-half-year-old laugh out loud. The joy of happy children.

Today, a friend came over and firmly, logically and ruthlessly snapped me out of the bad mood. I got verbally Gibbsed (NCIS). I'm still unhappy about the situation that was bringing me down but I am now thinking about where I am and where I'm going. Yay for both the friends, from yesterday and today.

Comments

[Skye]

Wow! First off, I love the friends situations, especially carrying around a baby. Wonderful. And the philosophy class sounds terrific.

Re the other. I used to do goals. I was an excellent project manager --- I had a day planner and was a whiz with scheduling and management software. I could hit my deadline every time. I was goals and deadline driven, very successful at it, and I got sick A LOT.

These days, I'm more into the whole "this is what I want to do" or "this is what I need" and just doing it until I'm there. Or, as in writing, just doing it as long as it brings me pleasure. I like the use of "guidelines" --- it's like "recommendations" or "suggestions" in that you don't have to follow them religiously, or even at all. But they are there if you want to follow them.

The guy at zenhabits.net wrote a great post a little ways back about no longer using goals. It's worth reading.

[Julie]

What Skye said about the suggestions. Much easier to LIVE with.
I have never even used the word "goal" in any aspect of my life. Ick, way too "success driven" for me.

LOVE the gratitudes today, yipee for generous and loving friends!

[Sarah V]

That baby was so calm and a really chilled little fellow.

Skye, thanks for the reminder about Zen habits, I haven't read anything from Leo in ages.