making peace with goals
I'm an endurance coach... supposedly guiding my athletes towards achieving their goals. That's what coaches do, right?
What’s my deal?
I have been unsatisfied with my personal relationship to goals and with the ways that I've asked my athletes to think about goals. It's not just that I'm uninspired by my old goals or that I'm endlessly aggravated by the futility of choosing goals at (what seems like) random: i.e. because they have round numbers, or because they reflect desirable personality traits, or attempt to fill in the gaps left by unconscious childhood wounds like, "no one ever believed in me," or "I got cut from my high school soccer team and look at me now!" or "watch this riveting underdog story of a middle class white girl who received an appropriate and adaptable amount of bullying and decided to hold onto it for long enough to win this random triathlon race instead of working it out in therapy." Of course it’s more complex than that.
S.M.A.R.T. goals are dumb goals:
I've been trying to get underneath 2 primary problems that I find with traditional goal setting methods:
1.That when your goals aren't aligned with who you are, what you actually want (not just what you said you want) and the realities of your life, they inevitably become unmotivating and futile.
2. That even if we can identify a meaningful goal, the path towards attainment is not a fixed trajectory. The path has to develop through time and space, and in relationship to other people with their own goals and desires, and to unplanned events, which we have very little control over.
What's missing is a way of navigation that includes acceptance of and collaboration with the changing nature of reality, and with the other subjects that are trying to set and reach goals and follow their own navigation systems. The ability to consciously navigate is crucial for our ability to feel fulfilled, whether we achieve the goals we set out for or not.
Instead of goals:
Because everyone’s personal navigation systems will depend on individual differences in environments, values, relationships, etc., I do not have a neatly arranged format for sending you on your way.
Instead, I’ve created a list of 10 topics and themes for contemplation - a word that I intend in its etymological form, combining the latin templum: a space for observation, and con, meaning with. You may be wondering, "with whom or with what should we carve out space for observation?"
Start with this advice from Adrienne Maree Brown: "Listen to strangers, listen to random invitations, listen to criticisms, listen to your body, to elders, to dreams, to creativity, to artists who inspire you, to books you're reading. The more you pay attention, the more you can see patterns, order, clear messages, and invitations in the small or seemingly random things that happen in your life."
This way of paying attention in the present to the world around us allows us to know things about the future. We begin to recognize the patterns and follow the clues from our outer environment that correspond to experiences in our inner environment. We begin to cultivate a way of being that is both intentional and receptive to the intentions of the more-than-human world around us. And this leads us to a rhythm more than a fixed state - a way of being in time.
Topics for Wayfinding:
Go through the following topics slowly. These are not meant to be digested in one sitting. I plan on spending 1 month working with my athletes on each topic, and I plan on returning back here to elaborate on each one, month by month.
The psychologists and founders of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), define acceptance as "not passive tolerance or resignation but an intentional behavior that alters the function of inner experiences from events to be avoided to a focus of interest, curiosity, and observation." What are you curious about?
We have become conditioned to create technology and systems that optimize and strive towards efficiency but at some point, we may want to ask, optimize for what? Do we have more time back in our days due to all of this efficiency? What are we doing with it? Is it fulfilling?
Over the course of several years, Charles Darwin performed a series of experiments where he tracked the movement of various plants for days and weeks at a time. He found a central pattern of movement that he believed is the reason that plants have evolved and adapted to almost every environment on the planet. This motion is known as circumnutation and is characterized by a gentle upward and outward spiraling, resulting from variations in the speed of growth in different parts of the plant. Apprentice yourself to nonhuman rhythms and ways of being in time.
If you want to know the future, tune into as many intricacies of the present moment as possible. Challenge the assumption that goals should be big and lofty. Consider how the smallest goals can be the most revolutionary goals. Take nothing for granted.
The other day I was running and contemplating rhythm when I came upon a creek crossing. The crossing was about 15 feet wide and there were a number of inconsistently spaced rocks that formed a crooked trajectory to the other side. There were enough rocks that if I held my focus only on the other side and not to where I was placing my feet, I would surely fall in. But if I only placed my attention on one rock at a time, I would still have a high likelihood of falling because I would be disregarding the rhythm that is often required for balance. How does the world speak to you? How can you cultivate other ways of listening than the ones you are accustomed to?
Toni Morrison's definition of freedom is the ability to choose one's responsibilities. It's not the absence of responsibilities, it's choosing the ones you want. Instead of starting with goals as a list of things you'd like to have, begin instead with asking yourself, "What do I want to be responsible for?"
One of my favorite things about living near the ocean is the number of people that you can find, at any given time of day, stopped and staring motionless at the ocean. How do you feel when you gaze at the ocean? How do you feel near mountains, in the desert, in the woods? Be careful not to fall into the trap of needing to understand or to explain. Making sense of a feeling acts as a barrier between you and the aesthetic moment. Contemplate with your sensory organs rather than your intellect.
Consider Eco-Psychologist Bill Plotkin's idea that, "We embrace deep and real change by falling in love with things - with an idea, a meadow, a melody, a person, an endangered plant - and striving to understand what each beloved thing is at its core." What do you love that is ordinary?
Acknowledging limits and boundaries may seem like a step in the wrong direction towards goals, or at least not a fun one. Perhaps this brushes up against prickly beliefs that designate working hard and pushing through obstacles as always superior to resting or playing. Take 3 deep breaths and ask, "What in me is worth protecting?"
Meditate on Ursula Le Guin's thoughts on meditation. She says, "To sit and be fully aware of the air going in and out of your nose... this sounds really stupid. If you haven't tried it yet, try it. It is really stupid. There's nothing your intellect can do to help you do it. This must be why so many people for so long have used it as a way towards wisdom."
(that creek crossing)