Maybe you’ve got one of those to-do lists where you dump goals for the near or distant future. I file mine under “Someday” and promptly forget about them.
Every now and then I peek into Someday and find entries like “Publish lots of YouTube videos”, “build a proper funnel for my business activities”, “learn piano”, “brush up my French”.
I know these aren’t real goals. Real goals would be specific: “Have at least 1,000 YouTube followers and 20 published videos by December 31st, 2021.” But still, they’re goals from my past, projected into my future.
These goals hide in Someday, but they still drain energy. The moment I look at the list, I start making unnecessary mental noise. Piano playing: Should I buy a keyboard? Maybe one that connects to my iPad? One second later I’m deep in a time-wasting research rabbit hole about good keyboards.
Pursue the goals that actually drive you
Deep down, I know I won’t learn piano in the next few years anyway. Why? Because I don’t wake up with an urgent desire to play piano.
So if these goals radiate so little energy, why keep dragging them along?
Here’s my suggestion: Why not just eliminate all the goals you have and focus on one or two you want to pursue wholeheartedly over a long period? You know the feeling. You get out of bed and all you want to do is play piano. It gives you energy? Then you’ve found it and should keep going.
Too many goals, too many energy vampires
I’m not saying you should only play piano and never work again. But if you’re in a position where you could reorient yourself career-wise in the medium term, now might be the right time to move.
What about all those other goals and possibilities, new gadgets and castles in the air? Should you just let them pass by? No, stay open. But if you only jump from one thing to the next, nothing remains in the end.
First appeared in German on reinergaertner.de, my blog since 1997. AI-assisted translation — because life’s too short to translate 150 posts by hand, but too long to leave them in German.