Goals are not the destination
{In case you missed it: How we got here. Eff Goals | They are just lines on paper anyway and If not goals, then what?}
The first most important thing about goals: ask questions. Yo, you goal - yeah you. The pretty one with all the allure - why you? Where are you taking me on this journey to become who I want to be in this lifetime?
Then once that pesky goal has given you a straight answer on part one, it's time to drop into the second most important thing about those damn {beautiful} goals: you must go after that goal with everything inside you - knowing it is not a destination.
The goal is not a destination. Nope, sorry - there is no Utopia or happily ever after when you reach it. The goal is the next important door to be walked through, the lesson to be learned, strength to be gained. And if you fail in pursuit of that crazy goal, well good because then that was entirely the point, to gain something new and to set off in search of the next goal.
In college I wanted desperately to be a fine arts major. I wanted to immerse myself in the creative. I longed to write and paint and bring beauty into the world. I felt called and compelled to do life differently than pursue a “successful” career in some profession where my worth was attached to how well I could out intellect people. So naturally, I did exactly the opposite of what that internal voice called me to do. I majored in finance. The message I picked up was: money is success and your degree will determine whether you make money. The arts will never get you there.
I designed my life around the goal. I took one drawing class. I dabbled in some courses in philosophy and language. I traveled abroad, all under the guise of “electives.” Deep down, I was searching for a way to make my goal of a degree in finance somehow align with finding a career more attuned with who I wanted to become. I just didn’t know it at the time. And since all the exploring seemed haphazard, I eventually just put my head down on a goal I didn’t truly care about, with the promise from the ether, that once I achieved the finance-thing, I’d be good.
In my stubbornness, I graduated with honors. I got a fancy job at a fancy finance firm. And by all accounts, I achieved the goal. I arrived at that destination. I was successful, right? There I was, twenty-two with this high paying job, traveling and living the life of high finance. But I hadn’t arrived anywhere. I landed on a horizontal line somewhere and I had it wrong. I made that goal the destination. And when I landed there I fell over. I had nothing left in the tank to keep going on the path because I had no idea where that particular goal was leading. I had no idea where my compass was pointing. I couldn’t understand that achieving that goal was meant to just be a stop along the route to something much, much bigger; aims along the path, to get me to who I am becoming. Goals are the reprieve. They are the moments to exhale, inhale and begin again. It didn’t feel like a reprieve. Not at all. It felt like a wall.
And so, it couldn’t last. I didn’t have the heart for the work. I couldn’t simply put on some damn harness and scale my way over that wall. I didn’t care enough. It wasn’t me. So two years in, I left. I gave up on that goal. I gave up on the newly-minted “successful” career in finance. Kerplunk. A failure. I reached a goal and there was no exhale, no inhale, no clear next goal to get me to who I want to be. I didn’t know who I wanted to be in that world; I just simply knew I didn’t want to be in that world, at all. So the story goes: blow it all up. Walk away. Try something different.
I needed to learn the next most important thing about setting goals - that they are not destinations. And that it is entirely ok to not get it right, to fail, to change course and to pick up the next goal more aligned with who I want to be.
Written by Courtney Sawyer
Artwork by Becca Williams
