Long-term goals or finding your passion

  • Thread starter Thread starter Ishajayil
  • Start date Start date
I

Ishajayil

Guest
I started implementing GTD a couple of weeks ago and I´ve had a lot of success so far (a few items that had been in my ToDo list for ages have finally been done! :D ). My problem however is about setting goals. Now that I'm getting things done, what things do I want to do? :? I read some very good posts on this board about goal setting and have managed to set a couple of short term (20k feet) goals like run a 10k for my birthday or generate more income as a free lance translator (so I don´t have to get a "real" job in an office :wink: ) However I'm completely lost at higher altitudes. I have no clue as to what to do with my life two years from now, much less what my "passion" or my "mission" is. I know I have many skills and a couple of college degrees, so that's not the problem. I have tried several things in the past (college professor, marketing manager, language teacher) and pursued many and varied interests (too many to list here), but I never managed to stick with anything for long. Does anyone have any suggestions for finding out? How did you realize what your calling was?
 
I look at my library. The books I read indicate to me clearly what I want to do with my life. Despite all the various genres of books I read, there is a thread that ties them together. If you can find that thread in your life, it will help you figure out what you really want to do.
 
Looking at the Library

MarkTAW said:
I look at my library. The books I read indicate to me clearly what I want to do with my life. Despite all the various genres of books I read, there is a thread that ties them together. If you can find that thread in your life, it will help you figure out what you really want to do.
Click to expand...

A very good idea. I would add one proviso, however.

When you look through your library, one thing you will want to do is to tease apart "things that I (would) love to do" from "problems I'm trying to solve." Most people have one or more of what I call "besetting problems." These are problems that arise from the basic conditions of their lives. They remain through long periods of a person's life, and often resist repeated attempts to resolve. However, if for some reason their life changes dramatically, the problem often goes away, and so does their interest in it.

An example might help illustrate what I mean. A person might be an accountant. If you look at their library, there might be a dozen books on novel writing and well as a dozen books on how to stop procrastinating. The writing books are there because the person has always wanted to write a novel. The procrastination books are there because the person needs to keep plugging away at a job they despise. If they quit their job and become a novelist, their procrastination problem might virtually disappear because they are doing a job they love. If you look at their library two years from now, there might be three dozen books on novel writing, and none on procrastination...because they have all been thrown out.

One would wonder what their library (and their life) would be like if they had quit their job to become a behavioral psychologist in order to help people overcome procrastination.
 
My Specialty :)

Here are some questions I ask my clients to help them identify their Life Purpose:

Give the following questions some thought and brainstorm ideas as they come to your mind:

Who are you?

What do you want your life to stand for?

What do you really want to do with your life?

Why?

What do you love about yourself?

What makes you feel passionate and alive?

What would you do if you knew you couldn’t fail?

What would you regret not having done in your life, when you’re on your deathbed?

What natural gifts and talents do you have?

What activities make you lose track of time?

Why do you do these activities?

What is most important to you?

What gives your life meaning?

What do you want to be?

What do you want to do?

What need in society do you want to actively contribute to?

What is the meaning of your life?

What is the purpose of your existence?

For what reason were you put on this planet?

Choose to have a great day!

Trisha Cupra, Life Coach :D
 
Imagine you are financially independent, and really LIVE IT in your imagination.
Then just brainstorm out all the things that you would do with your life and time.
Start with fun stuff, or whatever pops into your mind.

Keep repeating this exercise over and over, and patterns will emerge.

Coz
 
And then return to reality...

CosmoGTD said:
Imagine you are financially independent, and really LIVE IT in your imagination.
Then just brainstorm out all the things that you would do with your life and time.
Start with fun stuff, or whatever pops into your mind.

Keep repeating this exercise over and over, and patterns will emerge.

Coz
Click to expand...

And then return to reality... :?

TesTeq
 
Re: And then transform your reality...

Yes, then return to reality, and try to figure out ways to bring these things into your life, in one way or another.
Turn them into projects, and try them out.

So if a person imagines engaging in serious World Travel, and they spend their life in a small office, then try and get work that allows travel. So then you can bitch about airports...and food poisoning.

Or maybe a person has a fantasy of being a great Writer, well, then start with a Blog, or whatever, and start writing everyday. Then you get to see how much fun being a writer is.

or if a person wants to be an Astronaut, then figure out a way to raise the money to go into space on Branson's planes...

or you want to Save The World...well maybe Save The Children needs an engineer or lawyer?

or if you wish you were a Philosopher, then start reading the philosophers, writing, thinking, and bring the power of disciplined philosophic thought into whatever you are doing now...

What I am saying is to go within your own brain, and find out what your passions are. They can come up in free-form Blue-Sky brainstorming in SYMBOLIC ways. In a waking Phantasy.

Then transfer these symbolic desires into concrete reality, by small next action, projects, and everything else.

Its interesting how some people feel that "reality" and our fondest desires are something separate from eachother.
That is likely due to a core belief that "you can't have what you really want", and that "I gotta do this crap to pay my bills".
The reality is that those are self-fulfilling prophecies.

This is what GTD is about for me, not about getting my DVD's back on time, or processing papers and emails. That's great, but that's the details.
Its about having a comprehensive system to actualize your highest potential, and accomplish the things you want to accomplish in the most efficient and rapid way, while enjoying the process, and having less stress, and more fun.

Turn that wild, Blue-Sky nutty metaphor into something that can exist in reality, and then translate parts of that into Objective's and Projects, and NA's.

If you phantasize about making some hip-hop records and being the new Eminem even though you are over 40, (like my brother), then start writing down those rhymes, get some music-looping software, record some tunes, go out and rap at some local functions...you just might have some fun...and maybe that will turn into writing some slam poetry, and maybe you will write these slam poems into a book, and record them, and maybe you'll get invited to perform in a festival in Europe...and maybe some other old-foggies will get a kick out of your stuff...and you might start making a few bucks, and be a hero in your hometown....

Or, naw....ignore your silly, over-the-top Blue Sky Phantasies, and just keep thinking woulda, coulda, shoulda...back to pushing paper, clearing my inbox, and making sure my mp3 player's batteries are charged.

NOT! :D

Coz

TesTeq said:
CosmoGTD said:
Imagine you are financially independent, and really LIVE IT in your imagination.
Then just brainstorm out all the things that you would do with your life and time.
Start with fun stuff, or whatever pops into your mind.

Keep repeating this exercise over and over, and patterns will emerge.

Coz
Click to expand...

And then return to reality... :?

TesTeq
Click to expand...
 
Re: Looking at the Library

Scott_L_Lewis said:
An example might help illustrate what I mean. A person might be an accountant. If you look at their library, there might be a dozen books on novel writing and well as a dozen books on how to stop procrastinating. The writing books are there because the person has always wanted to write a novel. The procrastination books are there because the person needs to keep plugging away at ...
Click to expand...

Scott,

I used to think that some of your posts showed evidence of telepathic abilities on your part … but now I ‘m just plain scared. How DID you see into my spare room?!
 
I think, when you are younger, you tend to be more open-minded about who you want to be, what you want to be doing, where you want to be doing it, etc. The whole "maybe I'll be a doctor, or a musician" thing. It's all an open page.

As you get older (finish university, get a job, get into your career, get committments like family) you tend to lose this open view. You start following the grain. Where you are 2 years from now, is directly related to where you are now, and no longer completely independent of the present.

Not saying this is bad or good. Just that I used to have big grand plans, and now I'm starting to realize that many won't be realized. Which makes it even more important for me to pick the ones I really want to focus on (because I can't do them all).
 
I would say that the excitement and fulfillment that can come from realizing one's "dreams" has very little to do with one's age, and everything to do with one's thinking and core beliefs.

Blue-Sky dreams, can be translated into what these things might MEAN to us as individuals. They might mean we desire more adventure, respect, social status, and many other things.

Then one can look at these things, and see if they are in any way pathological. Perhaps the secret desire to be king of the world... could actually use some Lithium.
Perhaps the fantasy of being famous, could point to a lack of intrinsic self-worth, for which the cure is unconditional self-acceptance, not seeking to impress others, and find external approval.

Finding your passion seems to me to be utterly subjective, and so the only place to look is to one's own Intuition.
It can take a lifetime to learn one simple idea...YOU CAN TRUST YOUR OWN MIND! (as long as you reality-test it too).
What a concept, trust your own thinking, gut feelings, and Intuition.

Coz
 
I think it's safe to say that all of us would benefit from work that had the qualities of Flow, as outlined by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi in the book of the same name.

We have seen how people describe the common characteristics of optimal experience: a sense that one's skills are adequate to cope with the challenges at hand, in a goal-directed, rule-bound action system that provides clear cues as to how well one is performing. Concentration is so intense that there is no attention left over to think about anything irrelevant, or to worry about problems. Self-consciousness disappears, and the sense of time becomes distorted. An activity that produces such experiences is so gratifying that people are willing to do it for its own sake, with little concern for what they will get out of it, even when it is difficult, or dangerous.
Click to expand...

I've found that it's not so much what you do, but how you do it, and just as importantly, how you're allowed to do it.
 
A great book dealing with abilities, passions and putting it all together is "The Lemming Conspiracy." I wish such a book was available when I was but a lad. But life's about changin....nuthin never stays the same! (Patti Lovelace)
MC
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top