Do you feel like you are caught in the hamster wheel of life? Spinning your wheels and seeming to get nowhere? Each January is a marker of a new year, and a wonderful time to take measure of our progress, and re-focus ourselves for the coming year. All too often, however, the good intentions we made in January slowly fade and are gone by February Benefits of Using.
If when you hear “goal setting” you think of hard work, past failures, and think – why bother, you may have been caught on the hamster wheel before. This article is for those who’ve ever been caught on that wheel, those who have fallen off the wheel, and those who want to make their forward motion really count!
The Wheel: Typically, our path to achievement is to think of what we want, then set a goal, stick with it a couple of days, (maybe even a week or two), make some forward motion, then lose focus and revert to our old ways. It’s not over yet thought, because we then berate ourselves for failing the goal, and wonder, why can’t I just be more disciplined?
Time passes, we think about what we “should” be doing, and the vicious cycle repeats. Or, we forget about trying again, but are left feeling guilty, “lazy” or “undisciplined.” If you are focusing your efforts simply on setting and achieving goals, you may be missing most of the battle. If achieving your goals feels like struggle, you need to take a look at what is going on behind the scenes.
What is going on behind the scenes? Glad you asked. It is our thoughts and feelings that inspire action and inaction. Would you agree that our thoughts affect our actions? Do our feelings affect our thoughts? Do our feelings affect our actions? As you can see, actions, thoughts, and feelings are inter-related.
It works like a pyramid, with actions at the top, and thoughts and feelings making up the base. If we focus only on our outcomes, (actions) and don’t take into account our thoughts and feelings, we may be losing the battle and missing most of the action.
The problem with goal setting is in how we pick our goals in the first place. Many times we pick our goals to fill a lack, without even being aware of what that lack is. To begin identifying what’s really going on, try this exercise. It’s best to do it now as it will only take a few minutes.
Take out a clean sheet of paper and divide it into 3 columns. On the right column, list everything you want. It can be anything, a new car, more money, friends, family, etc. Then in the middle column, identify the benefit of what that goal will give you. In the third column, identify the benefit of the benefit.
What’s really going on? What do you want ’ What it will give you ’ The Benefit of the Benefit. For example, if I say I want X amount of dollars, I might identify that it will allow me to pay my bills easily, and the benefit of the benefit (paying bills easily) might give me a sense of freedom. From this process, I can see that ultimately, what I really want is freedom. The benefit of the benefit is your Ultimate Why.
How to get off the hamster wheel: Identify your Ultimate Whys. Usually the Ultimate Whys are a sense of something, a feeling, or a way of being. The secret is, you don’t have to wait until you’ve made X amount of dollars, or filled some other goal in order to have that Ultimate Why now in your life. You can have it now – and it’s free!