Lately I’ve been feeling like I need a method for goal setting. Maybe I need a Big Hairy Audacious Goal or a SMART goal. The more I thought about it, the more I felt that a goal setting method was unnecessary right now.

Misconceptions about Goals

I felt compelled to add a goal setting method to my system and wanted to know what was causing these feelings. I realized that I’ve been conditioned by several misconceptions about goals. Here are a few that were revealed to me:

• You Need Big Goals to be “Ambitious”: It feels good to feel ambitious. You haven’t given up on your potential and are continually pursuing bigger and better things. Despite the good feelings, ambitions are really delusions if you are not acting upon them.

  I

Lately I’ve been trying to remember what used to inspire me. Looking back, I can see there were times when I was inspired to action and there were times when I was just inspired (but didn’t do anything).

Leo Babauta of ZenHabits recently wrote a post called “Stop Reading About It and Do It,” where he tries to inspire his readers to go out and do. While reading this post, I found myself asking “Ok, I should do something, but do what?” I was inspired, but I wasn’t inspired to action.

Inspired to Action

There are times when I am fine with just being inspired. I like watching movies or hearing stories where cool things happen. I am content to have just experienced the story and feel good about it. In those… Continue reading

I have this hanging on my wall. It reminds me to keep on pushing until I can go no further. Pain tries to keep you the same, but you can be better.

My Inspiration

This little quote is inspired by two sources:

• Will Smith – Running & Reading: More influenced by the running aspect, than the reading part. Don’t listen to that little voice in your head because it tries to keep you from changing.
• Biology: Your body has mechanisms built into it that tries to keep you safe. Unfortunately, it does so by trying to keep you the same. Although it is difficult to overcome, you can change. If you keep on pushing, even when your body tells you to stop

You watch a movie, listen to a song, or read something and get inspired. Then what do you do? Can you do anything with it or do you let it die? Being inspired and motivated is useless if you cannot act.

Costs of Motivation

While you are being motivated, you are prevented from doing anything else. Choosing to do one thing (receive motivation) over another (producing) always creates an opportunity cost. You sacrifice your potential productivity to receive motivation.

It is fine to sacrifice potential productivity when you are not motivated, because you already know you will not be productive. In such a circumstance, the choice is between gaining motivation or continue doing nothing. Neither is productive in itself, but increasing motivation will lead to greater future productivity.

On the other hand, it… Continue reading