This week’s topic might be a little thought provoking.
I hope so.
I received a link from my colleague Lee Woodward to listen to an interview he did with Charles Tarbey. Lee is widely known in the real estate industry and has been training principals and sales people for over 30 years. Charles is the Century 21 Australasia Chairman.
Charles explained to Lee how destructive goals can be and how goals are really short term objectives on the way to achieving our dreams. Link below if you’d like to listen to the interview.
As it turns out, I was coaching with a client, we’ll call him Barry, a couple of days later who was concerned he didn’t have goals. He was questioning whether he wasn’t allowing himself to have goals or maybe he wasn’t destined to achieve them.
This led to a very robust conversation about goals, goal setting and mindset.
In fact, it was Barry who said, your goals can become your gaol.
I thought this was very profound and the reason I put dots in between the letters in the heading is to distinguish between the spelling of goals and gaols.
At times we can become so fixated on the goal and how it is meant to be achieved that we lose sight of the fact that goals are there to propel us forward on our journey.
Goals set the destination, however it’s the journey to the destination that we remember. If you’re like most people, as soon as you have achieved something you wanted, you quickly reach for something else.
So here’s another concept to add to the mix, that of “precession”.
Buckminster Fuller defined precession as “the effect of bodies in motion on other bodies in motion”.
Precession is the action that occurs at ninety degrees to bodies in motion.
When applied to goals, the concept of precession means that we can set out to achieve a goal and find that we achieve it in a totally different way to what we expected (i.e. ninety degrees).
For example, a young man decides to go to Europe to find a girlfriend. He applies for a job as a tour guide. About a month before he is due to leave, he meets a girl and then has a dilemma. Does he go to Europe to find a girlfriend, or has the goal been achieved already and he doesn’t need to go?
This is precession. We set a goal. We set the direction. We decide the how and start taking action and then somehow, miraculously, the goal is achieved, in a completely different way to what we expected.
What are your thoughts?
What do you think a goal is?
Do you believe it can become a gaol for you?
For me, I like what Charles Tarbey had to say. Keep dreaming and set short term objectives to get into action.
Here’s the link to listen to the interview:
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