As someone with the opposite problem, who can babble countless goals that interest me, and is rigidly married to a few interrelated ones (i.e. make music videos, make films) but struggling to execute them anywhere near to my liking, I hope I can provide some insight into how to find goals or what you want.
I believe that big goals are no different than small goals in terms of finding them.
I’ll be happy to write a post on this if any of this seems intriguing or useful but here’s the dotpoints:
If you have heroes, who are they? What adjectives would you use to describe them? For example, I would describe one of my heroes, Miuccia Prada, as “innovative” “insightful” “paradoxical” and “sophisticated”. I could make it my goal to cultivate one of these qualities in myself, and that would require finding an exercise or even enrolling in a course or activity which would allow me to do so?
i.e. the go-to example would be if you want to be more ‘charismatic’ take up public speaking, join a amateur theatre troupe as that is meant to be a means of developing it.
If you don’t have heroes, who among your social group or friends have the traits or manners that you most envy (in a non-destructive way)? Same as above.
Both of these exercises can be inverted by looking at people you detest or at least have a strong aversion to. Pride and Shame are good indicators too of what you want.
Coming up with goals is easy, committing to them is hard. Just babble. Here’s a template: “I would feel proud if I had a reputation based on fixing/making X”. Prune out the ones that don’t elicit a passionate response.
Analyze your Revealed Preferences on groceries as an Economist would. Everything from buying biodegradable dishwashing detergent to anti-aging wrinkle cream to tickets to a UFC match are all commitments to a certain lifestyle or living with certain principals or values. Those commitments should point you towards broader patterns of goals
Okay sure? But what works for me? “How do you come up with goals”. Here’s how I do it.
I’ve known since I was a teenager that I’ve wanted to be involved in motion pictures however last year I asked myself “okay you say you want to make films, but what is a film you would be deliriously proud of look like?” so I brainstormed all the qualities and elements, and made a video-moodboard (a hour long montage of films, music videos, retro TV commercials, even Beckett plays and experimental animations that inspired me) and that too formed the vague outline of a story. Now my goal is to write a screenplay that incorporates all those elements seamlessly, and then the subsequent goal to make that screenplay into a film. There’s certainly a lot of functionary goals and steppingstones that must be met to achieve those goals.
Do I know how to make that film? Not with any confidence. But that’s because coming up with a goal, being specific about what I want, what I’m passionate and dedicated to is the easy part.
As someone with the opposite problem, who can babble countless goals that interest me, and is rigidly married to a few interrelated ones (i.e. make music videos, make films) but struggling to execute them anywhere near to my liking, I hope I can provide some insight into how to find goals or what you want.
I believe that big goals are no different than small goals in terms of finding them.
I’ll be happy to write a post on this if any of this seems intriguing or useful but here’s the dotpoints:
If you have heroes, who are they? What adjectives would you use to describe them? For example, I would describe one of my heroes, Miuccia Prada, as “innovative” “insightful” “paradoxical” and “sophisticated”. I could make it my goal to cultivate one of these qualities in myself, and that would require finding an exercise or even enrolling in a course or activity which would allow me to do so?
i.e. the go-to example would be if you want to be more ‘charismatic’ take up public speaking, join a amateur theatre troupe as that is meant to be a means of developing it.
If you don’t have heroes, who among your social group or friends have the traits or manners that you most envy (in a non-destructive way)? Same as above.
Both of these exercises can be inverted by looking at people you detest or at least have a strong aversion to. Pride and Shame are good indicators too of what you want.
Coming up with goals is easy, committing to them is hard. Just babble. Here’s a template: “I would feel proud if I had a reputation based on fixing/making X”. Prune out the ones that don’t elicit a passionate response.
Analyze your Revealed Preferences on groceries as an Economist would. Everything from buying biodegradable dishwashing detergent to anti-aging wrinkle cream to tickets to a UFC match are all commitments to a certain lifestyle or living with certain principals or values. Those commitments should point you towards broader patterns of goals
Okay sure? But what works for me? “How do you come up with goals”. Here’s how I do it.
I’ve known since I was a teenager that I’ve wanted to be involved in motion pictures however last year I asked myself “okay you say you want to make films, but what is a film you would be deliriously proud of look like?” so I brainstormed all the qualities and elements, and made a video-moodboard (a hour long montage of films, music videos, retro TV commercials, even Beckett plays and experimental animations that inspired me) and that too formed the vague outline of a story. Now my goal is to write a screenplay that incorporates all those elements seamlessly, and then the subsequent goal to make that screenplay into a film. There’s certainly a lot of functionary goals and steppingstones that must be met to achieve those goals.
Do I know how to make that film? Not with any confidence. But that’s because coming up with a goal, being specific about what I want, what I’m passionate and dedicated to is the easy part.