I have been mastering small (and some medium-sized) goals, like working out every other day, purchasing a study manual for the APCAT (the written entrance exam for EPS), volunteering twice weekly at the John Howard Society, and driving around with a tiny police cruiser perched on my dash (for good luck, of course), to name a few. Committing to do each one of those is far easier than declaring, “I want to be a police officer,” and then feeling hopelessly lost and overwhelmed because the entire endeavour is so daunting that one might not know where to start.
Part of what makes Goal Buddy unique is that it encourages the achievement of large goals through starting with small and achievable ones. Things that you might accomplish in a week (or an hour, even), but help build patterns of behaviour amenable to the achievement of grander goals.
But what happens if you get stuck? The Saturday Morning Productions crew pondered this quandary. Would a reminder on your phone help? What if you kept missing the goal? Should you abandon it, modify it, or change the timeline? I’m not sure that there is a clear answer to that yet, because there are many reasons why one might miss a deadline for achieving a goal. However, I do know that failure is a destructive feeling that one might experience if a goal is missed.
It’s been a while since I’ve written a detailed blog post (writing them frequently is a goal of mine). I must confess that my head has been elsewhere, namely, due to factors I erroneously thought were beyond my control. Over the last few weeks, I’ve struggled to meet my goals (as outlined above) due to a situation elsewhere. It was like trying to swim while wearing leg irons. I wondered if leaving or staying in that situation would negatively affect my end goal (i.e., Would I get a bad reference if I left? Would I be seen as a quitter?). I indeed wondered what Goal Buddy would say.
Ultimately, after much thought and consultation with close friends, I knew that staying would be a huge hindrance and I opted to remove myself voluntarily from aforementioned situation. While there were many aspects of the situation that I could not influence, there was one variable over which I had complete control: my own choices. Modifying the timeline or nature of a goal is not failure. It is merely a reconfiguration of factors to set yourself up for success.
Things, my friends, are looking up!