I’m a goal setter. I’m pretty good at getting them, too. Become a successful book co-writer, check. Become a runner of 5Ks, check. Become a person who gives platelets, check. Become a good enough bass player to be in a bar band for breakfast money, check. Become a good manager of finances, check. Become a knitter of socks, check. Become a baker of biscuits from memory, check. You get the idea.
I conceive of something I want to do and then I take steps to get it. Sometimes it a matter of making an appointment (giving platelets), or practice (making biscuits from scratch). Some goals take years of practice and comprise many steps. (Co-writing and bass playing are examples.) Posting here 2x per week is an action I’m taking toward a major goal of becoming a successful writer of creative non-fiction books.
However, there’s one goal I’ve achieved a bunch of times before. The problem is it won’t stay gotten. I always lose it and then have to start over. Every. Time.
I want to become—and remain—a person who is healthy, fit, and strong.
This goal is important because it is a part of an overarching desire to live well and simply go “off the cliff” when I’m old rather than suffer for years with diabetes and dementia, which is what happened to my father. (Ma’s side of the family gets cancer or heart disease but they are all sharp as tacks mentally til the end. I already did the cancer thing, so maybe?)
The reason I’m thinking about this is I just finished Derek Sivers’ book, Hell Yeah or No, a book of pithy essays; words of wisdom. There’s a chapter titled, “Goals Shape the Present Not the Future.”
Sivers says that we should, “Judge a goal by how well it changes your actions in the present moment.”
Hmmm.
But what do you do if the goal changes your actions for a little while until it doesn’t? Did the goal run out of gas? Do I need to call the goal tow truck? Is the goal too boring? Do I need to set a bigger fancier goal that will result in getting the more modest goal?
Wait…I think I just got it. Hard right turn, hang on.
There are three different types of people: creators, maintainers, and destroyers. Everyone has a little of each, some people are more heavily weighted toward one or the other. Creators conceive and achieve. Maintainers take immense pleasure in keeping things going. Destroyers love to blow up systems that have outlived their usefulness and then recruit creators to come in and rebuild. I’m about 73% creator, 6% maintainer, and 21% destroyer.
What this means is, yes, I can maintain but the amount of energy available to me to do that is limited. Most goals have a little bit of a maintainer aspect to them. I can also blow things up if need be, but it’s not my favorite thing to do. Maintenance is...painful.
The healthy/fit/strong goal is at first creative (start doing) and destructive (stop doing) but once those habits are in place, it’s all maintenance, which doesn’t suit my personality at all! Gah!
I’m thinking only way I’m going get and keep this goal is to convert it into an unending string of creator goals. I need to think about how this might work. And if you have any ideas, please let me know.
xo hb