Guestpost - The power of ONE goal

This is an article from a coachee to her life coach. The power of having ONE goal, being accountable and responsible to her coach, being committed to her commitment.

What's your 2012 new year resolution?

"Most people have spent their lives practicing stopping them from going for what they want and then beating themselves up about doing such a good job with it."- Paul Mckenna

Again and Again

Amazingly 2011, for the first time ever, I am able to fulfil most of the things I wanted to do, even though I ... to be honest, didn't set much goals.

I wanted to do no goal, but being a goal-oriented person, I couldn't. I just couldn't. I am unwilling to fathom on the idea about having no goal.
Not yet.

The irony is I did went all the length to attend goal-setting workshops, had a Life Coach, and then pretty much scrapped most of my goals away at the end.

Not due to the frustration, guilt and disappointment upon myself, that I was cheating, being in denial by pretending I never set any one of them and sighed,

"Oh. Forget it. I'll never keep them."
"This is too hard. I'm giving up."
"I'll do it tomorrow."
"The new year is coming so let's set resolution again."

Again?
Wait.
Read the dialogues again.

Do they sound familiar?
Do you hear them often?
Or are you the one who said these?

Seriously, again?
Do you want set the same old goals again and again, every single year, and then beating yourself up for not living up to your promise?
Are you sure you want to wait until tomorrow, especially when tomorrow for this particular year 2012, if the Mayan are true, that it may never arrive?

This is when I realise the culture of efficiency, urging us to have achievable, realistic goals, or any goal, is way more embed in our society than I thought.
The expectation to perform, be perfect and have it all.

New year resolution becomes a new fad of convert judgement.

So, what's your new year resolution?

No. This does not mean you raise your hands up in the air and concede defeat. This does not mean you abandon all your goals now. It's tad too early. It's the first day of the new year, and this is the very moment to change. This is the best time to change.
You can change.

Let's review your resolution now.
Look at them.

If you haven't make any, good!
Do them now.

List all the things you want to do in your lifetime.
List as much as you can. Yes, the more the merrier.

Most probably they may contain something like "Losing weight", "Be rich", or "Be Happy".
Most probably, they look hell a lot like a to-do list.

How do you feel about your resolution?

Are you sure you really want to tick them all as a to-do list?

Okay, even if you do love to-to lists (like I do), no matter how much you check them off the chart, sooner or later you bound to feel tired, thinking like a tickling time bomb. And then you start to feel it's meaningless, explode and then make the same old mistake---- you give up.

Most probably before you really, truly, look at your resolutions, your inner voice may be spoiling the fun, telling you it's futile. Stop writing them down. New year resolution are meant to be... well, a resolution. A ritual for new year. Just write, because everyone else does so, and then clip it on your fridge or your wall as a shiny memorial to remember your first day of the year.

Oh wait! Let's set it as the first trash of the year! Yippee.

No!
That's your inner voice!

Let's make it right this time.
Let's make "again" truly a gain for you this year, a game you can win.

Rather making many goals for the new year resolution, how about ONE goal?

Most probably it's the first thing in your new year resolution.
Most probably it's the goal you never dare to write it down, or to be spoken to any soul, ever. Not even to yourself.
Most probably it's the goal you daydream often, the one you always dream as you sleep.
Most probably it's the very goal you avoided the most, the one you fear the most, the first you gave up in the list, the one you always abandon without fail each year, and then you repeatedly pen it down each year.

You already know what it is.

Even when you bury your dream, it never forget you.

Even in your darkest secret, in the darkest depth of your soul, your dream simply sits there, waiting. It didn't even expect you to uncover it and do the dirty work of digging. The dream does not judge. All it does is to keep the faith for you so one day you will be able to believe in it again.

A goal is a dream you commit to it, which becomes a habit.
One becomes a goal when you believe. And once you can, you do it.

Maybe the vital missing key you need to get what you want is focus.

Stop doing any more. Stop judging your dream or yourself. There is no point in doing more when whatever you do feel like it is never enough. There is no point in writing any resolution when you put no heart in the first place, writing for the sake of it. Your goal is no other people's goals. Your goal only belongs to you, sincerely you.

Do what you want, not what you should,
because what drive you at the end of the day, is how you feel when you follow your heart.

It's only then the words you wrote on that piece of paper, becomes your reality,
as you take action.

Not the act of writing, or how perfectly structured your goal is as a sentence.
When you want something, and you're dying for it, screw the grammar police. Even they can't even stop you from getting anywhere you want.

Just do one goal.
Resolve.
And finally a noun becomes a verb.

If there is only ONE goal you can achieve in this year,
that once you achieved it, you know you will be so happy for the rest of the year,
that you dare to say that you can die with regrets, what would it be?

The author, Qiuling, dedicates this article to her Life Coach Joel Yeo. He's the one who inspires her the idea of ONE goal. Thank you.

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