December was intense with the Christmas Calendar, and in the last episode I said this week was going to be about setting goals for the upcoming year. But setting goals and then failing on reaching them has been my main previous experience with goal setting.
“The problems with the conventional pursuit of goals (i.e., new year’s resolutions) are well-documented at this point.
People tend to rely too much on self-discipline and eschew forming useful habits. People tend to bite off more than they can chew, so to speak, setting goals that are far above their ability or knowledge level and then becoming frustrated when they make little to no progress towards them. People are tempted to take “shortcuts” to achieve a goal that may actually sabotage themselves in the long-run, like starving yourself to lose weight, or cheating to get a good grade on a test.”
My take on Goal setting this year will hence be focused on 30 day periods and building habits. Now the Habits will still have to tie back to some kind of goal, but it’s not about earning one million dollars. My goals are for instance to be a more charismatic person, that can socialize and have fun in all contexts, to live a strong and healthy live and become at least 130, etc. And from these I will create habits that will take me towards that end goal, but the end goal in itself is just to point out the direction. The focus will then be all about incrementally shaping me into becoming that kind of person. A good read on this mindset, which I strongly recommend you read, can be find here: https://markmanson.net/goals
You can read what my January habits here: http://alexandernilsson.nu/my-goals/
There’s also a very good free little YouTube-course which will guide you through this process up understanding habits on a fundamental level – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8JjuyRIxOg&index=2&list=PLE_vQWWxgaiED3B2gbKWzXItVNIQErstT
But frankly as I write this I’m a bit split on what the focus of the week should be. You see, the result of the Christmas calendar has also made me realize the importance of having that deep motivation for what we do. We are in a position to make the right calls for what we really should care about in life, when we have clarity on what actually are important to us, what values and believes that act as our decision-making guidance. But so, in order to actually know what kind of goals and habits to support us moving towards those goals, we need some idea of what those values, believes are – and what our “why is”. What gets us excited and create that deep driving force within. Because when we have that, the hard things become so much easier.
Take just my Christmas Calendar as an example, I put up a line of awful challenges for myself, things I would never had thought of doing if I wouldn’t have had this channel and my deep-rooted motivation for personal growth. But with all this in my head when facing that anxiety before doing my weird things, it gave me that edge to push myself to do it.
So what I’m getting is that we need to sit down and take time to think about these things. Which personally is something I’ve done before a lot of times, but every time I do it, it gives me more super valuable insights. And that’s why the challenge of the week is going to be an internal journey to seek out a greater understanding for what our purpose are – ‘Your Why’. Because your life, if you want a good one, should be steered in a direction where you get to live your why every day. And that could mean so many different things, and really doesn’t have to be end world hunger. Raising a child, spreading joy, making art that make people feel good, or fixing peoples broken cars to ease their pains are just as viable. But they are individual, and we owe it to ourselves to at least have some idea of a purpose. With clarity comes focus, and with focus comes result.
But so, the challenge for next week will be to define and find my why with the help of a guy that has made a career out of finding people’s and companies Why’s – Simon Sinek. Or in particular this book: http://www.summary.com/book-reviews/_/Find-Your-Why/ . You can read the first chapter here, describing the importance of “the why”, https://startwithwhy.com/find-your-why/ .
Now you don’t have to do this that way, you can simply sit down and think about your life with the help of these questions bellow – or google some other because there’s tons of similar content out there.
“We should take a step back and ask ourselves some questions. You can start by asking yourself a few of these:
Why is it that you do what you do?
What thrills you about your current job role or career?
What does a great day look like?
What does success look like beyond the paycheck?
What does real success feel like for you?
How do you want to feel about your impact on the world when you retire?
You could also ask yourself these follow-up questions:
What do you hate about your current job role or career?
Why don’t you do something else?
What does a bad day look like?
What is it you don’t enjoy about your job and why?
What does failure look like beyond the paycheck?
What does real failure feel like for you?”
(Source: https://www.goalcast.com/2017/05/09/find-why-discover-professional-purpose/)
I’m just hoping I’m not asking too much of myself this week, implementing a bunch of new habits and doing all this ‘why’-work. Focus is key, and this week I’m all over the place, but I want to utalize the momentum i get from the power of starting a new year! We’ll see, otherwise we’ll just go at it again next week.
– 2018 here we come!
Also, if you missed it, here’s the playlist to all the Christmas Calendar Episodes:
And I wish all of you a happy new year, and thank you all for this year. We just reached 250 subscribers and I value every each one of you tremendously. You make this journey called life even more fun, in good and in bad times?.
/Alexander
I’m starting daily blogging!
So I’m going to be starting daily blogging for january to see how that works out for me! I do this to improve my writing skills, but also to share thoughts I don’t always to include in my videos.
As I talked about in the livestream, Instead of focusing in on big grandiosa 2018 goals, Im’m going to work with monthly habit implementation challenges. Habits that aligns with my, values believes and goals. And evaulate the result of them it after 30 days.
The idea is that by focusing in on the habtis that supports the process of reaching those higher goals, the result will be much greater. And easeir to meassure, evauluate and tweak. It’s more about the process, beacuse the actual end goal seldom is worth any in itself. It’s about the person you become in the process.
Inspiration: https://markmanson.net/goals
But so, as for right now, the first 30 day habits I’ll implement will be:
The key is to just start the habit and do the minimum I’ve specifed, usually I’ll do more once I’m going!
January Month challenge
Area 1: SPIRITUALITY
3 min meditation daily
Area 2: HEALTH & WELLBEING
Directly after I’ve eaten something, write it up in the Lifesum app
Follow the Not-buy-Food-list (trigger foods for my overeating)
Area 3: Social
Say hi to at least one random girl a day
Talk/text with at least one friend a day
Meet with one friend a week
Area 4: Personal development
Read listen to a book for 5 min daily
Area 5: Business / Career
Blogg daily
3 minutes of writing down thought on the company I’m going to start before 21st of march 2018
Area 6: FINANCES
Read one financial article a day
Area 7: Fun things
Watch one funny standup sketch a day
But so the challenge for next week will be, except for starting to implement these habits, to define and find “my why” with the help of simon Sineks content, or in particular this book: http://www.summary.com/book-reviews/_/Find-Your-Why/