Don't Settle for Goals

Patterns might be the answer

Classes, books, and various firsthand lessons about mental health, personal development, and almost all things related teach that goal setting should be a priority. However, I have gathered enough insights to disagree with the prevailing view.

Making goals has become so standard as to be a self-evident imperative for any person seeking self-improvement. For persons battling any form of mental illness, the statement is doubly true.

It is easy to see why. I agree that setting one’s eyes on a future prize creates positivity and the potential for sustained, productive activity. It is not that goals are a bad thing, but they are not the best thing.

Admittedly, goals and I have not enjoyed a great relationship. It has always been a rocky friendship at best, but I did not understand why. I have been reluctant and sometimes avoidant of any commitment to working toward a predetermined outcome.

Setting small goals that are steps toward an imposing project is a logical plan. I did this once upon a time when jogging was still in my life. Do not think about the whole distance. Instead make small milestones to meet thus breaking down the full effort into manageable increments. All I have to do is get to the bridge, I might think in my head, and then concentrate on the next little accomplishment.

Goals, though, should not and cannot serve as the ideal instrument providing human beings with contentment and self-actualization. It is not the way to make life everything it can be.

The nature of goals is that they will finally end. Once an aim is realized, then there is no more use for the goal. Whether we like it or not, that is how people process achieving a result.

A goal without an identifiable endpoint is not a goal. Plus, all possessions that are worth trying for are not really possessions but instead function as temporary allowances that must be re-earned. Goals are a little like an illusion.

People must naturally rest after claiming a success or perhaps a series of them. Some people have a high aptitude for persistence, but most have something less than that. People are complacent and engineered to follow the paths of least resistance.

Goals and disappointment will sadly remain frenemies for all our days. Yes, there is no accurate measure or estimate of how many people attain some great thing and then are dispirited by reaching it. People have a broad imagination, and reality rarely compares to the marvelous possibilities conjured up in our mind.

There is a syndrome that accompanies meeting our goals. It can be a horrible, depressing, illness, detrimental to our mental health. The chase of a great object of our desire enthralls us, and so does the object itself — for a while. All strong emotions are related, and feelings of excitement can stimulate the opposite reaction of despair.

We are a “grass is always greener” species. The history of mankind tells a story of people with a wandering spirit never satisfied with whatever is in front of their noses. The reasonable brain tells us one thing, but the heart will always stir us to look around for more.

Financial goals are my least favorite topic. Money is not organic and has nothing to do with human origins and passions. Furthermore, it stymies internal growth, disconnects people from all that is natural and affirming, and drives countless people into the ground. The lust for money is the same as flirting with self-negation and substitutes institutional interests in place of human dreams.

Somewhere, a dread of finances abides in my unconscious Shadow. I may have that in common with a large chunk of the population. According to Carl Jung, the Shadow is part of the self we had rather not think about and definitely do not want to emulate. The thing is, we have to find the Shadow and incorporate it within our conscious mind in order to live in harmony with our dark side.

So many people reject their Shadow or never locate it thus allowing greed to run around unimpeded, and then every decent goal retreats and remains in hiding.

Goals, financial or otherwise, are narrow in focus and often self-centered. We get carried away with obsessions. The great stories of literature illustrate this with style and clarity, like Captain Ahab in Herman Melville’s Moby Dick. Besides, it is not advisable to arrive at a destination, because the next question is: “now what?”

It took a long while to begin to piece together some reasons behind my ongoing feud with goals. All my conclusions, to remind, came only after lots of teaching from others and as a result of my own meditations. I am using the word meditations rather loosely, dear reader.

I like the word patterns in the sense we should strive to establish patterns of thought that matches our behavior. A pattern is repeatable as many times as needed, forever. A pattern is never exactly the same. When I hear it, I think of things that we do instead of things that we want.

A pattern is more comprehensive and includes responses to unforeseen situations and bad luck. Life is a formidable opponent, and something always gets in the way of everything; some burden, malady, or unexpected intrigue act as barriers to a goal.

Life is not the enemy anyway, as it is just there as a constant. It is overstated but true: we are the greatest adversary we can face.

A pattern is amendable and establishes good habits that cofunction with your life purpose. It is a way to process the positive and negative things that are bound to occur in life. A pattern is the cohesive alignment of the head and the heart.

A goal can throw us off-track, violently swing our emotions from elation to despair, and cause negative coping mechanisms. With patterned thinking, we are never on or off track, because there is no track at all. We simply embody our true self amid the fair weather and the storms.

It is also accurate that we do not always consider the sacrifices inherent with any goal. We covet what other people have, like celebrity riches, and imagine ourselves living that lifestyle. Yet, life is like a weighted scale, and acquiring wealth, status, or anything of unusual value forces an imbalance somewhere else along the scale.

We do not see or consider what transformations must be invented, or what great sacrifices must be made, in order to claim fortunes of abundance. Entertainers and professional athletes face obstacles that most do not and frequently inhabit broken lives.

A pattern is no more than finding an authentic self and putting the values that reinforce our sincere longings to act as full, healthy human beings into practice. It means merging outward conduct with the inner picture of who we should be. A pattern, once solidified, will flow naturally from our values. People will notice and respect someone who is consistently singing in tune with a pattern of thoughts and behaviors.

As I am concerned, I figured out it takes a holistic view of myself, taking into account all that I am and that life throws at a person, to formulate a method of existing peacefully while, yes, working on self-defined goals.

So goals are not bad, but they are less perfect than efforts toward a pattern. Goals should not be taken off the good list of valuable tools. Also, I chose the word pattern because it makes sense in my mind. However, a different choice of words might be more relevant to you. My philosophy is to look at how similar things are, because I often find we are speaking about the same thing using different language.

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