GOALING 101-(The Rippling Effect)

Fellow growers, God is good. I have rediscovered my discipline and commitment. There are literally tears of joy in my eyes… It’s taken me so long!!! T.T don’t give up people!!!! You can do it too. Before I lose you let me give you the run down on what happened. For those of you who haven’t read my previous post, I finally got back on the exercise wagon. After a year of thrashing around on the ground like an overturned turtle. (It was NOT CUTE AT ALL!!!)

To be honest I feel like a new me. It’s interesting how when one area of your life is going well, (i.e., you are not slacking off anymore and are actually making progress) It tends to ripple down into other areas of your life as well and you begin to feel the same optimism about other stuff. The progress bug is infectious .

Allow me to elaborate on this. I finally (at the start on this year) got round to saving up for something I’ve been wanting for a long time now. For a bunch of reasons it couldn’t materialize last year, so it’s really more like a left over goal from last year than a new years resolution for this year. But I digress. I estimate(d) that it would take me 7 weeks to complete and as a result I created, in my psyche a 7 week deadline in which to accomplish this task. But then, being the active grower than I am, the goal felt a little empty. This is because all I’d have to do is just consistently put way a set amount of cash every week for the time period and I would get what I wanted. That was it.

There would be no further growth on my part other than the acquisition of another material possession (because I’ll admit, it’s a material desire I’m fulfilling here. And let me just say to this, that there is nothing wrong with wanting a material thing and going after it every once in a while. It’s the little gratification things that keep us motivated in life and there is nothing wrong with indulging yourself here and there if it makes you want to keep working towards something. just don’t over do it )

And all this got me thinking. It would feel even better if I accomplished something else more… wholesome by the end of this time period. Or at the very least be well on my way to it, by the time 7 weeks were up. Or alternatively I could choose to try something out for that period of time and see how it works. And that fellow growers is how I revived my enthusiasm and commitment towards exercise. I said in my last blog that I’ve found a routine I’m actually sticking to and this is how I got myself to commit. (And it’s a really good routine by the way. I’m already seeing results and it’s been just a little over two weeks)

You see, every time I put something away into my savings I think, “Keep this up for just 7 weeks (because 7 weeks is really a shot time if you think about it. It’s only a month and a half) and see what body you have. If you are already looking good at 2 weeks, I can’t wait to see what comes out at the end of 7”.

Literally, that’s what say to myself, and I shock myself with the kind of fire this ‘thought’ sets in my belly every time. And even on those days I don’t want to get up, this is enough to get me moving. So you see, one totally unrelated goal is literally, forcefully pulling up a totally different goal, just by virtue of the fact that is working. I think there is a law in physics that kind of works like this….centrifuge? … Momentum? … I forget which one, but I hope you understand what I’m trying to say here.

Anyhow, other things/ goals have been roped into this 7 week deadline frenzy as I can’t help thinking up how many other things l would like to have accomplished in this same time frame. I’ve added to the list my project, and blogging. But because these two are more long term I intend to only use this 7 week thing as fuel to get the engine started. After that I plan to use blogging and my project to motivate each other. I’m already pretty optimistic. I mean, thanks to this drive I’ve blogged consistently all week.

Though I won’t neglect to give credit where it’s due. I’m a lazy person, so many times the spirit is JUST NOT in me. And the thing for me to do is pray about it. Believe me it works. I’m telling you, it’s like the lubricant to the joints of a creak prone machine. It’s the varnish that smooths things over. I have NO DOUBT that the reason things have been flowing so smoothly for me even as I work on them is because I’ve literally committed everything to God. SO whenever things come up that would throw me off and unexpected developments occur, it always works out. It’s beyond me. And it definitely NOT luck.

Because God answers prayers and he is always looking out for me. Which puts me at an advantage really because he has a birds eye view of everything and he can see all the curves. He probably send some of them himself. But because he’s got my back, I know I’ll be okay.  He’ll never send anything my way that I can’t handle and he’ll never abandon me. It’s really comforting to know. The perfect safety net. It’s really the icing on the cake that is life.

So if you are having trouble with super long term goals, just give yourself mid-sized time goals and pair them up with other small goals so that they motivate each other. What helps me get to the super long term target, is the shorter goals I set in between to get me form milestone to milestone as I make my way. In this case I have grouped my saving with this exercise effort, because I can use the progress in one as a standard or yardstick for the other.

I’ll be keeping you posted. Why don’t you try it out too? J