Unsure about your goals? start here
It’s January, which means everyone and their mom is talking about one thing – goals.
Goals, resolutions, intentions. Whatever you choose to call them, they can be straight up terrifying if you aren’t sure where you want to go. And all those people saying “You’ve got to get clear on your goals!” are only making it worse. How are you supposed to magically get clear on your goals when you feel so unsure of everything? It’s like that scene in friends where they ask Pheobe if she has a life plan and she says, “I don’t even have a pla”.
So how do you find clarity on your goals? How do you even know what goal to set when you have no clue what direction to take your life in?
I feel you, seriously. There have been so many times in my life, finding myself once again wondering, “where do I go now?”. When I dropped out of University for lack of money and found myself living at home again with no job or plan, or when I realized the career I had been working on for years wouldn’t fit with my long term life goals, or pretty much a million other times in my life I’ve felt lost at sea. Seriously, I’ve not had a plan more than I have had one.
The truth is, finding your goals is a process. All those You Tubers who make it sound like a 20 minutes exercise and BAM you’ve got a life plan, obviously don’t understand feeling lost. The truth is, it’s harder than just creating a vision board or spending 10 minutes brainstorming. These are the ways I’ve slowly, but surely, found clarity when I felt completely lost on what to do next.
EXPLORE
The world is your freaking oyster. You can do anything, but you can’t do everything. Throw in a few more cliches that are way overused but are good nuggets of truth. It’s all true, but sometimes the vast array of choices makes it even harder. Personally, I wish I had about ten lives so I could do all the totally different things I dream of.
Sit down and write out any and everything that interests you. Even crazy things, get them all out of your head. Then take time and work through the list, research each idea as if you’re really going to pursue it. This can and should take more than just an afternoon. Fully flush out each idea until you know whether it’s a real possibility or if it doesn’t make sense you right now.
When I realized working as a full time stylist wasn’t going to fit with my long term dreams of working remotely, and having flexibility with where I live, I started researching new options. One of my top ideas was to become a registered nutritionist dietician. I spend a few weeks researching the ins and outs, the requirements, what schools I could potentially go to, and lurking reddit boards of RND’s to learn the goods and bads. In the end I decided it wasn’t going to fit with my big life goals and had to let that idea go (at least for now), but I can now look back and feel good that I really spent the time to rule it out and can sleep well knowing I made the right decision.
Sometimes a big part of figuring out what to do is figuring out what not to do. So don’t get down when you rule something out. No matter how crazy your ideas might be, give them the due diligence of exploring them seriously. Try not to hold those ideas too closely, but be willing to let them go when you see red flags. Maybe you’ll find that one of those “crazy ideas” is actually the perfect path for you!
EXPERIMENT
As adults we often don’t let ourselves just experiment and try new things out without the pressure to make it our life’s work, but often times it’s the experimenting that can teach us more than anything. When I left college I had no idea what to do. I realized I was really interested in event planning, so I emailed all of the event planners I could find contact information for in the Philly area, and one responded. I took an unpaid internship and drove over an hour each way to work for her, all while also working a crappy retail job as much as I could to make money. Even though I eventually decided that planning weddings wasn’t for me, I don’t regret it for a second. I learned so much from that internship, most of all, what a kick-ass business woman looks like.
You don’t have to take an unpaid internship to experiment. Try taking classes in things that interest you, or go to meet ups, ask someone in the field if you can shadow them for a day, or just learn from online tutorials. Try to let go of the pressure that this thing will be your ultimate goal and just let yourself try something new. It’s . that experimenting that can teach us the most about ourselves.
REMEMBER, IT’S OKAY
Seriously, it’s okay. I know, you don’t believe me. I know that because I never would have believed me. I still sometimes mentally beat myself up for not making the Forbes 30 under 30 list (although I do technically had a few months left for that one, but I have a feeling it’s just not going to happen).
Not where you thought’d you’d be at this point in your life? Forget it. Seriously. You won’t get anywhere if all you’re doing is focusing on what you haven’t done. Practice some self love, take a deep breath, and girl, believe in yourself.
I have spent too much of my own life beating myself up for not being where I want to be, and wasting that energy has never helped me. The only times I’ve truly reached my goals are when I let go of what was behind me and just started focusing on what was ahead of me. Last year I started practicing meditation and it’s really helped me to learn to live more in the moment. Let the shit go and move on, that’s my mantra.
In the end the best advice I can give you is to just invest more time in yourself. You won’t figure out your life calling by over-stressing yourself and obsessing over it every day (believe me, I’ve tried). Work on understand and developing yourself and you’ll start to see your path more clearly!
