Bringing your goals to life

How to get your goals front and centre - and keep them there.

It sounds cliched, but most of us have done some form of goal planning in our lives with varying degrees of success. Be it a bleary eyed January 1st new year’s resolution or something we truly desire but haven’t quite planned properly. We end up promising the world only to deliver an atlas.

Often when i meet a client for the first time i’ll ask them what they want from therapy - “their goal” if you like. I hear things like “i want to cut down on my drinking”, “i want my depression and anxiety to just go away”, “I just want to be happy”. Fair enough, most people want to feel better, who doesn’t?

The commonality here seems to be the outcome - to ‘stop’ a certain behaviour, which is fine, but then what? And what about the journey or ‘vehicle’ to get you to the outcome? What does that look like and what’s the plan?

My response to many of these outcome based goals is usually a thought provoking “and?” which is often met with a look of puzzlement or maybe a prickly “and what? what else is there?”. 

Russ Harris, in his Acceptance Commitment Therapy manual, Act Made Simple (v2) talks about the difference between ‘a dead mans goals’ vs ‘a living man’s goals’. (That should probably be ‘person’ not ‘man’, but you get the drift!)

Harris points out that’s it’s as simple (and brutal) as this: if a dead person can do your goal better than you, it’s not a goal that’s reaching its potential. Sure, goals that have achievements like meeting a new partner, no longer feeling depressed are great goals to have. 

But consider this: 

A dead person can stop drinking. 

A living person can stop drinking, and take up a hobby with the money they save, their improved health and their newfound time.

A dead person can stop lying. 

A living person can stop lying, and start being more truthful to themselves and make amends to those they’ve hurt with their lies.

A dead person can stop smoking.

A living person can gradually cut down their smoking at a pace that suits them, notice their health improving the less they smoke, and experience the journey of such an achievement.

A dead person can stop doing destructive things to their family. 

A living person can stop the destructive behaviour, begin to recognise what their family means to them, and work on gaining back their trust.

A dead person can stop hating themselves.

A living person can stop hating themselves, and start living in ways that demonstrate self compassion, love and self care.

If you can act on your goal in a way a dead person can’t - then now we’re talking. That’s not to say ‘dead persons’ goals aren’t useful, of course many of them are a terrific start - it just means we can do more with the goals, and are more likely to stick at achieving them if they’ve got some meaningful, values based action attached to them.

If you’d like to learn more about Acceptance Commitment Therapy and how it can help you, please get in touch on 0409 547 872 or email me at tim@timnolancounselling.com.au