In the business world (allegedly) being goal-oriented is a good thing. It means people can motivate you, and it (allegedly) means that you're more likely to get things done than someone who isn't particularly goal-oriented. As someone who's fallen into this category most of my life, I would like to submit that it is not always especially helpful.
For one thing, being goal-oriented becomes a problem when you leave school. Up until this point, goals are literally spelled out for you. Learn the subjects. Get good grades. Graduate. Go to college. Get good grades. Graduate. After that, the next step is meant to be "Get a job," or "Find your passion," but somehow that goal has become less of a clear path and more of an unknown, bramble-covered trail that's fallen into disuse behind a broken down silo somewhere. When a goal-oriented person finds themselves goal-less, it can be disheartening. One question lights up the front of your mind with horrible neon: "WHAT DO I DO NOW?"
Some goal chasers pick new goals - either with real purpose, or seemingly at random. As for me, I feel reluctant to pursue anything without genuinely liking it, wanting it, yearning for it. So attached have I become to goals that not having one kills my motor almost immediately.
Goal-oriented people can often be reward-oriented, too. Once again, not a problem if that person has goal after goal followed by reward after reward - but what happens if they fail? How many times will they try again before they go after a goal that doesn't require them to push so hard? Three? Ten? Or just one? When the only thing you want is success, life stops being a journey with side trips, pit stops and quirky attractions and turns into chasing carrot after carrot until you stop doing anything difficult at all and just coast down the highway of least resistance.
Another place goal-obsession can become an issue is in personal relationships. How many serial monogamists have you known? They chase someone for weeks, date them for a few months, get bored, and chasing someone else. Then they date them for a few months - until they get bored. And find someone else. And get bored.
Are you seeing the pattern?
There's nothing wrong with realizing you're not into someone and looking for someone new, but I tend to think that relationships require work, compromise, and trying to find solutions to mutual problems. If you bail as soon as it stops being interesting, you're probably not that into the person. You're into getting them. They aren't a love interest, they're a goal, and as soon as you've achieved that goal you want a new one.
So yes. Being goal-oriented can be extremely useful sometimes. "I want to learn how to play guitar, so I will practice every day until I can play Stairway to Heaven," is a useful goal that will likely yield results. But applying it to every part of life closes people off from experiences they may've enjoyed or grown from.
What do you think? Is being goal-oriented always a good thing? Or mixed? Or entirely awful?
I agree. Being goal-oriented is a hugely mixed blessing. For one, school works. It makes sense and you know what you have to do. It's making that next leap that has seemed to trip me up as well. I graduated from undergrad going on 3 years ago and I'm still amazingly frustrated as to what I'm doing. I worked retail. I sat around doing nothing. I'm now taking some classes once again and at least that gives me a sense of purpose - a goal. I'm just about to the point where I'm gonna pick a track - anything that will lend me stability and (hopefully) some amount of fulfillment. I like clarity. I like goals. But it's a hell of a lot more difficult when it's not set in stone for you any more. I'll figure it out sometime in the next 100 years. Maybe. Until then, there's chocolate, friends, family, music, movies, the internet, and hope. I'll hold onto those whilst I flail about in the real world.
ReplyDeleteI have no idea if I am goal oriented or not. I did enjoy school for that particular reason that where you're going is spelled out for you. I have never really been passionate about anything.. no band, game, person, pet, toy, movie, book.. nada. On the one hand this might been seen as sad, that I am missing out, but on the other hand it lets me pick a much wider variety of things that I find vaguely interesting.
ReplyDeleteThere is a brilliant strip by XKCD which states "My world does not revolve around you. I do not live to see you smile. But you are quirky and funny and interesting and unlike any other person I've ever met. I want to give you EVERYTHING, just to see what you would DO with it" which is pretty much exactly how I feel about my husband and pretty much how I see any successful relationship. Including the one currently growing in my tummy (yeah I'm having a baby, not an alien). I don't particularly want this child for my own sake. As cold as it sounds, I could take or leave having offspring. But I AM looking forward to introducing this new life to all that is awesome and wonderful and interesting about this rock we live on. I don't want to have the child for MY sake, but for his or her own sake.
Thank you.
I realise I veered off the goal bit quite early there. But on the other hand, maybe not.
DeleteI love that strip! It's very cool. Side note: glad you're not having an alien. Good luck with your son or daughter!
DeleteI think it's important to learn to be happy with what you have and where you are in life. Chasing carrots will only lead to dissatisfaction.
ReplyDeleteHOWEVER, in order to achieve anything, it's extremely helpful to make goals. Personally, I pursue so many different interests that in order for me to improve at any of them, I have to break them down into achievable and comprehensible goals.
As you said, the best way to operate is to have a happy balance of goal-oriented and "just because" activities.
Yes I agree it's kind of a mix between good and bad (after school situation). It can help you to set goals to keep yourself going, but if these goals have a dead end you'll be stuck. But again this should be (or so I'm told) for us to experiment and find what we are passionate about. So making goals and accomplishing something can be a great thing instead of being someone who doesn't make goals and floats in life till something comes up.
ReplyDeleteKind of on the same boat right now and hope we all figure it out soon...
Hope that helps?
Best of luck.
I don't know how to just be. Or, at least, I'm uncomfortable in the state. I've found this to be problematic in social situations. Goal orientation is a blessing and a curse, but it is my life.
ReplyDeleteI have to say that I am very goal oriented. If I don't have anything to work towards, I just laze about like a blob and don't get anything done.
ReplyDeleteBut I can see what you mean about it being less useful post-education. Right now I'm about to graduate high school so I'm still in the thick of it and haven't experienced non-structured goals yet. But I still think I could make it work. I do all sizes of goals, from graduate university without debt to clean the top of my desk, so even if I don't achieve the big ones, the small ones are still around to keep me content.
Up until the 12th grade I never had any problems in school. I knew what I had to do and that each small goal would get me one step closer to the next one and therefore I just did it. I was a very good student and was determined to get into a great university. And so I did.
ReplyDeleteThe problem was that I didn't know what to do after that. Choosing a degree is not something someone else can do for me and there's not a right way to do it.
So I chose what seemed the most rational option (mathematics, not that it really matters). After that I could no longer see an exciting future for myself so I lost my main goal and reason as to why I was studying so hard. Obviously, without a clear goal, my grades started going down, which only made everything worse.
Conclusion: After some rough months, I learned the hard way that sometimes (mainly in the big decisions) I have to go with my heart and don't choose what seems the most rational and safe option. Now I'm excited about my future again and it feels like a weight got lifted from my chest!
Well, goodbye now! And I hope you find a new meaningful goal. Good luck! ;)
What did you end up choosing for university? I have thought about math/physics/engineering because I do find them interesting but I'm worried I'll get bored.
DeleteRight now I think I have made up my mind and if all goes well next year I will be studying cinema (producing, directing, photography, etc) :)
DeleteI still have to keep studying mathematics until the end of the year but at least I have something to look forward to. I do really like maths but without other interesting things in my life I got really bored...
If you can see yourself enjoying a job in any of those fields then I say sure, go for that! However, if not, I would advise you to think carefully about what your priorities are: a stable job or one that you're passionate about... and then make your choice. ;)
Well, there's nothing I can think of in the world that is entirely good, or entirely bad.
ReplyDeleteWhen you say "When a goal-oriented person finds themselves goal-less, it can be disheartening." it hit home really hard for me, I would go as far as to describe myself as a "go-getter" but I graduated college about a year ago and still have that fire under me, I just don't know what I want to go and get.
The problem for me is that I just end up shooting at every direction, jonesing for the planning and the anticipation of achieving a goal, any goal.
So yeah, now that I'm goal-less I find myself thinking, constantly, What do I do now?
I guess one thing we all need to know that the world isn't black or white. Nothing is just good, so always wanting to achieve a goal is not managable. On the other hand, as a person the excact opposite of you, I couldn't even bring myself to achieve something if my life was threatened and sometimes I even wished I could just give up everything, that is hard too. At least you know that you can get where you want, while I feel like not only fighting extern obstacles, but intern problems at the same time, my motivation is so not willingly to listen to my brains.
ReplyDeleteSo while you need to learn when something shouldn't be seen as a goal, I need to start seeing somthings as rewarding and good, instead of just a kind of torture method.
It's just like little kids. Structure is good. When expectations and boundaries are clear, life is peachy. Take that away and it's all quite scary. So, people find structure in the chase. It's easy and predictable and little-to-no work.
ReplyDeleteGoal-oriented is good, when you have goals; dangerous when you don't. I suppose if you can make the journey your goal - more abstract, less concrete - some of that stress could be alleviated.
The "problem" with goals is that in the 21st century there's an enormous pressure on people to have goals, therefore if they don't have any people tend to feel guilty/feel like they're missing out/feel like they're losers. I guess it's also because people spend too much time watching movies with happy endings and successful lives, or people spend too much time lurking at their friends' perfect lives on Facebook. And admitting one doesn't have a goal or doesn't know what they want to do with their life has become socially inacceptable.
ReplyDeleteBut you know what? It's ok to not know where you want to be in 5 years time. Or in 10. It's ok to just have a vague idea and just go with your gut feeling when opportunities arise. It's ok to take a break, because what are we racing for anyway? Why can't we just slow down to enjoy life and the passing of time?
I turned 30 a few months ago, I have no idea where I want be in 5 years time and I couldn't be any happier. Sure, in my twenties I decided on some vague direction I wanted to pursue after graduating and I did make some important decisions at various crossroads, but they were based on new opportunities and on what felt right at the time, not a precise action plan. Do I regret anything? No. Do I wish I had spent more time charting my course? No. Why do people forget about spontaneity, about grabbing new chances when they arise? That's what "seize the day" means, not planning every single day of your life until its end.
One decision I did make and which helped me a lot was moving from London to Shanghai (with no plan, apart from a 3 months language course just to be able to get a visa and see if I liked the place, then I ended up staying there for over a year before moving to another unplanned city and spending another year there. btw, I'm not even from London or from the UK, it's just where I was working at the time.). Now I work in the Middle East but if someone had told me that 4 years ago I wouldn't have believed them. In fact I clearly remember writing on my blog years ago that I wasn't interested in working in this part of the world, yet now I absolutely love it. What I love is how in these countries people are not necessarily that goal-oriented, they manage to enjoy life even without knowing what the next day will bring to them. Which is why I think "goals" are really a western concept, something cultural rather than completely necessary to our lives. And to be fair, in the big picture, on the scale of the universe, do our goals matter that much? Who do we think we are to think our goals are so important?
tl;dr: Enjoy life and don't let modern Society put pressure on you. Also, see the world as a whole instead of just watching western trends, because there are other ways of living your life, despite what we've been told all our lives as we grew up. Goals are mostly about nurture, not nature.
Oh and one last thing, have faith in serendipity to make your life more interesting.
DeleteI think Goals are a good thing. They help you keep track on what you want in life, its like a little checklist. But of course too much of a good thing can turn bad too. If all a person cares about is their 'goals' in life, it becomes an obsession, which in turn becomes a hinder to life rather than a booster to accomplish something. When a goal is achieved, its the end. We find another goal and the cycle repeats. How boring. But if we divert our focus from the "goal" to the "process" of achieving it, things get more interesting. Be it relationships or work, the element of surprise often lies in the process of learning/understanding a particular thing/person. Just imagine! Its better to enjoy the scenery (and discover new places) at a systematic pace than to rush blindly towards a certain destination
ReplyDelete