How Setting Clear Goals Helps to Reboot and Upgrade your Lifestyle
We all go through multiple stressful periods in our lives. Dozens of things are yet to be done, and many deadlines on our calendars are chasing us like tigers on a hunt. We want to achieve resolutions, but more often end up with excuses and lousy executions. How can we escape from this lifestyle and reboot our life? Here are some tips we can utilize from the flow experience.
In the last article we talked about the 9 components of flow experience, and we will introduce the first component, clear goals, to explain how it can be exploited in our daily life.
Choose an activity you want to engage in/are engaging in
First of all, choose an activity you want to engage in or already engaging with. It can be reading, writing, running, swimming, doing yoga, working out in the gym or playing a sport. Whatever activity you choose, incorporate it in your daily life. Make it a habit, something you do for a certain frequency. For example, everyday spend at least 30 minutes reading a book, or running at least 3 times a week. But how do we decide the frequency? That is what clear goal setting is about and we need to take the following steps:
Take the map, and prepare for the activity.
In order to set clear goals, we need to do some preparation for the activity. Just like we want to travel to some scenic spots, we will find a map like an adventurer to know where the place is (X marks the spot). Besides, we may look up some books to inform us about the place. Likewise, we need to get some knowledge about the activity we plan to take part in frequently. Take running for example, before we run we can depict a picture of what different running types are like in our mind. Running 3 km, 5 km, 30 minutes, 10 km, 21 km (half-marathon), or 42.195 km (marathon). These are all different experiences you will get during the journey. You will take the preparation, such as time, physical strength and mindset, according to the type of activity you pick. After the preparation period comes, the deciding point. What will you decide to engage with?
Decide the ways of the journey.
We often take an airplane to a remote country or city, not having many options. But when we arrive, we can choose many ways to get to the scenic spot. We can take a bus or train, we can drive a car by ourselves, or even ride a bicycle or walk to the place. That is what I call the different ways of the journey. Thus, it is time you made a decision. Whether it be 3km, 5km or 30 minutes you decide to take, what matters is that you leave the seat and move on. After a start-up, you begin your journey that you have dedicated to.
Promise a dedication you can make, and make it.
To reach the destination, we need to promise ourselves to the dedication and make it happen. “We can make” is very important. We often fail in the wishes because we set a difficult goal and promise a dedication we cannot make. The reason for this is due to the two steps mentioned above — -we didn’t prepare well and make an affordable decision. Now we know how to correct it and promise an attainable dedication. If you think running every day for 30 minutes is unrealistic. Good! You can adjust it to 3 days a week and trust me, when you fulfill it and find it so enjoyable, you will try to do it 4 to 5 days a week, and even every day in a week spontaneously. To that point, I will say congrats to you because you are on the brink of reaching the flow experience.
How do we set clear goals and use it to reboot and upgrade your life? We prepare first, know the goals, decide to dedicate and keep it. The secret is to start from little but with a clear plan to attain the goal. A good saying is always in my mind: “Baby steps to giant strides.”
