SISTER WISDOM

Part 3 of the series: The Get-Your-Life-Together Plan

Having 3 kids under 3 forces you into being a simplicity guru. It’s not a matter of preference but survival. As I burp my one-month-old and browse for writing jobs with my free hand, I realize something that is, for me, profound: having too many goals is just as deadly as having no goals at all.

Goals should bring freedom.

In order to make progress, you must define and limit your goals. Your goals should free you to pursue what matters and to happily ignore what doesn’t. That will only happen as you consciously decide what matters right now and what can (or must) be ignored.  If you want to be successful in modern homemaking, mothering, working, entrepreneur-ing (how’s that for coining a word?), then you have to limit your efforts in order to succeed.

We have an unfinished basement, some major landscaping needs in the backyard, and about 4 rooms that really need to be repainted in our home. I would prefer to get all those projects completed, but neither my time nor my money allows it. My time is spent caring for our children and for myself, writing, and keeping the household afloat. My money may one day be in excess to simply hire someone to do the things I don’t have time for, but that day has not yet come. In the meantime, repainting my bedroom would be nice, but it’s not important. If I have a free afternoon one weekend, I might tackle it; but I’m not going to interrupt the important day-to-day stuff just to change wall colors.

Now. Fast forward ten years or so in my life and things might be different. Our kids will be older, in school, much more independent. I will have either reached some major milestones in my writing, enabling me to slow down, or put it aside, or switched to a different business focus. I might want to entertain more, have more overnight guests, spend more time with friends and family in our home. Painting, redecorating, landscaping, finishing house projects might become more important as other things become less important.

You can only pursue a few goals at a time.

Well, that’s not entirely true. You can pursue lots of goals at once, but you won’t make much progress on any of them. I am always seeking to become a better person and build a better life; however, I can’t conquer every area at once. If I set goals to run 3 miles a day, read a book a week, cook gourmet meals for dinner, and spend time playing with my kids, something must collapse. (It will probably be me.) Priorities. I simply cannot spend all the time required on all those personal goals and still have time to sleep at night. I must choose one.

Do you understand your work?

Work encompasses more than you think. It’s not just your 9-to-5 or your freelance career or your side business. Life is work; this is not a bad thing, and the sooner you realize how much work is involved in life, the sooner you can start building more efficiency and enjoyment into it. Sort your areas of work out, but don’t get complicated. 4 or 5 at the most. Here are mine:

1. Personal
2. Household
3. Business
4. Community

Those are mine, and those are their order of priority in my life. Yes, I put “me first.” More on that in another post.

Overlook these at your peril.

Treating one area of your work (a.k.a. your life) as unimportant leads to problems in all areas. You are only one person. You cannot ignore your personal needs and still function well on business matters. The creativity and intelligence you nurture by taking care of yourself are what make you able to be great at your business. This concept flows from all areas. There is no real division; we categorize only for the sake of identifying problems and solutions.

Separate the infinite from the finite.

A to-do list is infinite; your current goals should be finite, reachable, measurable. The ideas and visions you have for your life are infinite; your time is finite. Once you’ve sorted out your areas of work, set one specific, current goal for each. These are your working goals. You must choose to quit being manipulated by a never-ending list and start making real progress toward a few goals.

As you progress toward your working goals, you build habits. Once you reach your goals and set new ones, those habits you established can remain. Some, of course, may end with the accomplishment. But many will have become positive habits that can remain in your life, even if they are modified or downsized to accomodate your new working goals. Your decision to limit your working goals to only a few ends up having a positive, cumulative effect on the quality of your life. The more goals you reach, the more good habits you have established.

You will reach more goals by limiting your efforts and focusing your diligence.