When do we want it? Now!

(A-Z Challenge: N)

I came across this little gem recently and it’s been the little angel on my right shoulder for the past few days. What do I want this morning? To watch another episode of Girls and eat chocolate chips right out of the bag. Oh wait, that’s what I want right now. What I actually want is a serene bedroom space, which means my “right now” is better directed at finishing the closet cleaning project I started a week ago. 

For being a little angel, though, the Angel of Big Picture Goals is quite a whip-cracker. What I want most is to have a novel written, a clean house, a strong, toned body, great nutrition, great sleep, success at work, joyful leisure time and peaceful relationships. That’s just my top few on the list. Every micro-choice I make could affect one of those things. 

Sounds like a recipe for decision paralysis. I want all of these things that require both ambition and rest. Peace and grit. If I’m checking every impulse against a larger goal, that little angel is pretty easy to outsmart. My house is a disaster and it’s overwhelming, and I want sit on the couch reading all day. Hey, that supports my goal of joyful leisure time! So there, Angel! 

That’s where the discipline comes in. The discipline to know when I’m trying to pull one over on that angel. When I’m disguising procrastination or flat-out avoidance as “joyful leisure” or “great sleep.” 

It comes back to the whole concept of equilibrium and figuring out my priorities. Perhaps it helps to narrow down the goals on the “want” list to be shorter term and more actionable. What do I want? To have the kitchen bathroom clean before my parents come into town for my son’s birthday in a few days. If I weigh my choices for how to spend my morning, a vague “I want a clean house” goal means that no effort I make on that front is going to feel like enough because a) I can never get every nook & cranny clean and organized at once and b) a clean house never stays that way. But simply having the kitchen and bathroom clean before a specific date is totally do-able. I can plan for that, which means that I can enjoy a sense of accomplishment that I couldn’t enjoy if the goal was all perfectionist like “a clean house.”  


Do you use goals to motivate you toward bigger picture "wants"? What's your method?