Impossible Goals

It was many years ago, about a year after I finished college at good old Metro State, that I found myself far from home and far from myself. Perhaps not far from myself but certainly far from whom I thought I wanted to be. I was in a coffeehouse in Northwest Portland on a cool rainy day in February. At the time I was a suit and all I wanted to be was a Bohemian. The coffee tasted dark and burnt and afternoon rich.

I was not where I was supposed to be. I was supposed to be some miles off in one of three small towns southwest of Portland. I was still wearing my suit and tie at the time of this story. I was just in a quiet nook of the coffeehouse leaning over my notebook.

In my years working the “real” job, I learned a few things. I learned about budgeting my time and setting goals. These are skills that I think everyone should know, should employ and should perfect. Balancing my time, at least in this scenario meant that I needed to split my time between the long term tasks set against the small easily attainable parts. And the goals? Well, many of them were set for me. I had to perform or would not have work.

Needless to say, I did not like this job, I did not like the lifestyle. I did not like that my work took up so much of my time and all of my energy. As I said, I wanted to be a Bohemian and not a young executive.

When I did leave that world behind, nearly twenty years ago, I never looked back. I also never harbored a single regret about it either. And to be completely honest it took a great many years to put the part of my life into perspective and to gain an understanding of what I learned.

The most important thing I learned, I suppose, is to balance work load and overlay balance on goals. I also learned that there are goals, there are easily achieved goals, and this may feel good to cross off a list, but they do not advance self development.

Then there are the reasonable goals. These are goals that take persistence and patience when working. These are the sorts of goals that can be completed but they need attention. I think for me this blog is a great example of this sort of reasonable goal. I wanted to keep and maintain a blog at a once a week frequency. Not difficult to do, it just needs persistence.

Then there are the impossible goals. This is where I like to spend my time. For me, an impossible goal means something like I'll write half a million words in a single year. That comes to about 1,400 words each and every day for a year. I guess that does seem all that impossible, but just try it.

It may not have been 500,000 words this year, but I set my goals pretty high. I guess I've always figured that if I'm going to set myself to a task, it's best to work.