A more human view of designing our goals for a better life
Do you ever geek out on something? I mean—get really into it and naturally invest a lot of time going deeper? When you do, I suggest paying attention and making note. Oftentimes we may not think we know where we want to put focus and energy, but when we’re geeking out, it’s a clue. Perhaps that is obvious, but oftentimes we dismiss such things. There are more clues around what we are interested in and what we care about than we realize.
This past month on the podcast I featured two interviews with academics where I admittedly geeked out. These are two accomplished women whose work I admire and is work that has had a significant influence on me and my thinking around Sustainable Ambition. I was so honored that they both were willing to be in conversation with me to… geek out, for sure!
Why is their work of interest? Because they both speak about how we can shape our goals and ambitions in a way that is motivating to us personally, supports our well-being, and helps us craft the life we want. Essentially, how can we design and orchestrate our goals and ambitions for a better life?
Here’s a little bit about my two guests and a few of their insights:
Dr. Ayelet Fishbach is an award-winning psychologist who is an expert on motivation and decision making. A few of my favorite lessons from our conversation:
✨The idea of “losing our motivation” is one that Ayelet finds interesting. She would say that you never had motivation to lose; rather, you need to do something about it. See, we have more agency around our motivation than we realize, and we can design our goals in a way to motivate us and pull us toward what we want.
✨We can motivate ourselves by putting a lot on our plates, and we are overly optimistic about all we can do. Ayelet said around this, “You were too ambitious in order to motivate yourself. It's not really that important to do everything that you put on your plate. You were just trying to do a lot.” I love this insight! Yes, we wanted to do a lot, AND it’s okay to not do it all.
Dr. Valerie Tiberius is a professor of philosophy and her work explores the ways in which philosophy and psychology contribute to the study of well-being and virtue.
✨A favorite insight from this conversation: We can experience well-being by going after goals that are tied to our values, that fit us as individuals, and that fit together well and fit well over time. And, it pays to learn to better navigate conflict across our goals to reduce our frustration and increase fulfillment. One strategy around this is goal reinterpretation.
While I learned a lot from both of them, the number one thing I left the conversations thinking was that our goal pursuit and our fulfillment would benefit from being kinder to ourselves. There was a moment in each of the conversations where both of these researchers who study human behavior kind of chuckled. I took away that it’s helpful to remember that we are human and that at times we need to let ourselves off the hook. Like… that our natural behaviors lead us to over-commit. Or, that sometimes we just can’t change a part of ourselves. So, it’s helpful and perfectly fine to accept ourselves as we are. “That’s just me.” These two stellar academics were kind of saying, “Just don’t take yourself too seriously,” and “Don’t be so hard on yourself.”
I think these are worthy reminders as we step into this last quarter of the year—both that we can design our goals and ambitions for wellness and for our desired experience, AND we can go easier on ourselves and have a good chuckle about it along the way.
So as you look to this last quarter of the year:
What do you want to design for yourself? What do you want to pull yourself toward?
Where might you be experiencing conflict? Where can you resolve it perhaps by reinterpreting a goal to create more ease and fulfillment?
And remember to go easy on yourself, let it be okay to not do it all, and have a good laugh along the way.
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