When I was teaching, one of my favorite courses was on Systems Analysis. One of the discussions we would frequently have was setting goals for a given project. We talked a lot about setting specific and measurable objectives and mapping those to measures and milestones. The goal, however, was where I would really challenge the way people were thinking. I would ask the question, What is a goal? I got a lot of responses on this. Many of which you would expect.
A goal is something that you want to achieve. A goal is something that you want. A goal is something that you can measure and know when you get there. A goal is where you want to go. I am sure you could probably think of what your definition of a goal might be.
However, I think a goal is something that we usually do not attribute to the definition. A goal should be motivating. A goal should be inspiring and more importantly, a goal should be IMPOSSIBLE.
In fact, a goal is only really motivating when it is impossible. Think on this for a minute. Pick any of the major world religions. Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam – does not matter. They all have many faithful adherents and have been around for centuries. Yet, they all have a faith system that asks the faithful to believe in an impossible goal. An impossible destination, a place or condition that you cannot really get to on your own (very easily) and that requires that you get some sort of divine assistance to get there. Yet the goal remains very powerful, very motivating, and absolutely impossible.
The unobtainable as it seems is so alluring to us humans that we must seek after it. When we create goals that are possible, we ignore them. When we create impossible goals we chase them passionately. My goal to lose 10 pounds is well, meh. My goal to look great naked – now that is impossible – but super inspiring!!! The problem with diet programs is that they are selling obtainable goals. Change the goal to something completely out of your reach and suddenly you will have thousands of people flocking to your clinics to try your new fad. The South Beach diet – case and point.
You have no doubt created thousands of goals, all obtainable, and all sitting in your graveyard of coulda woulda. Create yourself an impossible goal and watch yourself suddenly strive to make it happen. The wonderful thing about you is that you might be the one that just might make the impossible possible!
So think of what your impossible is going to be. The cool impossible. What can you not do? What do you think is just impossible. Set that as your focus and watch what happens to your motivation.
Guy Reams
