Goal Disoriented

In the post-Christmas slump, we’re opening gifts from my sister in the certain knowledge they’ll be edible.

Due to a glut of gingerbread, the lebkuchen included in her parcel can wait for another day but we happily plunder the chocolate-covered biscuits.

We are in the middle of a game of “Rapidough” and my son is complaining because I am refusing to let him have “Jigsaw” when the card actually reads, “Jigsaw Piece”.

The tension is broken when he admits, with the grace that only springs from maturity, my attempt at fashioning a duck from the small piece of clay we have left is quite impressive.

“What are your goals for next year?” my daughter says, looking directly at me, a faint smile nudging at the corners of her mouth.

She knows I can’t stand the concept of New Year’s resolutions so I’m unsure if she is goading me or asking a genuine question.

“Hmm,” I think for a moment.

“My goal is to do a pull-up,” she says.

“Just one?”

“They’re really hard.”

It makes sense as a goal because she does spend an inordinate amount of time in the gym.

“What about you?” I ask my son’s girlfriend.

“Graduating and finally becoming a doctor,” she says, which seems like a reasonable aspiration.

My daughter laughs.

“Lena’s going to be a doctor and I want to do a pull-up.”

“I’d like to work a bit less,” I say, finally settling on what feels like a laudable target.

“Less?” my son says with incredulity and unnecessary gusto.

I refuse to take the bait whilst accepting his point. Our careers are very much on opposite trajectories as he steadily builds his reputation and experience while I essentially live off the reserves of mine.

“Believe it or not, I tend to find it quite hard to do nothing much and just relax. It’s easiest for me to work and I’d quite like to change that as I get older.”

Although it’s a realisation that has been simmering in the background for a while it’s the first time I have heard myself articulate it so clearly.

It came into sharper focus this week when I happened upon a radio programme called “The New Gurus” and, more specifically, an episode about people who promise to help us toward ever greater levels of productivity.

I found just listening to it exhausting and needed to have a rest.

I often seem to feel guilty doing nothing but, as my supervisor pointed out to me recently, “resting is not doing nothing.”

The more I have thought about it the more I have distilled the problem into one that is really about motivation.

It isn’t that I don’t want to work or even that I have particular trouble resting but rather that I avoid starting projects where the ending is not in sight.

It feels overwhelming not knowing how long something will take, whether I will have the skills for it, or that I might lose interest in the middle when it’s too late to turn back.

So I defer to doing what I already know, what is clearly defined, and where my time investment is not open-ended.

“Actually,” I announce, “I’ve changed my mind about my goal for next year.”

Everyone looks at me.

“You know the space that exists between doing a single pull-up and training for umpteen years to become a doctor? Well, I want to do something that fits in there.”