Achieve or Die!

I’ve never been good at keeping my New Year resolutions, Lent I’m not so bad at, but resolutions leave me feeling pressured and anxious and guilty if I don’t achieve the goals I set for myself.  How unbelievably naive is it to set yourself goals you are unlikely to achieve without flipping your whole life around?  It’s masochistic, I tell ye.  I know this, yet I still do it.  Like, I need a reason, a deadline, to achieve something.  Weird.

Sure, it’s easy to go online and find a voucher for skydiving or swimming with dolphins, but then that’s not good enough.  When it’s too easy, I want to make it harder; like, I need to skydive in New Zealand, or it doesn’t count unless it’s swimming with dolphins in the Red Sea. That’s why all my goals are impossible – because I make them impossible.  Ain’t nobody stopping me but me.

I think singing in the shower is going to lead to a Grammy and I’m just SO DAMN GOOD that I don’t need a band and pub gigs and managers and Youtube channels and 25,000,000 Facebook followers and a deal with Disney. Honestly it’s hard to know whether I need the goal to survive or just the daydreaming.

So, for the next little while, I’m going to try taking baby steps in the egg and spoon race to the finish line.

Last year, I flipped my lid trying to force a new career path.  I’d apply for job after job and got nowhere.  It was so disheartening, until I changed my tactics and actually *did the right thing* and enrolled in a course that got me a specific software certificate that would help (go me!), then I started other courses to build up my subject knowledge.  Sure it takes longer to finish the race, but at least I did it knowing I’ve achieved something rather than having blagged it through sheer luck and force.

From now on, here are the basic rules I’m going to live by or, at least, try to remember:

1.  Only try to achieve in areas I actually care about.  Forcing myself to do things I don’t care about only makes me feel like I’m either stupid or have a major attention problem – neither of which is true.

2.   Dress for the occasion.  It makes me feel capable and confident.  Before long I’ll be so naturally confident I could kick corporate butt in my pyjamas if I wanted to.

3.   Plan and *write down* the baby steps I need to take.  Tick them off as I go.

4.   Seek advice and encouragement from friends in the know, without embarrassment.

5.   Be proud of my accomplishments, no matter how small they are – whether it’s making a batch of cookies, getting my make-up just right or designing a new building for the Parisian CBD.

6.   Reward myself as I go, like a puppy in training.  New dress?  Sure – after 5 baby tasks completed. Double win!

7.   Didn’t quite manage that task on time?  Don’t worry, have a bath and a girly night in and I’ll try again when I’m ready. Comfort myself.

I tells ya, I’m looking forward to the self-motivating, self-comforting, self-sufficient me.