GOOOOOOOAAAAAAAL!

Have your goals lost their lustre?

Were you a lot more passionate about them when you first wrote them down?

Are your goals simply objectives that you should/could want but cannot seem to find the motivation or time to get around to completing?

It’s Time for a 360° Review on Your Goals. 

We all know about creating SMART Goals (specific, measurable, actionable, realistic, and thrilling.) But what about adding these elements to your goals as well:

• Feelings of Achievement – how would it feel to achieve it? Try to bathe in this feeling for 5 minutes.  Let your imagination run wild and really feel it.
• Consequences of Not Achieving – how bad would it feel not to achieve it? Again, stay here for 5 minutes.  Bathe in the disgust, regret, and anxiety produced if you stopped short of achieving your goals.
• Quantity- Do you have too many goals? More “shoulds/coulds/like to’s” than real, stretching, passion inducing goals?
• Reminders – How often do you see, reflect upon, or remind yourself of your goals?

The bottom line:

Do you really, really, really want to achieve your goals?

If not, it’s time to find you some new ones.  Let’s do some Goal Replacement Surgery.

5:10 AM - close enough to 1:30, right? Early.

Is there anything really meaningful that you would stay up for until 1:30 am?

Something so cool that it taps into vast uncharted energy reservoirs hidden deep inside of you that you didn’t even know you had? 

Passion for a movement, idea, or activity that is inspiring enough to keep you going even when your body wants to hit ”shut down?”  

I get up at 6 am every day so that I can read. As a result, it takes an awful lot to keep me up past midnight. Last night, I couldn’t help myself… I found myself unable to sleep because I was so excited about the idea I was working on.

When was the last time that passion for something really meaningful kept you up until 1:30? What were you doing?

And no… watching television, a movie, surfing Facebook, and/or getting drunk is not what I mean by passion.

Not exactly Vancouver but a gravel road none the less.

I go to a downtown gym on the 2nd floor of a high rise building. The cardio equipment is right up against large windows so that you can see a busy street below. Currently, the entire street and sidewalk are torn up as work is being done. As a result, the sidewalks are gravel – not smooth, level, well packed gravel, however.  We’re talking uneven, inconsistent, unpredictable patches of gravel, dirt, construction materials… you name it!

It’s like walking in a minefield. However, the ‘mine’ is not a bomb… it is the embarrassment factor that could be caused if someone were to trip, fall, or look awkward.

Here’s what I noticed… ANYONE walking on uneven, inconsistent, unpredictable gravel looks like a fool. You could be the CEO of a billion dollar company with a $5,000 suit on and lizard skin shoes… or a homeless guy with barely enough change for a coffee. Regardless, we all look the same trying to navigate an urban minefield like this torn up sidewalk.

What I found interesting is that the people I put on a pedestal sometimes (high price suit clad professionals or really good looking women) look just as foolish as everyone else.

Could it be that their appearance sometime makes me think that they are superhuman when they are just like everyone else?

I found this at the beach.

The Enemy of the Best is the Good

From the video clip ‘Shells’ by Rob Bell (http://flannel.org/)

I was at the beach one day with my family walking along the ocean.

My boys were running around ahead of us and they were finding all of these fragments and pieces of shells on the beach… amazing in their complexity and design but not real shells… almost like a lot of tiny little ‘shell shrapnel.’

Suddenly, floating in the water offshore about 30 feet is a HUGE starfish just bobbing their peacefully.

One of my boys sees the starfish and there is a look in his eyes like, ‘that starfish is mine!’

So he goes charging into the water to go pick it up… but then stops half way and turns and runs back onto the beach.

We keep saying, ‘That’s your starfish… go get it!’

So he runs out and stops about halfway again and runs back to the beach looking even more frustrated and anxious.

He tries a third time… same thing… now, he looks extremely upset and agitated.

So, we say, ‘What’s the problem? Why can’t you get the starfish?’

He says, ‘I can’t do it… because my hands are filled with shells.’

Is this you? So busy doing so much that your hands are filled with shells? Some if it may be good but you can’t grab hold of the starfish.

May you drop your shells in the pursuit of a simple, disciplined, focused life in which you pursue the few things God has for you.

Can you say NO because you have already said YES?

What is your Starfish?  What ‘shells in your hands’ do you need to put aside to go after it?

My wife likes it when I fail.

Sounds weird but get this: My failures are opportunities for her to give something of value to me – support and encouragement.  She feels needed and worthy of providing support by just being there for me, reassuring me, helping me realize that I am okay and that everything will be fine.

I find it hard to look like a failure sometimes.  I have always been very independent and handled things on my own.  However, I need to fail at things more often and thankfully, I am blessed to have someone in my corner like my wife to be there when I do.

What ‘failures’ are you hiding because you don’t want anyone to know? Could you be denying someone the chance to support you at the time of your failure?

My captivatingly beautiful wife, Beth. She is so hot!

Women are beautiful. 

There’s no other way to say it.

My guess is that women, like men, fall victim to the deadly mental cancer called comparison:

Am I pretty enough?  

Why can’t I be as pretty as her?

Or her?  

Or her? 

When I admire and acknowledge my wife’s beauty (something I need to do more of), she instantly feels unique and valued.      

Here’s the Repulsive Part:

If I stare at other women in the presence of my wife, she no longer feels unique or valuable. 

Why?  

Because it prompts her into thinking that her beauty is a commodity – I can easily find it elsewhere at a lower price.  It tarnishes her uniqueness and value and could prompt her to wonder:

Am I pretty enough?

Yes, she is!  Her beauty is priceless to me.  

I don’t want to be a contributor to cancerous comparisons.  So, Dudes -  hear me on this one:

1. Admire women’s beauty in a respectful way. 
2. When you’re with the one you love, keep your 100% focus on her.  Make her feel unique, valued, and show her that she is the most beautiful, priceless posession in the world.

Ladies, can I get an ‘Amen?’

Another great Post-It Note usage. I love those little suckers.

Quitters Never Lose

When a book, CD, movie, party, conversation, friend, girlfriend, website, restaurant, coffee, job, store, meal, e-mail, presentation, phone call, or Blog Post (maybe this one?) SUCKS, do you:

• Rationalize staying with it? (I spent money on this… I have nothing else to do… etc.)
• Think you’re not good enough to want something more or better?
• Bite your lip and sit passively like a good dog?

How about this?  QUIT

It’s time to quit these life suckers. Don’t stay with it/them as we both know the chances of major improvement are slim.

There’s a good reason they SUCK… mostly, it’s so you know when it’s time to leave.  Yes, it feels uncomfortable.  Yes, you need to do it.

Me during my modeling days.

Accessing What’s Deep Inside

I worked with a Personal Trainer a few months ago – Greg Day from Steve Nash Sports Club in Vancouver. 

Here’s the thing… I go to the gym pretty much every day and up until last month, I thought I was working pretty hard… boy, was I wrong.

Greg pushed me to a level that I had not gone to in a long time… he ACCESSED potential buried deep inside me that had not been tapped for a long time.

The funny thing is that he did not do this in a complex way… just by employing 4 key techniques:

1. He Walked Along Side Me
   • He was not working out with me.  He was outside of my world looking in - his focus was exclusively on helping me push myself.  He was able to maintain objectivity by not being directly involved in what I was doing.
2. He Did Not Assume Anything
   • About my limits, how hard I wanted to go, my flexibility.
3. He Stayed Curious
   • Continually wanted feedback as to whether to push it harder, how things felt, if I needed to back off a little bit.
4. He Kept things Fun and Light
   • We had a good time and I received a good work-out at the same time.

This is not a promotional post on why you need to get a personal trainer. It is more a realization for me that I am the WORST person to see what I am truly capable of… whether this in the gym, at work, or in life.

We need trained professionals to walk along side us, not assume, stay curious, and keep things fun and light. With this combination, there is no telling where we can go in our training and lives!

Yesterday (Sunday), I competed in my first ever outdoor running race.  Not just any race, mind you.  This one was 16 KM long and straight uphill (elevation change of 4,100 feet) stretching from the ocean to the peak of Vancouver’s highest mountain.

On Saturday, I almost backed out.

Why?

Fear.

I feared not being able to do it. 

I feared that I had not trained enough, did not know the course well enough, or that I was not in good enough shape.

I feared that I was not a runner… that my body was not built like an endurance athlete or designed for that much punishment.  

I feared looking like an amateur in front of experienced runners.  That I would be left in the dust by old and out of shape people. 

Above all, I feared that my mind would give up far before my body.

What made me go through with it?

Fear.

Overcoming the fear made crossing the finish line that much sweeter. 

Overcoming the fear made me truly value the accomplishment.   

Overcoming the fear made me realize that fear is designed to limit myself and what I believe I can accomplish.

Overcoming the fear gave me new perspective on any other fears lurking in my head.  I realized how unfounded and weak they are.

Overcoming the fear made me feel proud in front of my friends and family when they asked how the race went.

The next time you feel fear, go after it… challenge it… wrestle it to the ground… put fear into a submission hold where you cut off its air supply, suffocating it until you feel it tap out.  Then, raise your hands high, savour the well earned victory, and reflect on how the fight itself was so much easier than the pre-fight that occured in your head.

Up until I was 23 years old, I was an Overachiever.  My gas tank ran on a fuel called ‘the admiration and praise of others.’  If other people were impressed by my achievements, I felt great.  If other people were indifferent or unimpressed, I felt dejected.  These feelings drove me for hours on end to a secret Mad Scientist lab in my head where I thought of newer and better ways to create positive impressions.

Life was a constant roller coaster ride.  All the while, I couldn’t stop thinking, ‘LET ME OFF THIS THING.’

What do I think helped me to permanently get off?  DIAGNOSIS and PRESCRIPTION

DIAGNOSIS

Check out the chart below from Keith Ferrazzi’s new book, ‘Who’s Got Your Back.’  Can you see any behaviours in here that you recognize in yourself?

Ask yourself these questions:

• What is the behavior you want to stop?
• How did the “old behavior” affect others?
• Envision yourself stopping the behavior. What would life be like without the behavior?

PRESCRIPTION

Let’s do something about this.  Commit to:

1. Not living a day longer without addressing this behaviour.
2. Enlist an Accountability Buddy or join a mutual support group (like Young Professional Men) to check in weekly on the following question:
   • On a scale of 0-5, how well did you do in taking action to change your chosen behavior or bad habit?