A lot of times, I hate having plans. I will work ahead to complete any task so that I have as few responsibilities as possible everyday, and so that I can then do whatever I want without worrying about having obligations. Whether that means spontaneously eating out with friends or binge-watching an Australian reality T.V. show (Bringing Sexy Back – on Netflix), I like to have the freedom to decide what I want to do as soon as I think of doing it in my daily life.
However, while instant gratification is nice, only focusing on doing things I enjoy in the moment does not lead to long-term happiness. Having this realization, I came up with a strategy for figuring out what my long term goals are and beginning to take the steps to initiate them.
First, I wrote down exactly what I envision my future looking like. I am a very visual person, so picturing what I want to accomplish in life or what I would like to own someday helps me get started. A sample of what I wrote is below.
I picture myself living by the beach in a house with a room solely dedicated to books and the like… and being able to work remotely.
But I also dream of a life where I get to travel, where I find a home in a foreign place and learn to speak another language fluently. In this image I am still very young, much younger then when I picture myself owning the beach house.
Next, after writing down my image of the future, I create a bulleted list of the main goals I can pick out of my writing.
- Beach house
- Be a writer
- Travel extensively
- Life abroad
- Learn another language
Once I created my list, (note- the above list only includes the goals from the above passage) I then separated them into categories. My categories reflect how my goals either require money, action or time, but use categories that reflect your own goals.
In the “cash” category, I put owning a beach house and traveling extensively, since both of these goals require money to be accomplished.
In the “baby steps” category, I put learn another language, because it requires a lot of practice and time. Another goal I have in this category is to be more healthy and strong. This is another goal which requires me to constantly be taking little steps daily to accomplish it.
In the “ambition” category, I put my goals of having a writing career and living abroad, since both of these goals require me to be actively taking action to find opportunities to achieve them.
A fourth category I have is called “luck of the draw.” These are my personal goals that I am currently not prioritizing. But if they happen sooner then I plan on beginning to work on them, it must be “the luck of the draw.”
Once I had separated all of my goals into categories, I then put them into one of two piles, either on-going goals, or long-term goals.
For instance, I considered traveling a lot, becoming bilingual, being healthy and becoming a writer to all be on-going goals. Meaning that I can be taking steps to accomplish these goals everyday in the short-term to fulfill them. This also means that even once I have “accomplished” the goal, it will still require me to maintain the same level of commitment to it.
In contrast, I considered living abroad and owning a beach house to be goals that I can be taking steps to achieve, but will require long term planning to accomplish them. As an example, I put owning a beach house to be a goal I want to accomplish 10-15 years from now. But that does not mean I cannot already begin saving up to purchase the house.
Reading my future goals, they are somewhat contradictory, since one involves travel, and the other involves creating a home to ideally live in for a long time. But having written them all out, I feel that I have been able to envision a way to accomplish both in my life.
After having separated all my goals, I then did an exercise where I wrote down the steps I could immediately begin taking for my on-going goals. As an example, I have included the steps I would take to travel more frequently.
Travel a lot: start budgeting- begin saving cash each paycheck for travel and open another savings account, do not buy unnecessary junk, look for travel deals, do research to help prioritize places to visit, do research on getting a travel rewards card…
Example of me writing out steps to my on-going goals.
For my long-term goals, I wrote down questions I needed to consider to help me plan how I will achieve them. I have included an example below.
Beach house: location – driving distance v. being far away, market value, cost and risk: purchasing a fixer upper v. townhouse or condo, living in an isolated beach town v. city, and again needing to save up and begin budgeting.
Example of writing out questions related to long-term goals.
After completing all these steps, I felt that I had a good start for understanding what my future goals are and how I can begin working towards them. Since writing this all out, I often journal updates about how I am either working on these goals or accomplishing them. For instance, I just returned from a trip to Boston, and already have planned a two week trip to Europe in the upcoming months, thus already traveling frequently.
So while short-term gratification is important, it does not look at the bigger picture of a person’s life. I think it is critical to be self aware about your own passions and desires so that you can begin figuring out what steps you need to do to achieve your dreams. So hopefully, by thinking ahead, in just under 20 years I’ll be reading my books by the beach full time.
Chasing serendipity 