Tool 8/10 - Live people’s goals v Dead people’s goals

Setting goals for un-initiated

How many times have you set a goal like this:

“Starting Monday I will not x” or

“I wish I didn’t do X so much.” 

or, “I should quit doing Y”.

I have. Lots of times. 

And a quick show of hands how many times has that actually proven to help you stop X, Y, and Z?

I’m betting not so many times. 

Psychologists call these kinds of goals “dead people’s goals.” Sounds macabre? Well, we call them that because only dead people never do X, Y, or Z. 

A dead person will never yell at their children or become angry. 

A dead person will never get anxious or become overwhelmed. 

A dead person will never fail. 

Live people do sometimes. 

And if you are like me, then you are probably a living person. 🙂

The idea here is that most often we set up goals for ourselves that are impossible to reach. We fall short of them. Get frustrated and then become overly critical of ourselves (remember self-compassion?) and then we set goals again and again. 

So what do you do?

You set up live people’s goals. 

What are those? 

Live people’s goals are goals that are flexible, reachable, and kind. They are meant to affirm what you can do, not what you cannot do. 

Instead of saying “I will never yell at my child”, I could say: “I will do my best to talk to my child in a calm voice and to take a break if I feel like yelling.”

Instead of “I won’t stay up late watching Netflix.” you can say: “I want to go to sleep by 23.00.”

The main advantage of this is that it:

• Creates a clearer picture of what you can and want to do

• Gives you more freedom to choose how you achieve the goal

• Takes you toward a want- to motivation. 

But most of all, it shows kindness toward yourself and moves you to treat yourself like a human being, rather than something that needs to be optimized all the time. 

Till next time!