Hi!

I love the potential of journals and notebooks—a treasury for favorite jokes or ideas from books or even my own thoughts. I always feel excited by how wise I will become when I start writing stuff down, and through that process, find meaning to the hodgepodge of interactions and surprises of each day. Then I get home, take off my coat, and promptly forget about future enlightenment. Maybe I’m hungry or the mail came or it’s Thursday…who knows. Suffice it to say that although I have had the intention of keeping a daily journal for, well, ever, I have managed to do so exactly once, on a trip that lasted two weeks.

But great news – I found a loophole! I am going to count this blog as a journal and voila! I am now keeping a journal. Thank you to everyone reading this post for keeping me accountable. I hope you find any insights I gain along the way helpful to your own journey.

Why am I talking about journaling? Well, I just found one of my notebooks from a long time ago. It was mostly blank, but as I flipped through the pages to check, I found this:

Not all goals are important to achieve. It’s who you become while trying to achieve them that’s important.

I love this idea. When I read it, I felt…happy. The strain of trying to achieve something hard, even when it’s something I really want, can feel discouraging. Maybe especially when it’s something I really want. Instead of feeling excited by chasing the challenge, I often feel like I’m pedaling with the brakes on. In those rare moments of self-awareness, I realize the brakes are my own making: self-criticism and unrealistic expectations.

So for me, this perspective is freeing. I can pursue ongoing aspirations like “Be kind. Always.” and not end each day feeling like a failure because there were moments when I wasn’t, when I felt frustrated or impatient or more likely, both.

The idea that some goals don’t have to be attainable is basically another way of saying it’s not the destination it’s the journey. But I always feel uncomfortable when someone cites the journey adage. The destination is important—isn’t it? That’s why I picked it! I like this way of thinking about it much better. I feel like I’ve been given license to set idealistic goals and the reward is simply making a genuine effort, regardless of the outcome.

For folks who enjoy enriching their intuition with the context of science, I found this neat fact: a study by Gail Matthews at Dominican University revealed that people who wrote down their goals and dreams on a regular basis were 42% more likely to achieve them than those who didn’t. Of course, there are different ways of writing down your goals (S.M.A.R.T, S.M.A.R.T.E.R, etc.), so one could argue about the percentage, but the results of this study seem aligned with what I’m talking about. Writing down a goal—even if you don’t look at it again—sets the intention.

If the intention is the destination, well, now I have a map for getting there. I am at X, my goal is at Y, and however many times I have to double-back and start again, take detours, or miss the endpoint entirely, the terrain I’ve travelled is meaningful and important for who I want to become. For idealistic goals like being kind (always) or feeling happy (most of the time), I am encouraged by the idea that the aspiration is the accomplishment. Seems obvious, but I often forget.

If you’ve been struggling to achieve an idealistic goal, maybe keeping this idea in mind will inspire you to feel more positive about pursuing it. I hope so!