What’s your goal-setting process?  Are you the master-strategist, designing the entire undertaking from start to finish?

Or, do you allow someone else to become the authority and follow their direction one hundred percent by the book?

This is a key decision at the beginning of every major life project because it will directly impact whether a project is a wondrous success, or a dismal failure.

Also, it influences our sense of fulfillment.

Why is this the case?  Because only we can define our own success.  And we cannot feel fulfilled following a path intended for another.

Everywhere we look, it seems like the world is quick to impose its agenda.  Eloquent, attractive promoters want to tell us not only how we should approach our goals, but also what those goals should be.

Just as often, we’re all too quick to submit to this persuasiveness, and give others the authority.  The kicker is, the more easily we submit, the more it seems others attempt to take control and impose their agenda.

Just look at the book industry.  Countless authors assure us that theirs is the one and only way to achieve success across an infinite spectrum of topics.  They try to tell us how to improve, how to win, and how to be the best.

They think they know what’s right for you and me.  I don’t know about you, but that makes me a bit indignant.

So much so, in fact, that there have been times I’ve leaned towards a sense of nonconformity.  The danger here, though, is non-conformists often throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Sometimes individuals can be too rigid, and may eschew some good approaches and life strategies which would otherwise be genuinely helpful and value-added.

What’s a solution?

Consciously selecting goals and tactics that work best for you.

Another term for this could be cherry-picking.  This doesn’t only apply to tactics.  Let’s think more broadly.  What if we were to design our goals the same way?

I’ve had friends who attempt to power through a book, and implement every aspect of an author’s program exactly as said author described.

That’s both exhausting and overwhelming.  It becomes all the more challenging when an individual works to apply multiple books on the same topic, and there is conflicting information.

Additionally, it’s imprecise.  It wrongly assumes that the author’s plan is exactly what’s needed to achieve a goal, and it ignores any sense of nuance, individuality, etc.

A better way might be to approach an author’s plan as a set of tools for your tool box.  Just because you have a tool, doesn’t mean you need to use it.  You can choose whether to use it or not.  If you’re not into it, or it doesn’t apply, leave it in the box.

That way, you’re able to take complete responsibility for both your goal, and how you decide to pursue it while still being able to safely and properly utilize appropriate tactics.  Really, it’s the best of both worlds.

Over the coming months, I plan on using this approach for my yoga goals.  I’ll let you know how it works.

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And have a great weekend.