I haven’t written in weeks, months even. I haven’t written my goals down in a long time, but I just accomplished one that I’ve been working on for years. You can live your life day to day and still be getting closer to your dreams. Believe it or not but cleaning your house on a Saturday, is a part of working toward your aspirations.
For years I’ve been lost in frustration about how incredibly long the process of accomplishing my goals are. I have so many and I have always been inpatient about acquiring them. And I get so focused on what I still need to do, that I forget completely to look back and acknowledge what I’ve already done. For example, I have an amazing job that challenges me, teaches me new things all the time, which I got my Associate’s degree and Certificate to acquire. Not to mention was chosen, out of 50 other applicants for. But after all that work I saw it as a small step in the right direction, not the amazing accomplishment that it actually is.
If you cannot appreciate the teeny tiny steps toward each goal, as well as the actual goal itself it will make the entire process a lot less satisfying. It sounds cheesy because you hear it all the time but you have to appreciate the journey. I had it in my head that I needed to be writing my dreams down every day, and setting a schedule every morning in order to make headway toward them. But that’s not always true. Just working, taking care of my kids, and saving 5 dollars here and there whenever I could is what actually got me to my most recently achieved goal. Don’t get me wrong, keeping a schedule is important to stay on track, and of course it helps you to understand where you’re headed if you write down your goals and look at them often because it gets you in the productive mind state. But the real work is in those seconds that you think fly by without notice. That 5 dollars you could have spent but hid away from yourself. Those 15 minutes you used to jot down an idea for your next blog/ social media post. Those 30 minutes after work that you spent tidying up so the house wouldn’t be a complete mess by the weekend. That extra tiring day at work that you could have understandably slacked off on, but still gave 100%. Those 10 seconds you took to show your significant other appreciation for their hard work. Those 10 minutes you took to read your kids a book before bed.
Each and every moment, while they do fly by in an instant, all add up to what you desire in life. Do you want to have a good relationship with your SO? Seize that moment to show them you see their effort. You want to save for that new car? Put that 5 dollars away every time you have it. You want your children to grow up to love books? Take the time to read to them a couple nights a week. You want your house to be semi-clean by the weekend so you don’t have to spend your entire Saturday cleaning it? Take a few minutes after work to pick up. You want to remember the great ideas you have for blog posts? Prioritize even a few minutes to write some things down so you don’t forget it.
One of my all time favorite movie quotes is from Cloud Atlas when one of the antagonists tells one of the heroes, “No matter what you do it will never amount to anything more than a single drop in a limitless ocean.” And his response is utter brilliance, “What is an ocean but a multitude of drops?”
Each second of your day is but a moment of your entire life. And how you spend each second creates your life. Take those vital seconds and spend them wisely and consciously because they all add up to something: your future.
Miss ECG 