Goal-setting

Somehow over the past few years, I've fallen out of the habit of regular goal-setting. Other friends have merrily plotted magnificent courses for themselves, saving money, paying off debts, improving their fitness and cleaning up their unfinished business. And I've just been sitting here on the couch eating tortilla chips and thanking God that I'm not one of those crazy goal-setting maniacs who's always pushing herself to improve. Because, you know, self-improvement is hard work. It's kind of a drag sometimes.

I mean, who needs goals? I've got serenity, and a bag of tortilla chips, and a remote control. Sweeeet.

So I've been drifting along, aimlessly bumping into jobs, friends, activities that happened to float my way. Did yesterday mark my 100,000th tortilla chip on the couch? Maybe it did, because I suddenly realized that I'm getting really tired of being so utterly rudderless.

At work we've been going through an excruciating cycle of "self-development and coaching." This cycle apparently comes up once a year, and sweet mother Mary, it is torture. You have to request written feedback from others who judge how well they think you're doing in the area of Change Agility™ or Communicating Impactfully™ or Building Meaningful Relationships.™ It feels awful, asking a co-worker to wax eloquent about how skillful I am at Change Agility. I would rather ask them to personally throw away my used dental floss.

I thought I was done with all of this, but then yesterday my Superboss came in and provided some On-the-Spot Coaching™ about this one final bit of development I need to take care of. It is a massive Self-Evaluation Form™ where I have to write a long, reflective essay about how I've done with my own work objectives over the past year. I have to write entire paragraphs about my skills in Sharing Knowledge Openly™ and Communicating Impactfully™.

"I usually spend four or five hours putting mine together," Superboss said. "It's good to spend some time on it, because it ends up getting put into in your permanent file."

I nodded thoughtfully and made a good Listening Attentively™ face, absorbing all the details about this massive crap-fest I cannot seem to extricate myself from. As soon as she left, I took out my journal and wrote an angry screed which contained so many swear words that I am too embarrassed to quote it here. The bottom line is that I am getting back into personal goal-setting, and the first goal to permanently eject myself from this company in the next year so that I never have to go through one of these ridiculous self-assessment cycles again. Change Agility that, Superboss.

Yes, I know I'm pretty much repeating myself a lot here lately. But this is where I go to process reality and concoct new plans. So bear with me.

(Deep breath.)

Yesterday I ran across this quote from Theodore Roosevelt. I keep reading it again and again:

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man [or woman] who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs; who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat."

First, I wish this guy was still president.

Second, I love that final phrase: "those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat." I know that when he wrote this, Roosevelt was probably talking about courageous soldiers who went into battle to give their lives for the cause of freedom, but from where I'm standing, I feel like that phrase is a good characterization of my attitude towards work over the past few years. All the upper-management shakeups at the office over the past few weeks have helped me clarify with unshakable certainty that sitting on the couch eating tortilla chips is not enough anymore.