How to work out what you want when all you know is what you don’t want.
When I went on one of my first coaching training days, one of the exercises was to set some goals. Anything is possible was the assignment, and we were split into pairs. The girl I was with was ready to go, and without skipping a beat she had it all planned out. Second home, pillar of the community, busy social life and a lot of luxury added to each of those. It sounded amazing.
Mine, on the other hand? Not so good. Best I could come up with was a holiday home somewhere warm! At the time I had two small children and a demanding job and I was tired all the time, and everything that had brought me joy had been relegated to a time when life was easier. And so I’d forgotten what life could be like, I was just trying my best to get through each day. And I knew what I didn’t want, but wasn’t sure how to turn that into something I did. Since then I’ve met a lot of women who are in a similar boat.
Over the years I’ve learned a few ways to help with working out what you want, so if you’re feeling the same you can try one or two of these and see if it helps.
My favourite way to start this is one I call Ideal Day. Basically get a pen and paper and write down your ideal day from start to finish. Who are you with, what are you doing, where are you, how do you feel, how do you look. One good thing that came out of the pandemic for me personally was that working from home became the norm and it was one of the points on my ideal day. Another was spending more time with the kids and it helped with that one too. The pandemic had a lot of downsides but this exercise I’d done helped me to find upsides too, and to test out my ideal day. The biggest limitation with this exercise though is that you don’t often stray far from where your day already is, so it might not allow you to think big, and you could find yourself coming up with a better version rather than a best version, so bear that in mind.
That brings me nicely on to the next exercise which helps you to think anything is possible! This one is called the Magic Wand. Pretty straightforward but what would you do if you had a magic wand. Starting with a blank sheet of paper can be a bit daunting, so if you take your ideal day writing and work though it, you can ask yourself what you would do differently if you had a magic wand. Maybe you’ve said you’d go for a walk in the park. You might look at this and say with a magic wand you’d want to go for a walk on the beach somewhere hot, or in a rainforest, or in Costa Rica! Expand what’s possible to help you develop your ideas and goals.
Another method to use when you’re thinking of what you want is to use opposites. So think of what you don’t want and then what’s the opposite of that. You don’t want a long commute? You do want your workplace to be close to your home or easy to reach and a pleasant journey away. You don’t want long working hours? You do want a shorter working day with set hours that you can leave behind without feeling guilty when you’re finished. It isn’t always completely opposite as you can see from the examples but it’s a great way to help determine what’s important to you.
When we were children we often had a much simpler view of the world and there were things we really enjoyed and were good at. I’d put rollerskating on that list as my favourite thing to do as a ten year old! There are often clues in what we found enjoyable as a child, and often in what we wanted to be when we grew up. Yes, some of that might have been naivety or undue influence but looking back to what you wanted to do can help shape where you want to go. Take some time to think back to what you wanted then and see how if fits now. Maybe your dreams of working in a shop have moved on, but maybe you have a great eye for detail and sourcing and selling products in an online store might be the new updated version of that.
When you have a list of the things that you want, then one good last sense check is to make sure they fit with your values. A holiday house abroad that’s a flight away will be of little use if you value sustainability and it’s important to minimise your carbon footprint. That’s an extreme example but it’s also easy to get swept up in the inspiration so just adding that view is helpful. Think about the things most important to you and make sure that your goals are aligned.
Finally, when you’ve worked out what you want, put some timescales on it. When do you want it by? A goal without a timescale is just a dream. You need the deadline to help you focus and move forward.