Goals, Lifestyles
Daily Meditation 528–8/7/2023
Say you want to get down from 250 pounds to 165 pounds (as a, say, 6' male).
You set your goal:
“It’s Jan 1, 20xx and by Dec 31 this year, I will lose these pounds and be thinner and stronger than ever!”
Do you do it?
Probably not.
You may go to the gym for a month or two, start focusing on caloric deficit, and stay on it…
But maybe you slow down after the major water weight plunges…maybe you go on a vacation or get discouraged.
You don’t do it.
We are too focused on the “do” of getting to a goal.
We are not focused enough on living the lifestyle to “achieve” the goal.
What I mean:
You’re “do what you have to do” to move towards it, but it is just a moment in time almost parallel to your existing way of life.
As one of the YouDaimonia Mottos go…
You must behave in a manner consistent with the person you aspire to become.
Or, another way, you live, today, in a manner consistent with the person you aspire to be, tomorrow.
Whether it’s investing, becoming fitter, developing into a reader and writer, or attracting a partner, you aren’t just “pausing” the way you live in order to “achieve” some thing and then resuming once you’ve achieved.
You are walking the walk.
Talking the talk.
Living in a way that aligns with the goal as a lifestyle. Not as a phase.
If you want to achieve anything, the motion towards it must be a lifestyle…and you must acknowledge it isn’t really a “motion towards,” as with a lifestyle (fitness, a relationship, finances etc), it’s just how you live and not a direction.
So cast aside your parallel way of living as you move towards a goal and instead become the person who that “goal” is simply part of their life, their day.
Hit the ✉️Email Subscribe✉️ button to get these DAILY in your inbox!
Follow for daily philosophical meditations.
These are distillations from my coming book “YouDaimonia: the Ancient Philosophy of Human Flourishing.”
