BHAGs

Despite what people might think, I am not a goal setter. I feel like I don’t know what I want so how do I set a goal to get there. I knew I wanted to teach, and so I made that happen. I knew in the back of my mind that I wanted a master’s degree. The economy (or God) made that happen sooner than I had planned. Now fourteen months into my program, I realize that I NEED to set goals. Life is coming at me in a major way, and I need to prepare for it or at least embrace reality. For the first time in my life, there is no real path – no place I expect to go. Most people would soak in the possibilities, and instead I allow myself to be swallowed up in uncertainty.

More than a year ago, I read a post on Janssen’s “Everyday Reading” blog about setting huge life goals. It’s taken me all this time to even try writing something down. She framed her goals around these questions-

What you want to become
What you want to do
What you want to achieve
Places you want to visit/live
Things you want to have
People you want to meet

There are so many things that I want out of life to the point that I feel almost unable to pin them all down. Here though is the beginning of my list (because you have to start somewhere):

I want to be a published writer. I don’t know what that means yet – whether it’s writing an actual book, a short story, or simply a review of someone else’s work – either way, I want to do it.

I want to live in Europe, most likely in England, for at least a year. The fact that I want to travel as often as possible almost goes without saying next to that.

I want to sing in a trio with my sisters. This, of course, means that I have to learn a bit more about singing so that I don’t embarrass them.

Like I said – just the beginning of the list. Notice that I said nothing about my life’s work. I don’t know yet. I know I want to make people’s lives better but I don’t know how exactly I am going to do that.
It's been really interesting to think about what I want to do with my life in the long-term. I'm excited to keep working on my list and working toward achieving those things.

Dr. Thompson, the Organizational Behavior professor that I work with, calls huge overarching goals BHAGs (Big Hairy Audacious Goals). He did not coin that term, but he is the one that introduced it to me. I need to be more audacious in my goals – I’m working on it.

Hope you are too. The possibilities, as I used to say in high school, are endless.