Defining Your Goals for 2010

As 2010 approaches, I am attempting to become very clear on my goals and aspirations for the upcoming year. I have learned from several reliable sources that it is crucial to be entirely unambiguous about your desires in order to actually manifest them in your life.

And no, I am not just talking about advice gleaned from the columnists in Oprah’s O Magazine.

For the past few years, several people who I trust and value as experts in the field of self-awareness and self-actualization have imparted to me the following wisdom: it is entirely possible to achieve whatever your mind can conceive and believe, however you must be very specific and consistent on what it is you are seeking to achieve.

That sounds so simple, does it not?

Do not be fooled, though. Of course, so many things in life sound simple. In fact, they often are fairly simple if the result you are seeking is merely satisfactory. When you up the ante and decide on aiming for an exceptional end-product, then those simple things become far more complicated. Scrambling eggs is a good example.

It is hard to make bad scrambled eggs. It is far more difficult to make exquisite and delectable scrambled eggs. Seriously, give it a whirl.

Anyway, as I tackle this concept of being clear on what I want, I have become very aware of how other people seem to go about achieving their version of success. Something I find impressive is when I ask people why they are doing something and they are able to provide an immediate, concise, and reasonably thorough explanation. It just makes such them seem like they have given their life and their life decisions careful thought.

I am not certain I have ever been able to answer questions about myself with succinct little elevator pitches. Not only do I have a tendency towards the verbose (hello-have you read my 1,000+ word blog postings?), but I also follow more of a “do it then reflect on it” pattern of living than I do a “think about it and then act on it” path.

Well there you have it: bingo! Root of problem uncovered.

It is no wonder I am having difficulty manifesting what I want into my life when I have no condensed and consistent idea of what it is that I want.

This problem, for me, is that I seem to want many different things and I change my mind a lot. It often seems that just as I have honed in on one specific goal, something pops up and distracts me, lures me away with a tantalizing window display if you will. And it truly is the proverbial window display that reels me in: I am taken by the surface of things, but when I actually delve deeper, I find my interest wanes. At that point I am a prime candidate to be lured away yet again. And so the pattern continues, and I hardly have enough time to be clear on window display A before I have completely chucked it in favor of window display B.

If you have not gotten the gist from my cryptic analogy-laden vernacular: I am easily distracted. I sort of have ADD in that way.

But before you get all in my grill about your thoughts and feelings on the over-diagnosis of ADD in our culture, please note that this reference is not being utilized as a way for me to shirk responsibility for my distraction-prone mind. It is just something I have noticed about myself and I am working to rectify it.

Without prescription meds, mind you. No offense to Western medicine.

So, as I was pontificating on what it is that I want, I was given the good suggestion that I ought to write out my ideal day and read it often. I have done this before and it works to some degree. I suggest you do it too. It will probably work better for you because I can be very vague. I believe that this exercise would REALLY work if you are very specific. That said, I plan to try it again too. Let’s compare notes later.

In conjunction with the writing of the ideal day exercise, I was also told that the best thing to do is to imagine people who are leading the life that I want to lead and use them as my virtual role models for achieving my ideal life myself.

After ruling out Ellen DeGeneres (I like men, and my husband in particular), one of my dogs (I enjoy being able to talk and to eat at non-mandated intervals), and Sara Gruen (I just LOVED that book Water for Elephants and wish my mind had conjured up such a beautiful story—but that is all I know about her so to emulate her makes little sense), I decided on the perfect role model. One issue, however was that I not only wanted to use this person as a role model, I want to actually BE her.

Here is the thing: I pretty much want to be Julia Child. I realize that sounds pretty darn unoriginal—in part because there already was a Julia Child and also because of the recent success of Julie and Julia and the subsequent resurgence of interest in both Julia’s memoir and her famed cookbook. I know, couldn’t I have come up with someone else, for the sake of not being one big blogging cliché at the very least?

Well no. Why reinvent the wheel, is what I am saying.

But I am not Julia, I am Maggie, and I quite like Maggie. Although I do think I could like Maggie more.

And that is a goal for 2010.

But what I like so much about Julia’s is that she was wonderfully creative, yet without those dark artist moods that often befall creative people. She had the most palpable joie de vivre. Additionally, her life is appealing because she spent almost every day writing and cooking, and that pretty much sums up heaven to me. With both pursuits she channeled her creativity into her passions and she was so clearly energized and inspired just by her own momentum. I find that amazing.

All that AND she lived in Paris for many years, and living in Paris is a big-time dream of this bird.

You also might be interested to know that I actually have a lot on common with Julia Child. For one thing, we are both Leos.

Astrology is one of those things that is extremely important only when you can immediately find direct correlations, otherwise its significance can shrink to the non-existent category. Not to insult people who live by it or anything. That is just my experience.

So now I am on my way to being clear about what it is I want. I want to live in Paris, time to indulge in the creative outlets of cooking and writing, and a perpetually positive attitude. Voila! THIS IS SO EASY!

But seriously, having a list of the qualities I admire in others, the activities from which I derive inspiration, and a bonified role model to emulate are good steps towards formulating a very defined goal.

I am telling you, the way things are going, it looks like I will be scrambling some pretty delectable eggs in 2010.