A life without goals

are goals destroying our world?

‘I am trying to live without any goals at the moment,’ I told the guy who was sitting next to me at a community gathering at Casa Lucia. We had met 10 years ago and I can remember how I was always a bit uneasy when he was around. He was so different than me and the world I knew at the time. Our basic difference: he is a free spirit and I had not even started my process of freeing myself from the world I knew.

‘Goals are ineffective,’ he answered. ‘There are already to many people who have goals and look where that brought us.’

I knew what he meant. Look around and see what goal setting is doing to peoples lives and the world around us. Goal setting is about getting somewhere, working hard or efficiently or earning a lot of money to be happy. A quick Google search tells me that a life without goals is not a life. You should have goals otherwise you’re not going anywhere and you can’t thrive. But this is what business and life coaches tell you so they can work their magic.

A life without goals

I do agree though that it is nice to have something to do, to feel useful. But this feeling only comes over me, when I doubt life. When I let go of my deep trust that there is always a way. And I feel happy just to be alive.

The last weeks I am on a house hunt here on the island. I had set my goal to find the perfect place for me at the end of May. So I told a lot of people that I am searching. And the main reaction I get is, ‘Good luck, it is too difficult to find a house here on the island.’ And maybe it is. But I have been living a life for more than 10 years without my own place and I have never slept under a bridge for one night. So with this trust I let go of the goal to find the perfect place and surrender to the idea that the perfect place will find me. Even though all the people telling me that I’m not successful made me feel like a bit of a failure for a couple of days.

It is their vision

The fact that others think it is a problem to not have a place is all in their own conditioning. I know I will be fine and that there will be a place that is perfect for me. It will be there when I am ready to choose to go there. Because this is the thing, sometimes you’re not ready yet to make a big step. And finding a house long-term here, feels like too big a step to take for me now. But it is like finding the right partner or job, once you see the person standing in front of you, you will forget that you weren’t really looking for a relationship and step in to love.

Let them have their opinion

It’s easy to let other peoples ideas infect your mind. I am still working on completely ignoring them and just have my own ideas on how I live my life. I think we should all be able to let go of other peoples ideas and live our own lives. Because their ideas are based on their conditioning, not yours. Once you truly believe in your own truth others won’t be able to tell you or scare you.

Goals make our lives stressful

We don’t need goals for our basic survival. Maybe the only goal in a day should be to have food on the table, or water in your glass. But everything else is really unnecessary. We don’t need to push ourselves attaining something because of a greater good. The greater good in my opinion is to live. To feel alive and to create what is yours to create. Nothing else. And yes I have been in the position where I set goals and wanted to achieve more in less time, faster or whatever it was that my mind wanted me to achieve. But since I let go of all those ideas, my life is less stressful and more joyful.

Play and create

It all comes back to playing and being creative, because in the moments where you let go of all you should have, you can be in the moment. And when you are connected to the present moment, you don’t need more than you already have. The now is the only moment that counts. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.

So what goal can you let go of today?

And what will you exchange it with?