How & Why to Set Goals (for people who feel lost in life)

I wanted to start this right at the start because I find that a lot of goal-setting videos will start with the assumption that you know what you want to do. But I want to start this at the point where you are like lost. Do you know that feeling? Maybe you do. You know when you're totally lost in life and there's no structure around you and you're directionless and every third thought is what should I do with my life? You probably know it. It's pretty common. And the way that I want to address this feeling and structure this video is in two sections. Why to set goals and how to set goals. The why will be quite big and higher order. Should get a bit philosophical. And then the how will be quite tangible and practical. So you can start writing stuff down there. So let's kick it off. Section one. Why set goals at all? I'm putting in a section on why to set goals because if I don't look after myself I tend to default into nihilism. What's the point of doing anything? The sun's going to explode in five billion years. What difference does it make if I achieve a few more things than if I don't? You know the feeling. Here's why I set goals despite all of that. It feels really good. Right now you might be thinking dude that is the most basic thing that you could have said right now and this seems like a really big fundamental problem and I guess I'm intrigued. So let's break it down. It feels good to set goals. You are personally going to die one day and if you weren't here the world would still have all its problems. Without you we'd still have war, floods, famine, all of the bad stuff. Unless of course you did cause a war, famine, come on man. Why you gotta do that? Other than death we can also be sure that you are going to spend your whole time as you. As far as we know it you are the only lens that you are going to experience the world from. So it makes sense to make your lens as nice as possible. And I personally believe that the better you make yourself and your world the better you will make the rest of the world. Good leads to good. So while without you the world would probably still be as bad, with you you do have the potential to make it slightly better. And I think that But this whole thing starts out with you figuring out how to generate positivity within yourself. Feelings like fulfilment, self-respect, direction, competency and that feeling of humility that comes when you try something new. I believe that these feelings, these good feelings can be manufactured by setting good goals and going after them. So that's why to set goals. To make the future a little bit nicer. So hopefully at this point in the video you're thinking, yup got it that's why we should do it. But how do I set goals? And also what should I do? Like what should I chase? Those are the questions that I'm going to try and answer in the next section of this video. And remember this is just my method for setting goals. This is just what's worked for me. If it doesn't resonate that doesn't mean there's anything wrong with you or me. It just means we're different people. But hopefully there will be some value. So let's do it. Section two. How to set goals. Remember how this video started? I had a dog here and I was talking about that feeling of being lost. When these feelings pop up for me I remember one simple phrase. Follow the fun. This is a phrase that came from Jordan Peele when he was asked about his writing process for Get Out. He said, that's my advice for dealing with writer's block. Follow the fun. If you aren't having fun you're doing it wrong. And I kind of love it not just for, oh you're gone? Sick. And I kind of love it not just for writing but also for life. Obviously you've got to pay your bills. Obviously you've got to keep your dependents alive. Obviously life is complicated. But if you're allocated creative time where you are more flexible do what gets you excited. Part one. Excitement. Here are the three main ways that I notice excitement in my life. The first way is just sheer intuition. It's just noticing stuff that I think about in my downtime. So times when you are not obliged to think about anything. In the shower, when you're on the bus, when you're in line in the grocery store. Whatever it is that your head keeps coming back to that might be that thing that gets you excited. If that doesn't sound systematic enough and you need something a bit more structured don't worry I got you covered too. So the second way that I notice excitement is through this journaling exercise. At the end of every day you ask yourself three questions. What After 30 days of doing this you'll notice serious patterns pop up and it's at the point where it's almost like comically unavoidable. You'll find that there's something that gets you excited on days one three and five and then also pops up on days six through thirty and you're like oh probably that. And if that doesn't work for you the third way that I notice excitement is jealousy. I personally have a tendency towards jealousy. I wish I was one of those people who could just skip straight to admiration but I don't. My mental train has a stop just before admiration which looks like oh screw you man I want that and the train usually stops there for longer than I'd like to admit. But I've kind of worked on this and I've attached a phrase to that feeling so every time I notice that feeling pop up I've tried to link it to the word direction because that's really what jealousy is. It's just an unpleasant way of your body showing you what you want out of life the direction that you would like to head in. If you want a more in-depth look into that feedback loop check out my video on comparison I'll chuck it in the description. But in any case from this first step we should have something that excites us. Cool man! And if you are a bit of a perfectionist and you have the myth that there is a perfect thing waiting out there you might have a tendency to deny that thing that you found that has popped up for you the thing that looks exciting so whether it's let's say it's board games or something and you're like oh but there might be something better out there. For me I have to just cut that off just let it go like a balloon. Nine times out of ten that better option doesn't exist and it's just me trying to find a new way to procrastinate. So pick that obvious exciting thing and once we have picked it it's time for part two. The Goldilocks Zone. We have that thing that excites us. For me right now it's animation so now it's time to formulate a goal around it. I'll give you one of two scenarios that you might be familiar with or maybe you're familiar with both. The first is you have had way too much coffee and you're in a freaking amazing mood and you're like man I'm gonna do everything I'm gonna take on the world I'm gonna clean the pacific ocean I'm gonna just kill the garbage patch dead and then I'm gonna you know change rap forever. In the second scenario you're at the end of a very long day you had one of those days where just nothing went your way you got every red light you had an important email that you were waiting for but it starts with the word unfortunately you know those days you had one of them and now it's time to formulate a goal and your self-belief is way lower than you deserve and you're just thinking man goals I don't know get uber eats. One is huge and audacious and the other one's uninspired but they both wind up in the same place and that is you don't change you don't do anything. This one's too big to start you don't even know how to tackle it it's like looking at the world's biggest easter egg and you're like how do I even bite that and this one is just the love child of all your worst feelings it's not motivating and it hurts. So what I've learned over the years of setting crazy audacious goals and tiny goals that don't inspire me is to set goals in the Goldilocks zone the Goldilocks zone uh-huh I'll leave. Yeah basically goals that are achievable and realistic but are also big enough to be compelling they're just out of reach. An example for me in the field of animation would be too big and audacious I want to create the next Studio Ghibli which I've definitely said on this channel before. Too small would be I want to make a 10 second animated skit and email it to my mum but just right would be I want to make a series an animated series or at the very least a trailer for that series to gauge interest. I also find it's really important in this step to be okay with not having the goal I know that might sound hard to do at first but it'll make you more relaxed when you are on that path. So now we've identified what's exciting where the Goldilocks zone is it's time for part three create a compelling sentence. I really like this step because we're taking a vague thing that we want and we're putting it in terms of achievable reality in very specific language. I also like it because it's mad libs you know mad libs. The main thing for me here is to make sure the goal is specific that it's done within a time period and that you've attached compelling reasons. I'll usually attach two reasons that I want to go one for the world and one selfish one just for me and this kind of satisfies my shoulder angel and shoulder devil. The mad lib format that I use is this I want to something specific by time period because way it helps the world and way it helps you. For example the way that I might fill this out for animation is I want to make a short form animated series about bad parenting by mid next year because I think it'll act as both comedy and therapy to people and it'll establish me as an animation director. That's a really good specific sentence but there is one problem it's not very compelling it sounds corporate I want to go to sleep man it feels like the linguistic equivalent of a stock photo this type of stock photo or this type of stock photo or definitely this type of stock photo. To get around this I make the language as fun and compelling as possible. I'm making this one right here because most people don't get good parents but most people do have a dark sense of humor and enjoy a laugh about it and because I want to be an animation great. Once you've written your goal in a compelling sentence it's time for part four break it up into bite-sized chunks. Kit Kat eat your heart out we are going to break this thing up baby. Constituent elements of a big task that's basically all a big task is a bunch of little tasks that lead you to a big goal which begs the question how big should these tasks be and my rule is unless I'm calling it easy it's too big. So a huge thing that I finished earlier this year was my book and that is a very big goal and when I look at just write a book on a to-do list nah man nah I'm not gonna write a book but the constituent elements would look like this. Chapter outline, talking points, shitty first chapter, first polish of that chapter, final edit of this chapter, you get the idea. The whole point here is that we are trying to make these tasks not look daunting. Goals if they're set right are usually pretty big, achievable but still pretty big. Part four is about offsetting that so that we don't procrastinate. The other cool thing that we get is a sense of progress and that reward that comes in when you tick a box you know the feeling I'm talking about as well as perspective as to where we are in the progress. For me I'm a very visual person so what I'll usually do is write these all on a bit of paper and stick them on my wall. I'll start with that compelling sentence where I am now and where I want to be right at the end with all the steps in between and I'll move this arrow along so I can visually see exactly where I am in the task and I found this to be really good because it gets it out of my head. I'm not constantly thinking about it because it's on the wall and it's just really encouraging. And that's the video why and how to set goals. Hopefully you got something out of that. I really hope you did. I will leave a workbook in the description if you don't want to write all of that out so you can find the pdf and hopefully that'll help you. If you were curious about my book Your Head is a Houseboat do check it out. It's now available worldwide. Here are a couple of lovely reviews so I'll flash them up. Other than that subscribe if you're new. I make videos like this every week. Good luck with your goals and have an amazing day. Catch ya!