There is much emphasis and accompanying literature on the art and practice of goal setting. Today I want to emphasize the artistic nature of goal setting—for often the wisest course diverts us from our most strongly held agendas and convictions, and it is only right and proper that it does so.
Some
years ago when I started this blog I set a firm goal—to submit
blogs daily or virtually so. I did this faithfully even when away
from home on vacations accessing the internet from wherever I
happened to be—be it the Atlantic coast of Florida or the mountains
of north Georgia. Then from mid-October to mid-November of this year
my wife became deathly ill. Suddenly my days seemed to have no
moorings of any type—certainly no tranquil spots of time for
writing blogs. So I stopped writing them regularly. Yet I view this
breach of set plans not only proper but profoundly right. It would
have been wrong of me and indicative of obsessive addiction to regime
had I continued to blithely maintain the practice despite current
realities.
The
same sorts of things happens to millions of people daily. Whether it
means the plans of the day must be set aside, or the plans of a
lifetime—even those plans held firmly with conviction. I, of
course, take a male point of view in this. How many men “footloose
and fancy free” have found themselves a few years after marriage
deep in family responsibilities filled with new commitments that
completely derail once cherished old ones and their associated
dreams? Yet, this apparent failure to follow through will prove to
be the wisest and most rewarding thing the man has ever or will ever
do.
Thus,
the art of goal setting requires that we hold the exigencies of love
(and God's will) more valuable than the accumulation of Pyrrhic
victories and their vast array of hollow trophies. Often the right
impulse is a hundred times more valuable and effective than a firmly
set plan or a closely held conviction.
Print Page
