I am always wanting to push my goals further, always focusing on my goal. When I get close I move the goal further. Beyond just not moving the goalpost all the time I need to remember to shrink my focus. Goals are destinations on the road trip of life. We can set them so we know where we want to end up. But there are so many obstacles on the way. We have to use roads. We cannot just go the way the crow flies. I can’t drive somewhere only looking at the destination. The best approach for me has been the Headlights approach. When one drives at night, I can see only as far into the power of my headlights. They are moving with me and I’m moving with them towards my destination, but I can really only see what my headlights show.

“We overestimate what we can accomplish in a day, but underestimate what we can accomplish in a year.” ~ Chris Guillebeau

This is my favorite way to refocus: “Headlights.” I say this to myself whenever I am extending a goal or writing out all the things I want to accomplish. It’s like setting a goal, putting it in the GPS and then keeping the majority of my focus on what your headlights are showing. I can check in from time to time and make sure I am still on the right road, or maybe see how far I’ve come or calculate how much further away the goal is. But then it’s headlights, back to the road. I often fall into the trap of just setting destinations and forgetting to keep my eyes on the road. That would be like if I just kept on going and staring at my GPS, or putting in new destinations all the time. Then I’m 40 and confused, why I feel like I never got anywhere. I spent all this time driving though?! But I kept moving the destinations and driving aimlessly. Life has taught me that it’s important to have this healthy combination and that a lot of the road trip of life is boring. I am so often distracted by everything. Seeing random unmarked roads and this desire to see where they go. Often they go somewhere but it’s probably just an old logging road that just gets me lost in the woods.

I cannot stress enough how valuable its been to check in on my GPS. Goal Positioning System. OK I just threw up in my mouth at how perfect and corny that is. Ugh Bjorn your self help book is showing! Don’t forget to glance at your GPS from time to time but don’t stare at it or you will crash. I hate this so much. Really? Fucking Goal positioning system. Fuck you Bjorn. Call me a mid-day thong if you are going to be that far up your own ass. What’s your next little essay going to be? Top Fun ways to set the puns ablaze? Fuck you.

The lesson I am constantly having to learn over and over is that old proverb: “its about the journey not the destination.” I will realize something or identify it in the moment, I get all excited like oh I get it I understand the meaning of life! Then it’s like oh yeah it’s the journey! Not the destination, that old lesson again. Damn, I thought I was on to something new, but it was just that one again.

Headlights is about trusting yourself. Trusting the process. I first learned about the 1% progression method from atomic habits by James Clear. It’s just the idea to focus on just getting 1% better with each thing you do. If you are constantly trying to reinvent or outdo yourself by more than that it is both exhausting and not sustainable. When I say “headlights” to myself it’s me going back to the 1% focus. What can I improve by 1% today? That’s writing a little bit more, sometimes it’s just putting out another episode or another article. This short focus really helps me to do the work. When I was trying to one up myself in bigger ways I would often fall short, burn out, or not finish. Its another way of just saying one step at a time. It really is amazing sometimes when I look back and see how far I’ve come even if I’m still not at the summit of the mountain I was going for.

I wrote about a social media posting challenge of posting a new clip every day before 11. (Art Hoarding and Todds 7/11 Challenge) Today marks my 21st day of this. It has been a headlights journey for me for sure. So often I wake up and I don’t want to do it, but I removed all the barriers. I knew that I wouldn’t want to post some days, and so I built a backlog. I edited those when I did feel like editing them and got them ready to go.

I have taken this somewhat intentional break from comedy to regroup and find how I really want to interact with comedy. How it fits into my life’s road trip. I almost ironically started writing this article as how to make your life more memorable. For me that is not what I need to do. I need to do more of the boring stuff. What do I want to progress slowly at? We spend most of our lives on the boring parts of the road trip just looking as far as our headlights will see. I have been trying new things like writing every week and doing clip posting challenges. I have some new projects coming up that I am very excited about, but for now I’m just focused on the road in front of me, as far as my headlights can see.

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~Bjorn RG~

Headlights on a Goal