“How you spend your days is how you spend your lives.”

This quote made a big impression on me when I first heard it a year ago. Since then, it has stuck with me, resurfacing from time to time, always making me question my progress in life.

I find it shockingly easy to slip into stagnation and not do anything about my goals. Now and again I’ll have this occasional moment of realization when I’m all like, “what the hell have I been doing all this time? what have I been waiting for ?” From such moments has emerged my interest in personal development, and in getting to know the techniques used by the most different people to live the lives they’ve always wanted to live.

A few days ago, I listed my main goals in life; the things I want to work on at this moment. I came up with the following:

  • Music: I want to be able to play keyboard, synths, guitar, drums, make music, develop a better understanding of music theory and music production, take time to listen and appreciate records, write about and communiate what I find unique and interesting in some of my favouite songs, be able to discuss music with like-minded people.
  • Languages: I want to be able to express myself more clearly and eloquently, expand my vocabulary in English and German, adopt a native-sounding accent, be able to speak fluently without having to pause to find my words, have opportunities to talk with natives and revel in the beauty of languages.
  • Meeting people: I want to get to know more people in my school, more people outside of school, meet people spontaneously, find my tribes, experience close relationships and intimacy, hang around huggy, touchy people, experience honesty in my friendships, explore non-exclusive (open) relationships and be with people with an abundance mindset, meet people with a similar sense of musical wackiness and be able to shout and make some cathartic music with them, or simply relax with a friend listening to some music.
  • Growth: I want to discover new mindsets, be more empathic, more altruistic, think about myself and my place in this world, make a change in the world.

It feels great to have those goals clearly laid out in front of me, declared; to know what I want.

It should be noted that I haven’t mentioned some goals that get accomplished without real effort, for example getting better at developing websites, as I’m studying in a school dedicated to it and as such don’t need extra incentive to get to it. Even personal projects seem to get done by themselves; let’s hope it lasts.

A few months ago I read an interesting article by personal development blogger Steve Pavlina that advised to break down goals into “action steps”, concrete actions you could act on. For example, let’s say I want to meet people. How would I go about doing that? I could go to that weekly polyglot meetup; or contact a person I find interesting on social media, or invite a person I’d like to get to know more for a drink.

With my four big goals at hand, I thus listed all the concrete actions I could take. They brought some variety to each goal and, as such, would hopefully motivate me to work towards them.

Once my goals and action steps listed, I needed some radical action plan to do the things I knew I needed (and, secretly, badly wanted) to do. For the past few days I’ve been toying with the idea of “forcing” myself to do, each day, one action step for each one of my big goals. It seems a bit of a stretch but I think I could manage it, even if it means sometimes choosing solutions that are lower effort. Having those four goals in mind every day means that I can take every opportunity to work towards them and be relieved that I’ve done my daily action step such that I can move on to another thing.

I haven’t actually started this habit yet, though it might just have accidentally started today. Everything began with my scarf I lost at school; I asked random people if they’d seen it and soon began having conversations with them and started being on nodding terms with them. That’s that for my social goal for today. On my way back home, I entered that one music shop I walk past every single day and asked them about drum lessons. The instructor wasn’t there but I was told to contact him and was given his visiting card. Slowly getting there, maybe. That’s that for my music goal. Later on my way home, I went past a homeless, disabled person, reflected a bit then decided to open my wallet and go back to her, only to discover I had no change. I’ll remember to take some change with me next time. Later during the day, I witness a woman handing over a packet of biscuits to another beggar, and I’m struck by the smile of gratefulness of the beggar and how her face changed. I reach inside my bag but my biscuits are nowhere to be found; too bad. (At this point I’m asking myself whether intentions or more important than actions, and for the moment I’ll say they are.) That’s that for personal growth (get into the habit of giving out money and other things). And finally I figured out that writing this article would do me good and make the four goals complete for today.

After returning back home, I jotted down some more things I wanted to do tonight, each of which would work towards one of my four goals; for instance changing my profile description on a language exchange website to say that I’m up for a language exchange in my city (again: intention).

All this is to say that I’m really happy with that new “framework” and excited to see how things are going to unfold… and to live all those fantastic experiences I’ve always wanted to live !

Until then, thanks for reading!