In today’s guest post Louise Gillespie-Smith asks a question about goals:

Is it Wrong Not to Have a Goal?

By Louise Gillespie-Smith

Since becoming a life coach 7 years ago I always had a goal that I was working towards. Some I achieved, some I changed along the way and some just didn’t happen but that was ok, I learnt valuable lessons.

I was focused, I challenged myself and I achieved a lot.

Last year I tried something a bit different. I set intentions rather than specific goals. For me an intention is being the goal now, rather than putting off what I want to experience until after something has happened.

To clarify my intentions I began by setting goals, to get an idea of what I really wanted to create in my life. Then I asked myself, how will I be being once I have achieved this? A year ago it was Love, Divine Health and Abundance.

I then set off throughout the year just focusing on being that in everything I did. Rather than planning what had to happen for me to feel it.

What I discovered was that I was still in action, I was still creating but it wasn’t completely fixed. I was open to the unimaginable. There wasn’t one specific thing to achieve but I was open to exploring different ways of being what I wanted most in my life. I paid attention to my inner guidance to lead me to what was the next action to take, rather than what was planned on a milestone list.

The results; I had a relationship, I deepened my sense of love for myself and everyone in my life, I did volunteer work, I am very close to curing my asthma for good, I lost weight, I didn’t get ill all year and my business continued to evolve nicely.

Now don’t get me wrong. I still like goals and there are always specific things I’d like to achieve and using the goal technique of putting that in writing then planning what has to happen to make it a reality is powerful. I wouldn’t be where I am now if I hadn’t of done that. I am just enquiring if goals are always necessary for everything?

Since exploring this I have actually attracted a few coaching clients who have started off setting goals then once achieving them they have preferred to experiment with intention. Once their specifics were attained they have found intentions have really shifted how they are being each day, and sometimes it’s been the other way around.

I have one client for example who is focusing on being kind and being joy each day. He had started off with a specific goal around writing but it wasn’t until he started just focusing on his intentions that his creativity really started to flow.

I think there is value in having both, a goal and an intention of how you are being in the moment around achieving the goal. Especially when someone is new to personal development and goal setting.

I suggest to clients effective ways of keeping the intention in mind are post it notes around their home and reminders in their phones. It’s also great to have a few moments in stillness when you get up to repeat an affirmation of the intention and consider what you may do today to be it. You can even create your daily to do list based around it.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this.

About Louise Gillespie-Smith

Louise Gillespie-Smith runs a business called Create Yourself which empowers and supports people in making positive change in their life. She has a holistic toolkit of resources, life coaching/NLP/ yoga/ reiki/ image consultancy, to create individually tailored packages based on what each client needs. Lo****@***************co.uk /07779 150886.

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