Trashing the goals...

Not to use an overused metaphor, but I stopped in front of the elevator tonight after helping a couple get their DVD player working, and realized that I'm always running. Running after something. Running and waiting. Waiting for something. Happiness, perhaps. Like, waiting til I can quit my job. Or waiting to pay off my credit card debt. Or waiting til Craig makes more money. Or waiting til I write a book. Everything in my life is completely goal-oriented. I've written about this before concerning the little things, like the fact that I am always doing something productive and can't relax. But, now I'm seeing it in the whole. My whole life is one big goal and I am beginning to realize I will never get there, wherever it is I am going.

When running long distance, one technique that some use to get them through is to focus on an object in the distance. You tell yourself you can make it there. Then once you get there, you pick a new object in the distance and tell yourself you can make it there. Thus is my life. I pick one goal, which is just replaced with another and another, resulting in my never feeling any sense of accomplishment or peace. So I started to question goals in general. Are goals bad? Do they insinuate that something is wrong with life and needs to be changed? Yet, if we think about it, nothing is actually wrong with our lives, because they are as they should be. And we know they are as they should be because that is how they are. At least, this is what I'm learning from Byron Katie. But my goal today of drinking 60 ounces of water was not bad. It gave me something to strive for, and even though I came up short I was proud of what I did manage to ingest.

I don't know if goals are bad, but I do know that I don't need to know. All I know is I want to stop living my life focused on some point in the distance. It's such a waste. I want to focus on what's in front of me. And, right this moment, that is a cute little Chihuahua with his head resting on my stomach.


Another goal my husband and I have is to eat more vegetables. I am probably the only Mexican who doesn't like corn, but this corn was actually very good, to eat and photograph.