My Controversial Opinion on Goal Setting

I'm your host, Kevin Lowe, and you are listening to the season two premiere of the Lowdown on my life in travel.

For those who have been around for uh season number one, welcome back.

And if you are joining for the first time today, well, welcome to the party.

It was kind of difficult for me to decide what topic to uh talk about on the episode today.

This is actually episode number 25, launching into season number two, because quite frankly, there's so much going on in both life and travel.

I mean, we just had the inauguration at the time of this recording for the new president.

And I mean, let's face it, that brings about a lot of people who are super happy and a lot of people who are super angry.

Welcome to life, huh?

But then there's also the aspects of travel.

We have so many new things happening in travel that as a travel advisor, to be quite honest, it's kind of leaving my head spinning a bit.

And um, I think that's kind of the case for everyone in the industry.

And um, so you know what?

We uh do what we can.

And uh the biggest thing and the greatest thing, though, is you know that people are back traveling again.

I've actually been booking vacations again, which for quite a while, I guess pretty much the uh second half of uh 2020, I pretty much determined that I was no longer uh booking travel, I was just canceling and rescheduling.

Anyways, so like I said, I had a hard time trying to decide where do we want to kick things off with.

And then I thought, well, wait a minute.

It's launching in January.

So what do most people talk about in the new year?

It's always about new year's resolutions, goal setting.

What's the year ahead gonna look like?

And so I thought, you know what?

I have a little bit different spin on the whole thing of setting big goals and dreaming for the future.

And you know what?

I think it might go against what most people will tell you to do.

But uh hey, that's what makes this podcast a little bit different from everyone else.

But before we dive into that, I do have to introduce the sponsor of our podcast.

That's right.

Launching into season two, we introduce an amazing sponsor.

It's a company called Amaudri.

Do you know what every trip has in common?

I'm talking whether you're headed up to your grandparents' house out of state, or you're setting off on a seven-night caribon cruise, or I don't know, heading out backpacking across Europe.

What does every trip have in common?

Well, you've got a pack.

And that was exactly the problem that these three guys had when they were traveling 48 out of the 52 weeks in a year.

They traveled a lot for business and they traveled a lot for leisure as well.

It was always the hassle of what to pack.

What's the weather going to be like at the destination?

What should we bring?

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And that's when they thought, you know what?

There's gotta be a solution to this problem.

And that's when they created a modri.

In essence, a modri is a completely customizable online travel store built for fellow travel advisors like myself to offer an extra level of service to their clients.

We book the trip, we do all the research, and then it's time for our clients to go travel.

Well, with a modri, you now have another level of service that you can offer them.

Because now you're going to be able to give them a completely customized packing list designed specific for the destination they're traveling, specific for the time of year, what the weather's going to be like, and what their likes and dislikes are.

You've now just completely increased your touch points with your clients.

And you know what?

That's what it's all about.

Because in this industry, in our line of business, it's all about being of service to our clients.

And that's where Amaudri helps you excel.

And I feel so strongly about what Amaudri has to offer because I use Amari myself.

If interested in learning more, be sure to check out the show notes where I've left a link where you can find out more directly on Amaudri's website, as well as I left a link to my own travel store, the Better Days Travel Store, where you can get a good idea of uh what yours could look like.

Like I said, it's completely customizable, so it fits in with your own brand, your own messaging, and just becomes another asset to your travel agency.

Alright, guys, what do you say?

Let's get on with today's topic.

So it's January, everybody's talking about the new year, what's to come.

After last year, everybody's excited, hopeful that 2021 will be a much better year.

And let's face it, we could all use a much better year.

And so I hear a lot of talk lately, especially me.

I'm into podcasting.

Not only do I record podcasts, but well, I listen to podcasts.

And I've heard a lot of podcast episodes lately all about setting goals, setting your intentions for the year, focusing forward, and just going gung ho after your goals and crushing those goals.

And everything is about goal setting.

And you know what?

I mean, that's awesome.

But as with it seems like a lot of things in life, I sometimes look at things a little bit different than other people.

And maybe sometimes that's a good thing, other times it seems to kind of get me in trouble and makes people uh kind of stare at me a little weird.

But uh, you know what, each to our own.

Anyways, so here's the bottom line.

I personally don't want you to get so wrapped up in setting goals for the year.

Because unless your life looks like a life on TV, then you know as well as I do that life isn't always perfect.

Things don't go the way we plan, that is for sure.

And I've just learned that sometimes it's better to focus on the little achievements than the big overall goal.

So let me kind of give you an example here.

Come January 1st of this year, if you knew you needed to lose weight, and so you said to yourself, you know what?

My goal is I'm gonna lose 100 pounds by December 31st, 2021.

Gonna lose 100 pounds this year.

Awesome.

That's fantastic.

Go for it.

Well, what's gonna happen if come the end of this year and you've only lost 75 pounds?

Are you gonna be disappointed?

Are you gonna be upset?

Or are you gonna be happy?

Because I mean, 75 pounds is amazing, but you didn't meet your goal.

So what is there to celebrate?

You get what I'm saying?

Because I feel like when sometimes when we set goals for ourselves, it makes us lose focus on the little steps, the everyday wins that we have.

I read a book a while back that I highly recommend to anybody is Atomic Habits.

And in the book, he talks about the fact that every day, every step forward is another step forward to reaching your goal.

Atomic habits.

He talks about the 1% change.

And so to lose that hundred pounds, you've got to do a lot to get there.

You've got to adapt new habits, you've got to become a person who loves to exercise, a person who enjoys ordering salads versus hamburgers.

And so every day you're focusing forward on that goal.

Because again, if all you have in your mind is, okay, I'm gonna lose 100 pounds, well, you know what?

That seems like a really far-off goal.

And that's why I think by this time in the year, the end of January, everybody's pretty much gone ahead and gave up on that goal they were going after.

Whereas if as of January 1st, you said to yourself, you know what?

This year, I'm gonna adopt some better eating habits.

I'm gonna try to uh maybe be a vegetarian.

I feel like cutting out meat is the way to go.

Or I want to try the keto diet.

Or I just want to try to eat healthier.

I want to maybe look back at that food pyramid I learned about in school and follow it.

Whatever it is, it's just taking little steps forward.

And then you know what?

At the end of the year, you can look back and go, oh my gosh, every day I did this, this little amount.

You know what?

It bloomed into this amazing accomplishment.

And here's the other thing about goals.

I have to think back to when I was a kid in school, in high school.

I was never one of those kids that had a big plan.

I didn't have this goal of going away to a big university.

I didn't have this major career in mind that I knew I wanted to do.

And in high school, we're all taught, I mean, I think it happens younger and younger anymore, where it's all about your future.

You got to focus on your future.

You know, when you're in elementary school, they want you focusing on middle school.

When you're in middle school, you're focusing on high school.

High school, you're not worried about high school, you're only focusing on college.

Everything is the next step forward.

Okay, that's great in one sense, preparing for the future, aiming high, but you know what?

It can also not only take away from the moment at hand, but it can also end in a lot of disappointment because life doesn't always go like you think it's gonna go.

Take me, for instance, in high school, ninth grade, I took drafting and design.

I fell in love with it.

I had always been a really great artist, had always enjoyed drawing.

It was something that I was able to combine my love for drawing with math and design, and was able to draw out, you know, architectural plans and all that.

And I thought, wow, that was really awesome.

But as much as I enjoyed it, it wasn't like something that I knew, oh my gosh, this is what I want to do for a career.

Same thing said for riding dirt bikes.

I grew up riding dirt bikes from the age of about four years old, started out on training wheels, and I rode dirt bikes every day of my life.

I grew up, some of my superheroes, they weren't football stars or or uh baseball players.

No.

They were Jeremy McGrath, one of the best motocross riders of all time.

But for some reason, I didn't have this thing in my head that, you know what, I want to be Jeremy McGrath when I grow up.

That's what I want to do.

Because why?

I don't know.

The only thing I can think is that it was God who was helping me out because he knew what was gonna happen.

And if you listen to any of my episodes in season one, especially some of the early episodes, I talk about what happened.

And that was in high school, my junior year, when I found out that I had a brain tumor.

And that ended up resulting in me having a surgery to remove that brain tumor to save my life, but resulted in me waking up completely blind.

My life had completely changed from that point forward.

All of those ideas that maybe I had enjoyed things that I loved, like riding dirt bikes, drawing, architecture class, all of that was suddenly no more.

I mean, I don't want to take away from how heartbreaking it has been going blind and all of that stuff being taken from me.

But I sit there and think how much more devastating it would have been if I had been working towards graduating high school and going on, I was gearing up to go to a big university, because I knew all my life I wanted to go and graduate from the University of Florida.

I wanted to go and skip college and become a professional dirt bike rider.

What would have my life been like then when the whole thing that I had been aiming for my whole life was now taken from me?

Now, I mean, I don't want to get too kind of depressing and down the dumps, and you'd be like, oh my gosh, yeah, let's not set any more goals because we're gonna go blind.

That's not what I'm saying at all.

My thing is, I just want you to kind of put it into perspective.

And if you want to set a goal for yourself, set it.

But not only set it for something that's in reach, something that's not so far out there that it's gonna end up in you just being disappointed that you didn't meet that goal.

But also, I just want you to remember that you know what?

Life sometimes gets in the way.

And so be flexible.

Give yourself a break.

Life is tough.

My goodness, I think last year and this year starting out proves that more than ever.

Things don't always go like we think they're gonna go.

So give yourself a break.

Chill out on the goals that you have set for yourself.

All of us, it's goals in your career, goals in your personal life, goals in your marriage, goals for your children, whatever it is.

Everybody's got these goals.

And it's like, chill out.

I don't want to have to really focus on having a goal to get through the end of the day, because to be quite honest, by lunchtime, the whole world could have collapsed by then, much less maybe focused on what in the world's gonna happen and what I'm gonna get done by the end of the day, the end of the week.

I mean, come on.

Now, I get it.

Sometimes I mean, I'm kind of living in a little bit of a dreamland.

We all think have things that we have to do and things that we want to do, and that's good.

It keeps us focused.

But at the same time, just remind yourself to give yourself a break.

And you know what?

When people talk about those goals and those New Year's resolutions, you just tell people, you know what, I'm just living for today.

I'm focusing on right now, focusing on this moment.

I want to make this day count.

I want to make this moment matter.

And you know what?

At the end of this year, who knows where you'll be?

I guarantee you, you'll probably be somewhere away farther along, be a person who's better off than that person who went into the start of this year with a big, lofty goal in mind, and then let themselves get totally sidetracked and end up just sitting out the rest of the year because an obstacle got in the way.

SPEAKER_00: And that's the lowdown on life and travel.

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