OMag Adjectives

8/4/2019 OMag Adjectives

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EXPERT ADVICE, INSIGHT, REALLY SMART MOVES

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W H A T I W A N T Y O U T O D O IS i,~,;:,-~:,,i ~ .T,( ) " :, ....... : , : . . .. ( ) l i l. , . 1 ~ ! 1 . ~ , , \ I ., t . , , L , ,. ~ , ;I ! < N O W P I C K T H EBIGGEST, MO ST AMBITIOUS ONE.ILLUSTRATIONS BY THE HEADS OF STAT.E

"LIFE WOULD BEsaid Ilsa, a fledglinneur, "if I could j

business to pay all my bills: AnSue, wanted to have a baby. "Bewould mak e me happier than anyworld," she told me. Like any elife coach, I wanted everything Sue that they wanted for themselvfor a magic wand that would letboppity-boo their dreams into regodm other-style. Instead, I did tthing: I worked with them asto-d0 lists and financial plans aup on computer software and fo

Although it seemed like a gootime, my boosterism had someblowbaek. You see, Ilsas busineeed, ~out its rapid growth requwork like a pack m ule. Sue evebaby, who filled her heart wiher ears with colicky shriekingunhinged her. Both women wdistress after achieving their gtheyd ever been before.

I blame myself. In my fairy goI shouldre paid less attention to lprobed deeper into the reasons Ilhad focused on those particularbecause stated goals are quite madictate our attitudes and behaviorwe put our energy. But using magias most fables (and almost every Hmo vie) can attest, is a bad idea. of helping clients like Sue and Ilshow to help peop le set goals to gewant without unintended conseq

dANUAI~Y 201I ! OPR


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WORDS OF POWERThe difference between a dangerous spell-urn, I mean goal--and a safe, effective onehas everything to do with parts of speech.Most goal setters use mainly nouns and verbs("I want my business to succeed: "I want tohave a baby"). This frequently leads to ei-ther outright failure or the kind of successthat doesnt make people nearly as happy asthey expect. But theres another class ofwords that work much better--adjectives.

Ive come to depend on adjectives becausegoals made of nouns and verbs are risky:They bring to mind "imagined situations: asopposed to "imagined experie.nees." The twoare subtly but crucially different, and experi-ences, not situations, are always what wereally want. Ilsa expected business successto produce feelings of contentment; Suethought a baby would make her feel loved.Neither fully anticipated what would hap-pen after they achieved their goals.

By using adjectives, you can avoid thistrap by focusing all your efforts on the qual-ity of the experience you want to create. Thisprocess is harder than "normal" goal set-ting-it requires some serious soul-searchingand perhaps a good thesaurus--but it doespay off. Heres how to start:

STEP ONE: Pick a goat, any goat.Think of a typical noun-verb goal, some-thing for which you frequently hanker. Be

honest rather than politically correct. Somepeople may h ave deep desires to establishworld peace, stop global warming, and endpoverty, but maybe you actually think moreabout, I dunno, reaching your target weight.And thats okay. This is not a beauty pageant(those contestants can afford to wish forworld pe ace; theyve all reached their targetweight). W hat I want you to do is less.up toyour real desires. Now pick the biggest,most ambitious one.

STE P TW O: G aze into the future,You dont need a crystal ball to see whats upahead; the three pounds of gray matterbetween your ears will do fine. Use yourbrainpower right now to imagine what yourlife would be like if you realized the goal youjust identified. Create a detailed fantasyabout it. Loiter there awhile, observing yourdream-come-true with your minds eyes,ears, nose, skin. Then, clear your mind andyour throat: Its time for the m agic words.

STEP THREE: Generate adjectives.This is th e heart of a really effective goal-spell. Begin listing adjectives that describehow yo u feel in your dream -come-true sce-nario. This is a simple task, but not an easyone. It requires that you translate holistic,right-brain sensations into specific, left-brain words. Author C raig Childs comparesthis to "trying to build the sky out of sticks:

Spend enough time in your imagined tion to let your brain leaf through itcabulary, scouting out accurate adjecIn goal setting as in fairy tales, themum magic number is three. Donuntil you have at least that many wadescribe those lovely feelings.

My clients frequently try to squirm othe process by muttering, "Its hard plain; or "Oh, I dont kno w; or "I cscribe it." Well, of course its hard to eyes, you do know; and if you keep tryingcan too describe it. Your adjectiveshave to be eloquent; use simple w ordenergetic, focused, delighted, and fineyou owe it to yourself to persevereyouve found some reasonably descrwords. Three of era. W rite them h ere1.2.3.~:~ii, STEP FOUR: Focus o n anythincan be described with you r adjectDrop the fantasy situation you imaginstep two and concentrate on those atires. You might notice that these word~ bring your stated goal into shfocus. For instance, if your New Yearlution is to lose ten pounds--a noungoal--but your adjectives are strong,dent, an d healthy, you might.realizyour actual aim is to get fit. You w othat the strategy you cam e up w ith t(i.e., eating your weight in hydroponbage) might leave y ou thinner but a,cumbent on a couch w ithout the eneleave the house--which isnt what youwant. Thanks to adjectives, you catune your strategy: Swap a fad diemeeting w ith a nutritionist, and signweight training classes at the gym .

Sometimes tweaking isnt enougadjective goal might utterly contradistated goal. Time to rethink that ortarget. For example, if you think yoto win an Academy Award, you may your Oscar acceptance speech, and feeued, satisfied, and unstoppable: If yothat only a night at the Kodak Theatlead to those feelings, you might years obsessively pursuing movie stignoring everyone (continued on pa


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(continued fiom page 38 ) and everything ex- made her feel tense, joyless, and insecure).cept your ambition. Odds are you still When she scanned her life for activities andwouldnt win an Oscar, but youd probablp relationships that made her fee] allmanner of rewards without even noticingthem. On the other hand, if you immediatelybegin focusing on aspects of your presentlife that m ake yo u feel valued, satisfied, orunstoppable, youll feel an instant lift. All

E XP E RIE NCE S,SITUATIONS, ;",

sorts of things may happen. Su re, you mightwin an Oscar. But if you don t find yourselfonstage, blurting out that the statue sure isheavy, youll be left with.. .a pretty good life.You m ight even find that as you follow thethings that make you feel appreciated,youve tripped into an entirely differentreef. So starting now, survey your life foranything (I mean anything) that can be de-scribed with any of those three words.Putting all your attention on those aspectsof your life will make you happier right nowand help you create future situations thatfulfill your true desires.T H E S C I E NC E O F G O O D M A G I CI realize that all this sounds a little woo-woo,but psychological research on happihessbacks up my strategy. Over and over, re-searchers studying hap piness have foundthat the situational elements people crave--money , social status, possessions--dont reli-ably lead to an experience of well-being. Bycontrast, learning to find joy in the presentmom ent (a .k.a . focusing on experiences youtruly want in your life) increases life satisfac-tion, improves health, and allows us to livelonger, mo re fulfilling lives.

~VIy clients form my own database ofsorts, convincing me that good g oal-settingmagic is (to use the social science terms)robust and valid. For example, when I askedIlsa to go back in time and imagine whatshe once thought shed get from a successfulbusiness, she described herself with the ad-jectives relaxed, joyful, and secure (ironi-cally, the demands of her wildfire success

erywhere: in gardening, reading novels,playing with her niece. "Damn!" she toldme. "Id already succeeded before I sue-eeeded!" Indeed.

In Sues case, remembering how shed ex-pected motherhood to make herfeel yielded the adjectives loved,rejuvenated, and emotionally re-plenished. She realized that hernoun-verb goal (having a babywhos beau tiful and also colicky)1 actually created the opposite of

her adjective goal--she felt unappreciated,haggard, and drained. It turned out that hermagical adjectives described the way she feltwhen connecting with old friends. Both Ilsaand Sue managed to give more attention andt ime to the things that evoked the feelingsthey really wanted. (Thats the beauty ofadjective-based goals: They can wo rk evenwhen youre already suffering the conse-quences of unw ise noun-verb spells.) I lsacarved out time for reading and g ardening;Sue put the baby in the bouncy seat andcaught up with friends on Faeebook .

These efforts-helped Ilsa and Sue workand parent better, and handle the difficultiesconjured by their original goals, all of whicheased my fairy godmother guilt.

In other words, we lived happily everafter. So if you find yourself longing forsome idealized goal, tal~e a moment to gofishing for adjectives. Then use them toidentify the aspects of your life that arealready drawing you toward your hearts de-sires. Focusing o n these people and activi-ties will lead you g ently toward even m orefulfilling experiences. One day y ou m ay findyourself in a situation more interesting anddelightful than anything you ever imagined.Listen closely and youll hear m y annoyinglittle voice in your head, whispering,Bippity-boppity-boo. []~ HARTHA BECK is h eI ~~" a u t h o r o f s i x b o o k s ,I~~"" inc tudingSteer ingbyL___~[~. Starlight (Roda[e).


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