Several years back I found myself becoming viscerally aware of my own suffering. I desperately wanted this suffering to go away, but it was always there, like static in the background. So, I put on my problem solving hat and decided I was going to take control of my situation. I was going to educate and work my way out of suffering.
And so I dove deep into Buddhist literature. I tried to memorize the Buddha’s teachings and practice meditation in hopes that this would take away my suffering. These tactics worked at times, during which my mind was very quick to reward itself for its hard work and discipline. But most times, they didn’t work. So, I did what we Americans are taught to do within our education system. Work harder. Think more. Analyze more completely. I had been rewarded all throughout my professional career for these character traits. This was a habit. So, I had no choice but to apply this same mindset to solving my own suffering.
The harder I worked the further I moved from my goal. But thankfully, I started to realize that there must be errors in my approach. Right around then, I came across the following words from Kosho Uchiyama in his book, Opening the Hand of Thought - “Goals are inherently unstable.”
These words initially were an affront to my mind. Goals are unstable? Our entire modern society runs on goals! I’ve been through endless performance review cycles in large corporations where I had to lay out my goals for the coming year, align them with the company’s goals, and then accomplish these goals. If I did this better than my peers, I got rewarded with money and promotions. I have been conditioned my entire life to set goals and then achieve them. Rinse and repeat. And then I remembered the problem that led me to this book. Were goals the source of my suffering?
I tabled that thought for a while. Just let it rattle around in my head for a few years. I had this deep feeling it was true. But I just didn’t understand how to reconcile that with the only way I knew how to live my life.
And so my suffering grew worse over the years. It wasn’t just mental. It was physical. I was plagued by stomach pain and sleeping issues. I battled them constantly, along with the anxiety that I had no training to fix these problems. I was trained to think, but was increasingly aware that thinking was the source of my problems. The more I tried to turn off thinking, the more I thought (it was like telling someone to “not think about an elephant” which of course makes them think about an elephant… but with more pain).
This led me to therapy, which eventually made me realize that the secret lies in the title of Uchiyama’s book - Opening the Hand of Thought. I was trying too hard to fix things. My grip was white-knuckle-tight on life and I had to loosen it up. Whatever that meant. That’s easier said than done, because when you are conditioned all your life by a society that demands “success,” what does life even mean when you abruptly stop barreling down this path?
Anyway, as I was struggling with this, one of my therapist’s (that’s right… I had multiple at one time) comments dredged up Uchiyama’s warning about goals from the depths of my mind. She said that we can look at our lives as explorers, directing a boat in the middle of a vast ocean. When we live our lives in a purely goal-oriented manner, it’s like we see an island in the distance, and we try to reach that island as quickly and efficiently as we can. Those who get there the fastest are rewarded for their “work ethic.” But inevitably the people who pat you on the back, pay you, promote you, or praise you on social media, move onto something else, leaving you looking for the next island to conquer.
On we go, from island to island, collecting trophies, houses, cars, status… whatever we think we desire and will translate to lasting happiness. And then one day (if we are lucky) we wake up confused and exhausted, wondering where it all went wrong.
My therapist said there is a different way to live. We can be aware of the islands in front of us, but we can also look up into the sky and find our North Star. Then we point our boat towards this North Star. Each of us has a different North Star. It could be family, community, nature, religion, or even work. It’s all very personal to each of us, and takes some work to figure out, simply because we are usually not asked to look for it. I reflected on this for a while and the truth of this started to blossom in my life. It started to solidify the difference between a goal and an intention. The goal is the island. The intention is the North Star. So, I just try to keep my awareness on my intentions in my life. Sometimes my goals and intentions are aligned, which is awesome because I can sink back into my default goal-addicted wiring. But over time, I find that if I just drift off towards the goal (whatever it is) I usually lose track of my North Star and end up heading in the wrong direction. Luckily, when that happens I get this yucky feeling that something is off. And most times, when I reflect on this, it is because I have veered off course. I have failed my intention.
So what?! This happens all the time. We try and fail. Over and over and over again. But as long as we are aware of this process and have the discipline to course correct, we are awake living our lives, rather than living in delusion.
So what are we to do with goals? It’s a silly question. We cannot get rid of goals in our lives any more than we can get rid of gravity. Goals are the heart of capitalism - our world’s most dominant “religion.” But, individually we can choose to live within this system and outside it at the same time. We can choose to figure out what our North Star is and say no to the goals that take us further away from it, even if this means less money, toys, and status.
Try it out and see how it works. See what sort of pain comes up (probably of the FOMO type) but then also see if you find more unconditional contentment in life. If it doesn’t work, I have great news for you! Your goals will be sitting and waiting for you, ready to once again take the steering wheel of your life.