Can we live without Goals?
Are our Goals and Stress interconnected?
This is when we realize that there
is a clear misunderstanding about what a goal is, how to set goals in life, how
to achieve them, and how to derive satisfaction from reaching a goal.
There is a greater amount of stress because goals are not understood properly. If you want to reduce your stress and live with less distress, you have to make it a point to clarify your take on goals and stress.
Needs and Wants
The origin of a goal rests with the
needs and wants of an individual. Any goal without the
patronage of the corresponding need or want will lead to distress. More of
this we shall discuss later when we discuss types of stress.
The motivational cycle starts with needs and wants. Needs are necessities of life that you can’t do without. It includes physiological needs like food, water, clothing, shelter, and sleep, psychological needs like security, safety, well-being, love, education, and social needs like friends, family, work, and community. Wants are how, where, and when these needs are fulfilled.
For instance, a simple physical
need may be a need for food. How to eat, what to eat, where you eat, and when you eat, are
determined by other factors than your hunger. Most of our likes and dislikes
are because of wants rather than our needs. Food is a necessity, but how many
times we eat, what type of food we eat, which place we go to eat, and how we
eat, are all governed by our wants.
For example, drinking too many cups
of coffee or tea may not be a physiological need at all but a habit picked up
over a while that has led to a physical craving. Thus, it becomes a want or a
learned drive.
As needs are camouflaged by
accompanying wants, we shall call all of them wants.
Expectations from the needs & wants
Before you choose a goal, you have
an idea about what you may obtain by reaching the goal. For example, if the
need is hunger, then the goal is food. However, it is not so simple, as any
food is not acceptable. We just don’t eat whatever is available. Depending upon
our budget, our preferences, and the extent of hunger, we may choose a
particular food to eat mainly because we know what could be our satisfaction
level after eating the food.
Our expectations encompass not only
just the food, but also how it smells, how it tastes, how it looks, and
sometimes how it feels with touch. The higher the number of wants, the greater
the expectations.
Thus, expectations could be Overt (external), fulfilling the psycho-social needs and wants, or Covert (internal), fulfilling the psycho-physiological needs and wants.
Once the expectations are more or
less fixed, we decide upon the goal-directed behavior. We may either buy the necessary groceries and prepare food or go to the restaurant and eat. To do all
this, we have to keep in mind how much we can afford to spend on food.
Goal-directed behavior can take up two forms depending upon the want and the goal we have chosen. Suppose someone says the food is good in a restaurant, we would like to approach it whereas if someone says the food is very bad, we would like to avoid the same. Certain foods we want to eat, while certain other foods we want to avoid.
Thus, goal-directed behavior can be
to approach the goal or avoid the goal.
Goal
The goal-directed behavior continues until the goal is reached. For instance, an animal in the forest keeps on searching for food and stops doing it only when it comes to the goal.
The smaller the goal, the easier it
is to reach it. When people are given big goals, it may take an indefinite time
to reach them, and the goal-directed behavior becomes perennial and dissipated.
When you have lifetime goals, break
them up into smaller units to become manageable and reachable.
Daily, getting up in the morning,
brushing your teeth, taking a bath, having breakfast, etc. are all goals. You
continue to work toward it until you obtain it, and once you obtain it, you
stop the goal-directed behavior.
Unrealistic Goals
Winning a competition, getting a rank, becoming rich, etc. are unrealistic goals. However, people are goaded towards them and as individuals, we borrow these goals thinking that they are reachable. We may not be motivated to reach them, but we are forced to have these as goals. The chances of succeeding to reach unrealistic goals are almost nil, and even if we do so, we can’t derive satisfaction from it. The ‘to-do lists’ that are not backed by needs and wants are not goals at all and are unrealistic.
Realistic goals
Realistic
goals can be classified under three categories -- Involuntary, Habitual, and
Voluntary.
Activities like sleep, breathing,
heart rate, temperature regulation, and other bodily functions come under
involuntary goals. They keep happening automatically until there are drastic
changes. These changes enable us to take note and then it becomes voluntary.
Habitual goals are those that we
engage in routinely like waking up at a particular time, brushing our teeth, having
breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and drinking water, coffee, tea, alcohol, etc. These
activities are done regularly without too much conscious effort. Any
significant change in not fulfilling these goals will make us aware of them.
The other psycho-social goals like
living in a house, locking our belongings, becoming a member of institutions
and organizations, getting married, having children, being employed, and opening a
bank account, are done with intention and planning. We have to give a lot of
our time and resources to accomplish these goals. Hence, they are voluntary
goals.
Comparison of Satisfaction &
Expectation
Once we reach a goal, we compare our
expectations with our achievements. The comparison could be self-generated or borrowed. Self-generated comparison
is to judge satisfaction against our expectations whereas borrowed comparison is
where we judge our satisfaction against ideas borrowed from others. For
instance, let us say, you buy a car. You are satisfied if you are making a self-generated
comparison. However, if you listen to someone complaining about your car’s
features and performance, your borrowed comparison leads to dissatisfaction.
If your self-generated comparison
of satisfaction and expectation matches, the motivation cycle comes to an end,
only to recur once again. For example, we go to a restaurant expecting that the
food is good. If the food gives us satisfaction, we stop eating. However,
hunger sets in once again after a while, and the motivation cycle repeats.
The Motivation Cycle
The diagram below explains the motivation cycle. Needs and wants with expected satisfaction set out to reach the corresponding goal through goal-directed behavior. Once the goal is reached, the obtained satisfaction is compared with the expected satisfaction.
If they match, then the
satisfaction leads to neustress. Also, when the need or want is not strong
enough and is part of the routine (especially involuntary and habitual goals),
the achievement of the goal leads to neustress.
When satisfaction exceeds
expectations, it leads to Eustress.
In case there is dissatisfaction after matching the two (expectation and achievement), it leads to distress.
Thus, the motivational cycle is directly connected to the stress level of the individual. The origin of the cycle is in the needs and wants that lead to goal-directed behavior. Once the goal is reached, the satisfaction obtained is compared with the one expected. When they match each other, the cycle comes to an end, only to start another cycle all over again.
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