These 12 points should be considered when embarking on any journey of change or transformation for the individual.
- Start as early as possible. Your future ideal is looking back at your present decisions and actions judgingly.
- Plan the best journey you can (given the knowledge you have).
- At least consider/research alternatives -to assess which is the best route. If you just set off prematurely you might be going in completely the opposite direction to what you should be going, and will require you to backtrack later, wasting lots of time and effort. Remember, the shortest route between two points is a straight line. Don’t panic if you have set off prematurely, learn from it and get back on track.
- You don’t need to know everything when you start out, the journey is partly (even mainly) about growing into the type of person who can complete it, through acquired knowledge learned from the journey itself.
- The journey may have lots of distractions, or temptations, always keep one eye on the destination. When making decisions between choices, make sure moving closer to the destination is the deciding factor.
- Expect obstacles, they will teach you something about your journey. Consider them a missing part of your plan. Learn from them, they may crop up again further down the road, and you’ll know what to do next time. Some obstacles may even be fun to problem solve.
- Enjoy the journey whenever you can. It’s the thing that is going to take up most of your time. You’re less likely to pursue a goal that requires a dull, uncomfortable, or unenjoyable journey. Sometimes you have no choice, but when you do, pick wisely.
- The worry of fear is often an exaggerated version of the thing itself. The mind plays tricks to instinctively keep us safe. Think it through, what is the worst that could happen, and is that outcome really that bad?
- Listen to that off-putting part of you thoroughly before going any further, negotiate a satisfying resolution (in good faith), so it doesn’t keep popping up, and using up your energy and resolution. All parts of you should be 100% committed to the journey, so setbacks don’t end things later (wasting more of your time).
- Have 3 or 4 good arguments for undertaking the journey to begin with, so that counterarguments don’t get the upper hand. If 40% of you is against the journey, then the remaining 60% is having to pull against this anchor, requiring more expenditure of energy. If 60% is against your journey/ goal/ destination, you’re not going to even try. Do you really want to get to the destination enough? Do you have a big enough reason or enough reasons?
- Is completion of the journey a matter of life or death, very important, not really important at all? Get this straight in your mind. ‘Life and death’ is a big enough reason on its own, and you better get on with it. With ‘very low importance’, obviously not so much, but why not give it a go anyway, it might be fun and a great learning opportunity, since you have nothing to lose either way. Value being a lifelong learner.
- Once you reach your destination, you’ve got your next journey to navigate. Life is made up of many journeys and these will make up the dash between your birthday and the date of death on your gravestone (final destination of this life at least). We have one life (that we know about for sure), so make the most of it, while you can. But remember, it’s not just about hedonistic pleasure, it’s about making things better for others as well.