I am a freakishly OCD Type A personality with first-child syndrome. I have a tendency to over-book, over-try, and, ironically, over-fail -- the inevitable consequence of stretching oneself too thin. That's the problem with perfectionism, amongst the glory and gain is a pretty savage self-sabotaging downside.
But I am also a Perfectionist. That is, I subscribe to Aristotle's philosophy that the purpose of my life is personal happiness, attained through achievement. Perfectionism (philosophy) is the perfectionist's (psychology) dream: it sanctions an overly-ambitious nature of a Type A and gives us a sense of personal validation in the pursuit of our endless list of goals.
Anyway, I made a manifest of my asinine and amazing personal endeavors on DayZero.com, the trendy bucket-list-esque website that has users post 101 Goals to be completed with 1001 days. Naturally, I jumped on the bandwagon in a heartbeat (see my list here). I listed a variety of things, from saving money to filling my closet. The list is full of good intentions. I like to look at it a lot, trying to think of more to add (I still need 27 more), but most of all I LOVE reading other people's lists. I like seeing what other people want, for inspiration and to evaluate my own goals.
Ultimately I think users should consider what the list really is: a question asking, "starting from now, what kind of person do you want to be in 1001 days?". It's a daunting question. We all want to be "better", but what constitutes better is flexible by our own definitions.
I want to be smarter. More educated. Healthier. Wealthier. I want to be more well-traveled and stylish. I want to be a better cook and a better writer. I want to be more well-read. I want to be a published scientist.
But my time and income is limited, and I had to let go of things I wanted/expected to do, in order to fit the most important things in the list. I had to prioritize my dreams, and they lessened a little when I did that. I'm sure many people find their DayZero lists encouraging and inspiring, but they must have not have dreamt very big, because I found it constraining. I had to pick the most important vacations. I had to lower my savings goals to a reasonable number. Somehow, in some alternate unreality, I saw myself having $25K and going to Paris. I've never been very good at math, but my foolishness was a consolation prize to a busy academic schedule and a student's financial status (read: poor). Now reality rudely got in my face and laughed. Paris? Not with a grad student stipend.
It's a bit disappointing.
But I'm sticking with DayZero, and I completed my first goal this past weekend: I sold my poor neglected Roland digital piano.
It brought in $800 and left a gaping hole in the living room feng shui.
The upside (in addition to +$800) is that selling was my DayZero goal, but learning to play the piano was my buyer's DayZero goal.
I thought about going back to my list and adding, "help someone else complete a DayZero goal", but that would be cheating, and perfectionists play by the rules.
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