Life Goals

Life Goals of

Life Goals of Steven
Steven
Student
Life Goals of Steven
Setting goals and reaching them is something we encounter every day of our life and more so throughout our adult development stages. As we age, most would agree that we become wiser and our decision making process is altered due to general experiences and life altering events such as becoming a husband, wife, father, or a mother. During a lifetime, it can be estimated that thousands of goals are established, met, and failed for one individual. Currently in my life, I have a vast number of goals that I am currently pursuing and striving to complete. With the proper planning, determination and will power, I will accomplish all of these goals. As I have entered the early stages of my adult development, I have a new found understanding of the choices I make today and how they will affect my future.
Academically, I have been a college student for more than 15 years. I recently established a new goal of completing my Bachelors degree in Organizational Management. This goal is very important to me for a number of reasons. One, I have a desire to obtain a degree in a field I’ve been working in for the last 18 years to assist my life after the Military. By setting this goal, I have not established something that is out of reach nor is it farfetched. I have given myself a timeline to complete this goal and by the fall of 2015, I will be applying for my degree. This degree will assist me in transitioning out of the Military six years from now. Ultimately, I am tired of going to school. I have been playing around with it for years and this is my last run at it. There are a few things I have done to keep my motivation high to complete this task going. With the current draw down of the US Military, it is very important that I complete my civilian education. With that being said, for me to advance to the next rank, I have to complete my degree. I have also encouraged family and friends to ensure that I do not get side tracked or take a break from school until I complete it. I am also devising a plan to go for my Masters degree once I finish my Bachelor’s degree. Most importantly to me, I want my kids to know that I completed college. Hopefully I can use it as a selling point when I stress the importance of education to them. I am also using tuition assistance from the Military. If I do not complete the course and/or fail the course, I will have to pay back the money for the class. Currently I do not have money to through away on a wasted ambition.
There are multiple professional goals that I have been working for years. I recently moved from Virginia to Missouri. The reason for my move was due too professional business. I came to Missouri to take over a job in which I did not have the opportunity to do in Virginia. My goal has always been to take over a Battalion Maintenance program and create the best program within the Brigade I serve in. To some, this may be an easy goal to reach; however, others fail at this every day. The difficulty in this goal is that my success falls on the ability of other to complete their daily duties and responsibilities. It is hard to force others who do not have the desire to be successful. Ultimately, in the Army, there are too many individuals around that stay in the service for the pay check. With this, I have to figure out what makes their motors turn and attack it. I also have to be able to multi-task multiple projects at one time.
I am determined to hold myself accountable in the success of my new job. I have created a task list on my computer arranged by order of importance. I work on this list and make adjustments daily. I have also adjusted my approach and demeanor in order to become more approachable and deal with others in a more caring and compassionate way. I believe that if I treat people with dignity and respect while showing them support, they will want to be on my team. Lastly, it is important to my career and the advancement of my career that I leave this job successful. Failure to produce results in the assignment would only result in me being forced out of the Army prior to retirement. I have worked too hard and sacrificed way too much to get out of the Military without any benefits. When it comes to dealing with the Soldiers that work for me, I have established battle rhythms by taking input from all of those involved in our operation. I approached in a team manner and let it be known that if one succeeds, we all succeed. This action has made our operations take a complete turnaround overnight.
The most important goal I have today is to become a better father and husband. I am not bad at either nor have I ever been but there are things that I want to change. I look at my family and see that as the kids are getting older, we spend less and less time together as a family. It is hard enough being in the Military. I have spent half of my marriage in other countries missing months and months at a time. On top of that, with our individual functions daily, it is hard to spend quality time together as a family. It is important to me that we sit down and talk to one another about our days, the things we did, or the things we look forward to doing. This goal is important to me because my family is everything to me. When my kids are grown and have families of their own, I want them to say this is how I was raised and this is the way my family did things. I do not want a family who eats fast food on the coach every night at different times, I want to sit down and have a home cooked meal at the dinner table while talking about each other’s days.
I have made a large amount of changes in my life in the last few months that have forced me to start the right changes. Some things I have done turn off the TV and in simpler terms, we have banned eating in front of a TV. With that, we eat dinner together as a family every night at the dinner table. Since we have moved, our house is designed in a way that forces us to see one another more and more often. We have developed a family game night and a family movie night that we will do as often as possible. Our youngest son has a minor case of OCD and he reminds us that we have to have these nights or he has what I would consider a meltdown. I continue to remind my beautiful wife and children of my plans and desires for our family. We have open topics about this and we hold each other accountable for this goal. It will take a group effort for me to be successful in regards to this goal.
Major proponents of adult education believe that adults learn differently from children (Mossler, 2013). With the differences in life experience and different factors of motivation, it is easier for an adult to establish and conquer goals later in life. I am fully confident that these goals of mine will be accomplished. I am wiser in my decision making process these days and I have not created goals that are out of reach. The traits that I carry both in my opinion and the personality trait test I took would state the same thing. I am very calm and organized currently in my life and that brings together the balance and attitude required to reach my goals. In the past, I have struggled making the right decisions however, the older I get, the more ability I have had to reach my goals. The biggest factor is that I have not established unreachable goals.

Reference:
Mossler, R. A. (2013). Adult development and learning. San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint Education, Inc.