Ep. 223 - 2022 Goal Setting (Part 5 - Spiritual)

Join us on the 2022 Goal Setting journey!  Rob continues the multi-part series on the 2022 Goal Setting Workbook, by Dan Miller.   Today's episode covers spiritual goals, including discussion about personal commitment, theological understanding, and meditation.   

You're invited to join us on this journey -  the Goal Setting Workbook is a 100% FREE download and available in the show notes!  

This series includes discussion and review on the seven aspects of our lives:   Financial, Physical, Personal Development, Family, Spiritual, Social, and Career.   

Links:     

• 2022 Goal Setting Workbook by Dan Miller - 100% FREE download

• Guided Meditation - Relax. Change. Create. - with Andrew Johnson
• SMART GOALS - discussed here:
  • Ep. 73 - Goals
    • See show notes for a link to:
    • How To Set SMART Goals (Plus A Free SMART Goals Template) - Best Self Co

Past Episodes on 2022 Goal Setting:

• Ep. 219 - 2022 Goal Setting (Part 1 - Intro / Financial)
  • Put together a plan to get out of debt NOW!  
  • Visit fpu.com/1141840 to sign up and learn more!
• Ep. 220 - 2022 Goal Setting (Part 2 - Physical)
• Ep. 221 - 2022 Goal Setting (Part 3 - Personal Development)
• Ep. 222 - 2022 Goal Setting (Part 4 - Family)
  
  

Finances can contribute to a lot of our stress...but it doesn't have to be that way!  It’s possible when you know how to handle your finances.  Join my virtual Financial Peace University class, and we’ll learn how to dump debt and build wealth.  You won’t even have to leave home.  And now, you can try Financial Peace free for 14 days!  Visit fpu.com/1141840 to sign up and learn more.  Class starts Thursday, January 20, 2022.

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If you want to participate in a group chat with fellow audience members on a similar path, you can join the community on our Telegram chat group:  

• t.me/allaroundgrowth    

Subscribe to the All Around Growth Podcast channel for show updates ONLY:  

• https://t.me/allaroundgrowthpodcast  

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  • This really *does* affect the algorithm...
  • ...as of recording in November 2021 - I would invite you to do this!
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Transcript

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SPEAKER_00 0:02

Hello and welcome back to the show, everybody. Today is Wednesday, November 10th, 2021. This is episode number 223 of the All Around Growth Podcast. And today we are going to continue our short series on setting goals for 2022. Today is part five of this little series that we're doing on setting goals. And today we are going to talk about some spiritual goals. To provide a little bit of context, if this is the first time you are listening to this show or the first time you are catching part of this series, this is a multi-part series from the 2022 goal setting workbook that was written by Dan Miller, author of 48 Days to the Work and Life You Love. This goal setting workbook that we're going to talk about today is available for free in the show notes. So go to the show notes, check it out, and you will be able to get a glimpse of what I'm talking about and what we are working through together. That's right. Me, Andy, a few others in the community out there, and you if you so desire. So in today's episode, we are going to look into and talk about spiritual goals, personal commitment, theological understanding, and meditation. Now this series includes discussion and review on seven aspects of our lives. In the past four episodes, we've covered financial goals, physical goals, personal development goals, and yesterday we talked about family goals, and today we're going to talk about spiritual goals. Now, like I said, we're going to talk about personal commitment, theological understanding, and meditation. And like I've said in most of the episodes to date, or at least the past four episodes, this comes from the goal setting workbook, which was written by Dan Miller. And for those of you who listen to the show regularly, you know that I talk about Dan Miller a lot. I utilize his work as fodder for discussion in the show quite frequently. And I'm also a member of the 48 Days community that is basically like a social network that has stemmed from the book that he wrote, 48 Days of the Work You Love. So check that out too. I'll link to all of this in the show notes as well because it's relevant and it's important. Well, I might just link to the goal setting workbook. I don't want to overwhelm everyone with links unless it's something relevant to that which I have discussed. So let's start looking at this worksheet before we actually hit the road. Quote, asking for something from God does not mean talking God into it, it means an awakening of the gift within ourselves. Close quote. Richard Rohr. Now, like all of these other worksheets that we've worked through, we are looking at things initially in a three-year frame, and then we look at things in a one-year, we look at one-year goals that we can set, and then we look at specific actions that we can take today. So I will share those questions with you as we head down the road, and I will also share my own experiences with you and my thoughts of the day on this. I've already worked through this in doing my work in preparation, so I should be able to speak a little bit more eloquently on my own goals, but rather than share my own goals, I might just kind of share what's on my mind as it pertains to those goals. We shall see. So the first question that we ask ourselves that we write about is can you say that you are now living out God's purpose for your life? And I think that this is a good question to begin. So rather than actually look at these questions one by one, I'm gonna read all of them off and we'll attack them one by one after that. So here we go. Can you say that you are now living out God's purpose for your life? What are you a part of that goes beyond yourself? How have you handled a crisis this last year? And are you comfortable taking steps of faith? Or are you more comfortable with what you have already seen? Do you trust your dreams as being inspired? And how will you be remembered? Now for those of you who are in the Telegram chat group, you may have noticed that a day or two ago I shared a quote about how will you be remembered? And Sean kind of laughed at that and said, That's that's light conversation, lol, something to that effect, and it isn't, but it's good to think about. You know, how do you want to be remembered? How will you be remembered? So we can talk three-year goals and one-year goals, but I think that when we look at finding our purpose in life, and I talk about this a lot, finding our purpose. Maybe if we looked at that and asked ourselves the question, what is God's purpose for my life? And I know that there are some that listen to this that may not identify with being Christian. That's okay. Insert whatever word you want. Am I can I say that I'm living out the purpose the universe has in store for me? Can I say that I'm living out the Creator's purpose for my life? Whatever works for you, do that. But for me, I am a Christian. And I also am feeling more comfortable and confident in that, so I will speak from my own perspective and my own point of view. And I think that for me, reframing things and trying to understand what God's purpose is for my life is maybe a little bit different than simply trying to understand my purpose, my passion. And I mention that because I've been struggling to find my purpose and my passion, but working through this, I'm realizing that unless we have a balanced life in all of those seven aspects of our life, right? And those seven aspects are financial, physical, personal development, family, spiritual, social, and career. And unless we have balance in our life in all seven aspects of our life, we are never truly going to be able to understand what our purpose is, what our passion is. And moreover, if we look at it as trying to understand our passion and our purpose, we may never find it. The creator of the universe didn't build a staircase leading nowhere. We are here as part of something bigger than ourselves. Which is why so frequently in our lives we find ourselves searching to be a part of something bigger than ourselves. Whether that's a church, a volunteer organization, or simple community with friends. We are social creatures, we are spiritual creatures, and that is why, in my opinion, we are always looking to be a part of something bigger than ourselves. And what I'm a part of that's bigger than myself is the church and volunteer organizations. I've been taking active steps in that. How have I handled the crisis this year? Somewhat poorly. I don't need to get into the details of my own personal crisis, but reflecting back, the ways in which I've handled stress well have been suboptimal. And the complaints I have about people and their inability to communicate lead me to believe that my own communication skills require a fair amount of work. And in hindsight, I did not actively communicate to the degree in which I should have. Now I'm not suggesting that doing so would have prevented some of the issues that I'm currently experiencing, but the reality is I don't know because I didn't try. Am I comfortable taking steps of faith? Or am I more comfortable with what I've already seen? I would say that I'm comfortable taking steps of faith. The more I learn in this life, the more I also understand. Well, the more that I learn in this life, the more I realize that the less I understand. And that is most certainly relevant in this dialogue about spirituality. Because a lot of what we do in our spiritual lives is based on faith. And I've always had some trouble with that. Had some discussions with people about faith. Why did they believe what they believed? And they simply say it's faith. And I've said, well, clearly, that's blind faith. You don't understand what you believe. And this leads me into the little brief segue that I didn't think I was going to touch on, but I initially got involved in the church a couple years ago because I wanted that social aspect of my life. I wanted to participate in my community. And that's certainly given me the opportunity to do so, but that's stirred up a lot of my past, my religious past, and it's stirred up a lot in my mind. And I'm feeling a stronger calling to explore my own spirituality, especially with Orthodox Christianity. Because, quite frankly, the more that I learn about it, the objective of Orthodox Christianity is to commune with God, to be more godlike. That is what we're trying to do in this world. It's fascinating to me to learn a little bit more about religious faith and one that seems a bit obscure and uh quite frankly strange here in the United States. It's something that's practiced more in other countries, less so here, but there's a lot of reasons contributing to my interest in that. Perhaps I'll talk more about that later. Now, while I don't have too many dreams, I do trust them as being inspired by something. Whatever that is, I don't know where they come from, I don't know. But there's a lot going on that we don't understand within our brains and within our minds. And I think dreams are probably something worth paying attention to, and that's why I keep a dream journal next to my bed. A legal pad and a clipboard. And while I don't have dreams all that frequently, thoughts that come to me in the night or dreams, I write on that pad. I most certainly do not sleep with a cell phone in my bedroom. That really has less to do with tinfoil hat stuff like EMF and things like that, but electromagnetic frequencies that is. But I just don't think it's good practice to be that attached to your device, to rely on it for your alarm, to do any number of things that we do with our smartphones. I'm trying to actively disengage from my use in them, even though I am sitting here talking about this very thing on one and recording with one. I'm such a hypocrite. And ultimately, how do we want to be remembered? After I shared that, I remembered reading something about those who are remembered are those who live a life full of love. So think about that guys. When we look at three-year goals for our spiritual goals, we want to look at our personal commitments, our theological understanding and meditation. And how will you develop your daily devotional meditation or reflection time? This is an editable PDF, like I've said, and it gives you opportunity to write and expand on these questions that I've previously asked, including this one, along with space to write out action steps on what you will do. And finally, one year goal is I will plan a spiritual retreat too. Again, more open space. And this got me thinking. I've never taken a spiritual retreat, but this might be a good opportunity to begin thinking about that and begin planning that. Try to get to know God. Beginning today, I will grow and expand my faith by, personally, I will grow and expand my faith by reaching out, touching base with my the pastor at my local church, and talking about spiritual goals. And I did that. And we are trying to work out a date right now. And uh it sounds like he's excited about that. Not surprisingly, because, well, he's a pastor. And that's what they do. They talk about spirituality with people in the church, outside the church, all with the objective of trying to grow our relationship with God, become closer to God, and well, everything else that pastors do. So we also have uh I will read. And in terms of spiritual goals, guys, like I said, we're looking at personal commitment, theological understanding, and meditation. And in one of the other episodes recently, that I lingered to the goals anymore.