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For those of you who cook, how often have you taken a recipe and changed it because you lack certain ingredients, or you have a dislike for a particular ingredient’s flavor. I do it all the time, my cupboards are pretty well stocked to make most recipes from around the world, but often there’s one ingredient that’s missing. Do I not make the recipe, no I’ll make it anyway, because I know what I can replace it with that will make a slightly different flavor but not so different the dish won’t be enjoyed.

I hear you say “where is she going with this? I thought it was an article about changing goals not food cooking”. Well, actually, a set of goals can be viewed as a recipe for your life. You choose your goals by looking first at what you value. This can be anything that you consider important and vital to your enjoyment of life, for example:

• Freedom
• Family time
• Travel
• A high level job
• Being in the fresh air
• Living close to family

The list can be long or short, but it always, always is what is important and of value to you. Your values will affect what your goals in life are and how you will achieve them. However, there are times when the goals we have change.

When you look at your life recipe there may be times when the ingredients are no longer to your taste, maybe you need to change an ingredient because something else in your life changed. Sometimes when I’m coaching I get the feeling that something isn’t resonating with the client that I’m working with. When we delve deeper into the issue it is usually that something has changed in the client’s life and one or more of their goals no longer fits, but they have this goal written on paper and it never occurs to them to give themselves permission to change the goal.

So what happens when you realize your goals need to change? Well, just like the recipe for the dish you are making when you have a missing ingredient you have to search through your store cupboard and choose the ingredients carefully and thoughtfully, making sure that they will compliment the other flavors that please you and complete your dish to your satisfaction.

Life goals change with time. This is a good thing. It means you are human. It is one of the reasons I encourage you to have short term and long term goals. Short term goals build to reach long term goals, build confidence in ourselves and tend to be pretty well fixed, but long term goals can and do change. Keeping this in mind encourages you to be more flexible and feel more comfortable about embracing changes when they arise.

Enjoy your life journey, create new recipes from the ingredients in your store cupboard and remember change happens, it’s normal, it’s natural, and it’s there to be embraced.

TTFN

Amanda