Strategic Thinking And Long-term Life Planning

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

Basically, most people do not think about long-term planning, about some kind of strategic changes in their lives and about strategic motivation. Without which qualitative changes are impossible. Without a strategic, long-term understanding of your movement in life, it is very difficult to achieve and implement big plans and goals, and in general, in principle, to change your life for the better.

If there is no strategic vision, if a person does not understand where he wants to come, what resources he will need for this, if he does not keep track of what is happening to his life from year to year, then nothing will come of it. Simply setting strong goals is not enough, especially if these are imposed goals and values from outside.

Usually people agree that it is necessary to think and live strategically because it is beneficial and effective. But in real life, something constantly interferes with this. Most do not have this strategic vector along which they move. Often people do not know how to think and act in long-term categories, this skill is simply not instilled since childhood.

What prevents you from living strategically?

- Fear of life and fear of unpredictability. It is laid down by beliefs of the type: why plan, still nothing will work out, it is impossible to guess what will happen tomorrow, especially in a week, a month, a year. Therefore, why bother at all and think in this direction. Let everything take its course;

- The influence of other people. Other people's opinions often overwhelm your own. Even if you do not seem to agree, the words of relatives, colleagues and friends penetrate into the psyche and gradually become stronger there. And then decisions in life are made based on the opinions of other people;

- Man does not know himself. He doesn't understand what he wants at all? What changes in life do you want in the next few years? What is really important and valuable to him?

- Conflict of values. To formulate a strategy and goals, you need to know yourself well. Be clearly aware of what you want from life and where you are going. And few can boast of this.

- Lack of priorities. A person wants everything at once (and his business, and happy relationships, and to play sports, to maintain health and so that there are hobbies and entertainment and friends …), and such a quantity of “everything” simply does not fit into life.

- Haste and routine. There is simply no time for strategic planning. When life consists of endless affairs, there is simply no time to sit down and think calmly. Routine eats up all the attention, and you do not notice what is happening in your life.

- Lack of energy - The person has formed the habit of constantly squeezing all the juices out of himself. And at some point there is simply no strength and energy to do anything. And I don't want anything. I just want to breathe out from the constant race;

- There are no ideas and plans for long-term changes in life. Why is this happening? Because on the one hand, the psyche is littered with all sorts of rubbish, ideas and beliefs about how to “live” or how “fashionable”. And a person tries to live "not his own life", and then wonders - why is there no joy, why life does not bring satisfaction? When the head is full of "other people's values" - the psyche sees no reason to mobilize forces;

Until these problems are resolved, you will not have any “life strategy”. And willpower will not help here. To cope with these tasks, you need a methodology, a clear system following which you will move exactly in the direction in which you really want.

Facing reality:

When a person is not accustomed to building his life, at least even in his head. Not to mention on paper, on flipcharts (with drawing diagrams). He is completely unaccustomed to planning his life, even in his imagination. In the life of such a person, long-term motivation is generally absent as a class. And all that remains for a person is to function for a while on short-term motivation. That is, just to exist. And this inevitably leads to big problems.

For people who do not have long-term planning, life does not depend on themselves, but on someone or something else. It depends on the sum of the various combinations. For example: from the boss at work, from relationships (which a person often also does not know how to manage), from the motivation that exists today, and tomorrow it may not be there anymore. And the person does not understand what to do with all this.

When a person is not motivated for some long-term periods of time (at least for the next few years of life). He does not understand what he wants and does not know what to expect from life, for example, after 3 years. As a result, he is not motivated to perform any big actions in his life.

Lack of a long-term vision of life:

A person does not have a vision of long-term changes in life, but what is a long-term vision for the psyche? These are not just some pictures, but this is what is called "access to higher-order resources." This is what is capable of giving energy to change the entire structure of life.

The psyche is so structured that the larger the goal, the more energy it is able to bring into the system. That is, it is not the realization of the goal itself that supports a person and gives him strength, but the very fact of having these grandiose goals, the very long-term vision itself, already gives a person an influx of a colossal amount of psychic energy. And if a person has small goals, desires are frail and momentary, respectively, there can be no question of any strategic motivation.

Short-term thinking and strategic blindness:

Tactical or short-term thinking is one of the diseases of modern man, because of which it is impossible to live the life that you want. People are accustomed to think in small, short intervals, to think in short-term categories. Often a person does not even have questions about what I want in 3, 5, 10 years. For the average person, these are sky-high horizons, why think about it? We will wait and see what will be there.

Even if a person plans, sets some plans and goals, then for a week, a month, a maximum of six months - a year, and then no one thinks too much. You can already remain silent about some kind of detailed planning and tracking in which direction life is moving. That is, is it being implemented, what is planned or not? In life, to become more of what is valuable or not? Often, for most people, life goes on by itself. Events and various other factors build a person's life, not he.

As a result of this attitude towards his own life, a person develops strategic blindness. He does not see and does not know how to see what he wants in a few years, and even if there is some vague understanding of what he would like, then there is no understanding of how to achieve it all. Because just wanting is not enough, you need to move towards achieving your goals, track and, if necessary, correct this movement. And often almost no one knows how to do this.

What does strategic blindness lead to?

To the fact that a person does not know how to look at his own life globally and as a result he is torn apart by endless internal conflicts and contradictions. It is very difficult to live in a strategic mode, because you will be constantly pulled out of your long-term thinking by the daily hustle and bustle, routine, endless affairs. You just have no time to sit down and calmly think about your life.

On the one hand, a person is constantly influenced by advertising - what he should want. What kind of life should he strive for. On the other hand, relatives, friends, colleagues, impose their own thoughts and desires. And if a person does not know what he really wants. He has a conflict of different values and desires. What is being promoted in society does not suit him, and what the person himself wants is incomprehensible.

As a result, a person does not know where to live, what his life path is, what his long-term goals are, what his life strategy is, none of this is available. A person does not have a strong foundation under his feet, there is no support around which his life is built. Instead, there are only automatic responses to the propaganda of advertising, the media from TV, from people around or the Internet.

And as a consequence, local momentary problems constantly arise in life. Due to the fact that a person's life is not built, there is simply no foundation in it, there is no clear vector of movement in life. The person starts to run like a squirrel in a wheel. And so he walks in a circle for decades living someone else's, boring, gray life.

Fundamental choice:

And it turns out that a person has two options:

- Or learn gradually to competently, strategically manage and adjust your life;

- Or so and continue to live on the knurled, throwing off responsibility, not bothering about all these things. By type: how the events in life turn out, so it will be.

On the one hand, this seems to be a trifle, but this is what pervades a person's entire life. How you think, how you make decisions, how you manage yourself, how you create something, how you do business, how you build a career, how you build relationships, how you relate to your body, your health.

What does short-term thinking lead to?

Short-term thinking permeates all areas of human life. Over the years, people become even more accustomed to thinking short-term. That is why you can hear phrases like: "It is impossible to plan for a week or a month, but here we are talking about planning for several years." This is what shapes short-term thinking.

And it turns out that as a result, the product of the life of a modern person also has a short shelf life: mobile phones, laptops and other equipment become obsolete in 2 - 3 years. Relationships fall apart on average after a few years, and some do not even reach this date.

As a result, because of short-term thinking and the same behavior emanating from thinking, everything quickly becomes outdated and deteriorated. Most people simply do not know how and do not know how to do for a long time, the product they create, so that it would bring a long-term effect. Moreover, under the product can be anything: relationships, health, business, various services that a person provides, etc. Often people are not accustomed to living, thinking and making efforts for long-term changes, they are not accustomed to building their future.

Two approaches in life:

Imagine two drivers:

One driver has set himself a big, strategic goal. For example: go around a large number of cities. He filled up a full tank and took a few cans with him just in case, so as not to stop again. I calculated and planned the route, carried out a technical inspection of the car so that there were no malfunctions on the road and hit the road. Prepared and motivated for this journey.

Now imagine the second driver. He does not know where he is going, he does not know what distance he needs to travel, he does not know what state his car is in. "Goes well, okay, why poke around in it again." I sprinkled a couple of liters into the gas tank and it's fine. He doesn't think that the car will stall in a couple of kilometers.

The psyche of the second driver does not see the need to mobilize his own forces, because it is not clear why and for what to strain, it is not clear how many resources are needed for the trip. And as a result of such grief, a driver somewhere along the road can stall without reaching a gas station. If you're lucky, someone will pick him up and take him in tow. Well, if you are not lucky, his journey can drag on for a very long time …

These two examples perfectly show what happens in a person's life in short and long term thinking. Besides short-term thinking, what else is being promoted in society?

Consumerism and craving for freebies:

People don't want to invest in their own desired future. They do not want to waste time, effort and energy to create and maintain it. If a person has short-term thinking, he does not see because of "strategic blindness", for which he needs to make efforts here and now. He is not capable of long-term efforts, because he does not understand where they will lead. And he does not understand because there is no long-term thinking. Instead, the trend “take it here and now” is increasingly being promoted, in other words, “consumerism and freebies” is encouraged.

Why are all possible pyramids, programs and trainings on the topic of quick results so popular now? Like how to quickly cut money, how to lose weight quickly, how to quickly create a business, how to quickly glue a broken relationship, etc. Why are so many scams kept on this?

Because people do not want to build their own future, they want to believe in a miracle that a magician will arrive in a blue helicopter and everything will be fine for them, all problems will disappear. Or a person will find a magic pill or a magic way how to get everything he wants without doing anything … But for some reason, in the end, often a person is left with nothing.

Short-term thinking is a disease that needs to be eradicated from your own consciousness. And cultivate strategic long-term thinking instead. Strategic movement in life is a fundamental level, working through which you can really achieve the desired results. Working out this level affects all spheres of life and all life as a whole.

Where is the exit from F?

To replace short-term thinking, which usually prevails in a person's head. When he sees only events happening to him locally in his life and does not see his own life in a global perspective. Instead, long-term thinking should come, when you think about life as a whole, when you can set yourself some long-term tasks and realize big goals for which you want to invest in the future.

Only in this case, your life can really be built the way you want, because in order for life to change from the moment where you are now, you need to invest in it for a long time, you need to do some kind of action for a long time.

In order to build good, high-quality relationships, certain knowledge and time are needed, in order to build a stable working business, to improve health, and whatever it takes, it takes a long time, this applies to anything. Really high-quality, good results in life are formed slowly and in order to achieve them you need to learn how to invest in the future, think strategically, think long-term.

Only when it is there, you have the opportunity to understand yourself, what you want from life, how you want to live, how you want to use your strength and your resources. Only in this case you begin to perceive yourself really objectively. Only when you see life are strategically resolved internal conflicts between different values and you stop being torn between work and personal life, entertainment or something else. Areas of life gradually begin to balance, you understand how much and what you really need.

That's all. Until next time. Respectfully yours, Dmitry Poteev.