I have set goals to follow a particular diet without having any particular goal for how much weight to lose, and not experienced the regret you describe. I would certainly prefer that any given day’s weight be less than the day before, and I occasionally wish I’d done better at following my plan(s), but have not experienced any sort of desire that I’d done better so that I would have lost more weight.
It’s important to clarify that I am emphatically not saying to set a fake process-goal as a means to achieving your end-product goal. Rather, I’m saying that you must actually abandon your product goal and replace it with a pure process goal, having no attachment to achieving a particular result.
So, the lottery example is really quite unrelated to this sort of thing, unless your goal were to play the lottery every day, not to win the lottery. ;-) In that sense, I could say that by making a process goal (e.g. certain amount of salad eaten each day), I am “buying tickets” in the hopes of getting a win on average, without paying much attention to individual wins and losses.
In the last year or so, I’ve lost 40+ pounds by my rather erratic method, despite having had relatively few days where I’ve done all that well at achieving my process goals. It’s pretty clear to me that I could (potentially) be going a LOT faster if I were better at following my process goals, but at the same time, it’s rather nice that I’m making progress at all. If I’d been following product goals instead (how much weight to lose), I undoubtedly would’ve spent most of my time frustrated, and likely given up on some approaches way too prematurely.
Rather, I’m saying that you must actually abandon your product goal and replace it with a pure process goal, having no attachment to achieving a particular result.
That seems like a recipe for lost purposes to me...
Attachment and desire are two separate things. I can desire to lose weight, without being attached to losing weight on any given day. As mentioned in the grandparent comment, this has actually netted me a good 40 pounds of weight loss. How are your non-”lost purposes” doing, instrumentally?
I have set goals to follow a particular diet without having any particular goal for how much weight to lose, and not experienced the regret you describe. I would certainly prefer that any given day’s weight be less than the day before, and I occasionally wish I’d done better at following my plan(s), but have not experienced any sort of desire that I’d done better so that I would have lost more weight.
It’s important to clarify that I am emphatically not saying to set a fake process-goal as a means to achieving your end-product goal. Rather, I’m saying that you must actually abandon your product goal and replace it with a pure process goal, having no attachment to achieving a particular result.
So, the lottery example is really quite unrelated to this sort of thing, unless your goal were to play the lottery every day, not to win the lottery. ;-) In that sense, I could say that by making a process goal (e.g. certain amount of salad eaten each day), I am “buying tickets” in the hopes of getting a win on average, without paying much attention to individual wins and losses.
In the last year or so, I’ve lost 40+ pounds by my rather erratic method, despite having had relatively few days where I’ve done all that well at achieving my process goals. It’s pretty clear to me that I could (potentially) be going a LOT faster if I were better at following my process goals, but at the same time, it’s rather nice that I’m making progress at all. If I’d been following product goals instead (how much weight to lose), I undoubtedly would’ve spent most of my time frustrated, and likely given up on some approaches way too prematurely.
That seems like a recipe for lost purposes to me...
Attachment and desire are two separate things. I can desire to lose weight, without being attached to losing weight on any given day. As mentioned in the grandparent comment, this has actually netted me a good 40 pounds of weight loss. How are your non-”lost purposes” doing, instrumentally?
Okay, I understand what you mean now.