What You Should Do With Conflicting Goals

I think it’s important to have goals in life and they definitely do help you change your life for the better. Not to mention having goals gives you a clear reason to get up in the morning. But what should you do with conflicting goals?

You might have so many goals that it’s hard to know what you should spend your time on. Some very big goals can be so time-consuming that you simply have to make sacrifices and choose which goal to pursue and which one to forget about.

But how can you know what goals you should prioritize? Is it possible to reach all the goals you have? What to do when you have two goals that conflict completely? Let’s find out.

What are conflicting goals?

Conflicting goals are simply goals that conflict. It means that one way or the other it’s hard or even impossible to either work on both goals at the same time or it’s not even possible to reach them both, at least at the same time.

As you noticed, I mentioned time twice. Time constraints tend to be the central problem with conflicting goals.

You only have 24 hours in a day, so you can’t possibly do ‘everything’. Also, sometimes two goals conflict completely. You can’t be both married with kids and also single and free to go wherever you like. You can’t spend all your money now and also save it for a rainy day.

Sometimes goals conflict a lot and sometimes just a little bit. You need to know how much your goals conflict to know what options you have. If you aren’t clear about your situation and your plans for the future, it’s hard to know what you should spend your time on.

If your goals completely contradict each other, you have a tough choice to make. But if it is possible to reach them both, you just have to have a good plan and know how much time and energy you are going to allocate to each of them.

How can goals conflict

Goals can conflict in different ways. You need to know what is the problem you are facing and then try to come up with a solution for that.

1. Time

Time is the most common problem. You don’t have enough hours or energy to do absolutely everything you’d like to do.

This also means that it can for example be very hard to choose your profession if you’re interested in vastly different careers. To some extent, it is possible to have different jobs in your lifetime. But if you’re considering careers that require years of education or are in very competitive fields, choosing just one is probably necessary.

2. Place

It’s unfortunately impossible to be in two places at once. This poses a problem when you dream of living in two different countries or want to see the whole world.

If you’re planning on moving abroad, there’s a good chance that you will sometimes feel sad when you can’t attend some weddings and birthdays or see your old friends as often as you’d like. I still absolutely recommend moving abroad, it can change your whole life!

3. Money

You can’t have your cake and eat it too. Money is a big problem for many and it’s no wonder since most jobs don’t pay particularly well.

If you have expensive dreams, there’s a good chance that you don’t have enough money to do them all. So you have to choose what really matters.

4. Values

When choosing what goals to pursue, you sometimes have to take your personal values into account. Perhaps you are interested in a career that doesn’t quite align with your values and principles and that poses a dilemma.

Sometimes it’s possible to find the golden mean and combine goals and values that seemingly contradict each other. For instance, you might want to become a fashion designer, but at the same time, environmental values are very important to you and you don’t want to promote consumerism.

In this case, you might want to look into working for (or starting) a brand that aims to minimize the need to buy new clothes often.

Conflicting goals examples and solutions

Here are some examples of conflicting goals and what you can do about them. Remember that you don’t have to commit your whole life to just one thing and you don’t have to choose just one lifestyle.

Living in two different countries

If you wish you could live in two places at once, you either have to live a few years in one and then move to the other or get a job that allows you to work from wherever so that you can relocate every few months. Possibly you could also live in one country and simply travel often to the other.

Career woman Vs. Stay-at-home mom

Do you dream of staying home with your kids full-time but you also want to work 24/7 and advance as fast as possible in your career? You need to set very clear boundaries for yourself and choose how many hours you want to give to your kids and how many hours you want to work.

Focus on being extra productive when you work and spending quality time with your kids when you’re with them.

Having two different careers

Do you wish you could be a lawyer and a doctor? These professions don’t go very well together, so it’s best to think very carefully about which one is a better match for you. What kind of working hours do you want? How much responsibility are you comfortable with? Do you want to be able to work from home?

You can also try to ask lawyers and doctors what they think about their career choices. You can do this online.

Social butterfly vs. Staying alone at home

If you’re an introvert who dreams of making new friends and getting out more, you have a bit of a dilemma. The important thing is that you know how much you can socialize and how much alone time you need. Start going out maybe one or two days a week and see how that goes.

Don’t be afraid to turn your phone off if you don’t want to be available all the time. It’s also a good idea to tell your new friends that you need a lot of alone.

Work hard vs. Have a lot of free time

Big goals tend to require a lot of work. But you don’t want to spend your whole life just working. What you need to do, is to set clear goals for yourself and choose how many hours a day you are willing to work. Prioritize what matters the most.

You also need to aim to be efficient and spend as little time as possible on meaningless things that can take up a lot of time, like Instagram.

Related article: How I Became Productive after Procrastinating for Years

Healthy life vs. Enjoy life without restrictions

Having healthy habits is of course good. But where do you draw the line? You don’t want to be so obsessed with having a healthy lifestyle that you never let yourself eat candy or skip a workout even when you’re feeling under the weather.

Be clear about how often you exercise and how often you rest. Choose when or in what situations you throw your healthy eating habits out the window. You can for example eat pizza every Friday or have a limit of two bags of candy per month.

Two different online businesses

Once you start creating any kind of content online, you will feel like there are a thousand things you should do. But that’s neither feasible nor necessary.

If you have many different ideas for your online business(es), you need to rank them and first only do one thing. Later on, once you have mastered the first thing, you can start new projects.

What do you need to do when your goals conflict

It’s not fun to have conflicting goals and feel like you can’t possibly do everything you want in life. Believe me, I’ve been there. The good news is that you often can reach goals that at first glance seem to contradict each other.

First of all, you have to know which goal is the most important to you. If you could only achieve one goal in your life, which one would it be?

This is the goal that you need to prioritize above all else. If you absolutely can’t do both this and some other goal, the other one needs to go.

Secondly, you need to try to come up with ways to make your conflicting goals work. Could you perhaps commit the next few years to one goal and then focus on the other? Could you reduce your expectations a little and allocate less time for each of your goals, so that you can do them both?

You also need to know how difficult your goals are to reach and how much time, money, and effort they require. Do some of them require you to take risks? How does that affect other things in your life?

Be very clear about what each goal entails and what you are willing to do for them. Then you need to know which goal you are going to prioritize and create a plan on how you can reach all the goals that you choose to go after.

Related article: What are You Willing to Give Up to Change Your Life

Conclusion

It’s quite common to have conflicting goals because there are so many things to do in life and most of them require a lot of time and energy.

If you are in a situation where you have to choose between two goals, take your time to really consider what you want in life and how serious you are about your goals. Sometimes we have goals and dreams that actually wouldn’t even make us happy. So do try to figure out what truly makes sense for you and your plans in life.

Even if you right now feel like it’s impossible to reach all of your goals in one lifetime, I want to tell you that you absolutely should try to achieve your most important goals. Just because some goals seem unrealistic, doesn’t mean they are impossible.

Perhaps you can’t do them at the same time, but I’m sure you can find a way to do what really matters to you in life and be happy. And that’s what matters the most.

I have a free 30-day challenge that can help you change your life and go after those goals we’ve been talking about. You can sign up for my motivational newsletters below and the 30-day challenge will be delivered to your inbox right away.