March 10, 2025 • 35 mins
Episode 59: Embrace the Extraordinary: The Power of Setting Goals
In this episode of 'Conversations with Kimen,' the focus is on the importance of setting goals to lead an extraordinary life. Kimen shares personal experiences of overcoming perfectionism and the fear of failure, emphasizing how life can become monotonous without ambitious objectives. The narrative highlights the transformation from a mundane existence to a life of inspiration through the setting of incremental, moderate, and long-term goals. Kimen underlines the significance of vocalizing big dreams and surrounding oneself with supportive individuals. The episode culminates with insights on how to write effective goals, the impact of striving towards them, and the ultimate value in who one becomes in the process. Listeners are encouraged to challenge complacency and pursue their dreams actively.
00:00 Introduction: The Importance of Setting Goals
01:17 Perfectionism and Its Impact on Goal Setting
04:03 The Turning Point: Realizing the Value of Goals
07:00 The Power of Partial Success
09:18 Athletes and the Struggle with Goals
11:41 The Role of Community and Support
20:25 Practical Steps to Setting Effective Goals
26:58 Living an Inspired Life
31:46 Conclusion: Embrace Your Goals
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:05):
Setting goals as a pathto being extraordinary.
I think we've all heard aboutsetting goals and that it's a smart
thing to do and a good thing to do.
But I feel like sometimes life getsjust so busy that something like that
(00:28):
would stop and stop being as importantor as relevant, maybe as we get older.
You know, we, we tendto get stuck in almost.
A rut, almost maybe, andmaybe it's not even a rut.
(00:49):
It's just, it's just thismonotone existence that we have.
That's great, but
it's not really inspiring anddoesn't really wake you up
in the morning, ready to go.
Yeah.
Some people feel like, okay, we're, we'rewhat else can I do with this life anyway?
(01:13):
Uh, maybe we just made it so far or.
You know when I was young it wasinteresting because I was a perfectionist,
but let's not confuse perfectionismwith obsessive compulsive See the
type of perfectionism I was Did notlike everything had did not have its
(01:38):
perfect spot Everything was createdto the exact angle It should have
been now my type of perfectionismwas it will never be perfect.
So I'm gonna quit OrI'm not even gonna try.
And I don't know, um, I feel like, Ifeel like perfectionism is a spectrum
(01:58):
too, so there, there probably isa level of perfectionism that hits
where everything has to be, likethat people actually achieve, um,
some results as a perfectionist,
uh, that wasn't me.
(02:20):
Yeah, cause I knew, I knew for a factthat nothing would ever be perfect.
And it was interesting, it'slike, when people told me To set
goals, I'm like, what's the point?
Like, uh, sure I can set littletiny goals, like almost tasks.
(02:41):
Um, but what's the point insetting any, like, difficult goals?
What's the point of, uh, stepping outof my routine, out of the life I was in?
Cause like, I wasn't a veryoptimistic human being at that time.
It's funny.
The difference between me then andnow, and it's hard for me to really
(03:04):
Kind of get back into that state even
but yeah I was living alife that was basically just
existing just barely existing.
I mean pretty much just taking upspace Displacing a little bit of air
(03:29):
and not willing to take myself out of life
But not trying anything to make myexistence better and just sitting
around waiting for The time to play out
and yeah I was a perfectionist and likeI said, my type of perfectionism was, um,
(03:57):
there's, there's no point in even tryingbecause nothing will ever be perfect.
And I remember somewhere along the line,
I was talking to somebody, Iwas in a course and they were
talking about like, you know, whatdo you want to go for in life?
I'm like, well, I don't know.
(04:17):
And it's not that
somewhere in the back of my mind Ididn't have a wish to have a dream.
It's just, I didn't believe that I couldever bring any kind of dream into reality.
So, any big dream wouldjust be a fantasy, you know.
(04:39):
And it goes back to the fact that Ilearned when I was 26 that I was dyslexic.
But,
you know, in school, um, myreading was incredibly slow
and my spelling was atrocious.
And, um, I just thought I wasn't smart.
I never really thought I could make it,uh, through university, any post secondary
(05:03):
education because I wasn't smart enough.
You know, even, even after I backpackedEurope and I came back to Canada with
this kind of goal of going back touniversity and going into counseling,
in a sense it was almost a reliefwhen I got back and the economy was
(05:25):
so poor that I had to take multiplepart time jobs just to survive.
And then when I realized that becausemy English score was so low and it was
too late to apply for a semester andI wasn't going to get any, um, student
loans, It was almost a relief thatI didn't have to go back to school.
(05:46):
I didn't have to like chase that dream.
Because you know, in the end itwouldn't have been perfect anyway.
And I probably wouldn't have done it.
Or I probably wouldn't have made it.
So I just kind oftraveled into life again.
Just kind of existing.
Taking whatever job I could get.
Um, doing the best Icould in the situation.
(06:08):
But knowing that You know, I wasn'tever going to really excel and I
wasn't going to be extraordinary,that my life was going to be a mundane
existence, um, just displacing air.
So I took some really incredible coursesand I remember somebody was talking to me
(06:30):
like, what do you really want out of life?
And it's like, I couldn't even say,like, like I couldn't even speak
what I wanted in life into existence.
I, I,
because I couldn't say it honestly likeI was going to go for it, you know?
Because it'll never be perfect.
(06:50):
I'll never achieve that.
So why would I even say that?
And I remember
going through these goals, settinggoals, and, you know, setting little,
little goals, and moderate goals,and setting these harder goals.
(07:14):
And I can't remember how the conversationwent, but somebody was saying like, Why
won't you set a more difficult goal?
I said like, What's the point?
I'm not going to achieve it anyway.
And they were like, What percentage ofa goal do you need to achieve to say,
(07:34):
That you had some success in that.
And I'm like, a hundred percent.
They're like, okay.
And they shared this thing with me thatreally kind of changed my thought process.
They said, what if youachieve 90% of a goal?
Is that a success?
I'm like, no, 80%, 70.
(07:57):
No, no, of course not.
And then they said something to theeffect of, do you realize if you
have a big goal and you honestlywork in the direction of that goal.
sets, um, little goals, little, littlealmost task goals, some moderate term
(08:18):
goals, and stacking some moderate termgoals to get to this, uh, longterm goal.
And do you know, do you realize that ifyou were to achieve 70 percent of that
goal, that you would be in a completelydifferent place in life than you are
right now, had you not even tried?
Because.
(08:39):
If it's, if you can't do a hundredpercent, if you can't, if you, if you
don't feel like you can do a hundredpercent success, then you don't even try?
I mean, it kind of blew my mind.
I realized that, oh man, youknow, is it really the goal
(09:06):
that's the success
or is it who we becomeon the way to that goal?
Is that the success?
Now, that's a really good question, eh?
Like I talked to some incredibleathletes who have a lot of trouble
saying that I'm gonna go for this.
I'm gonna, I'm going to Worlds.
(09:27):
They're like, well, I hope to go to Worldsor I hope to go to the Olympics someday.
And it's really hard for them to likesay out loud that I am going to Worlds.
It doesn't sound that hard, right?
But I wonder, like, athletesare so competitive and they've
(09:49):
got this competitive edge.
And so driving in the backgroundof that conversation of being
competitive is I'm not good enough.
Which is a beautiful thing in a sensebecause that's the high motivation
that gets them to move forward.
To keep on working up, getting upearly in the morning, doing all
these crazy workouts, tired, missingparties, missing times with friends
(10:14):
and family, going to competitions.
It's what drives them forward, but italso holds them back in some ways, right?
Like, when it doesn't gotheir way, they're devastated.
And so I can imagine that this wouldcreate this This place where you wouldn't
really be willing to put your name ona giant thing, like, out loud, like, in
(10:40):
your heart, in your mind, that's whereyou want to go, but it's really hard
because you've got this other side ofyou battling, battling with you, saying
you're not good enough, and that's whyyou've got to work so hard, and you just,
I feel like this could hold you back.
(11:02):
So this is why I'm doingsomething on goals.
And like, this isn't just for athletesis like for people in business and
sports and like, in the world andrelationship and in anything you want
to create right in creating a podcastin creating a social media platform,
(11:28):
you need to give your name your voice tosomething really big, bigger than you,
the dream, you need to say it out loud.
And it's It's probably really smart
to surround yourself with a circlewho believes in the beauty of
(11:51):
your dreams and believes that youare the person who accomplish it.
And people will hear you and go,that's how I will relate to you.
This is what I say to athletes, whenthey share a big goal with me, when
somebody shares a big goal with me, fromnow on, when I relate to you, when I
look at you, when I talk to you, whenI, everything, I will be looking at you
(12:13):
as somebody who's achieving that goal.
That's where you're going.
You are the person in my eyes.
Because it's reallycrazy that, like, when,
when somebody believes in you, like,they say, if you have one person in
this life who truly believes in you,that will give you a higher energy.
(12:38):
But in order to have peoplewho believe in you, you need to
be courageous with your word.
You need to actually state outloud that this is where I'm going.
Not like, I hope, not like I'd like to.
But I am going to this now, you don't haveto say, I am going to worlds this year.
(13:03):
You can just say, I am going toworlds and you start working,
doing the work to get you there.
Like I heard this goal, or this quoteon goals recently was just fantastic.
It's like, so you setthis massive goal, right?
(13:23):
And you don't focus on the goal.
You focus all your energy.
I'm becoming the person who will, notwould, but will achieve that goal.
You do all the work.
So your whole focus andis becoming that person.
You see who is that person.
(13:44):
Maybe you go out there and you lookat people in society in the world
who have achieved that goal and maybeif you if you're fortunate enough,
like if you're fortunate to be in theVancouver community, there's a bunch
of really incredible people here who'veMade the olympics who are so open
and like ready to support and have aconversation with you about what it
(14:08):
takes or how they got there and whothey became and like what they did.
And then of course you, you get all thework you see, you get your therapy, like
not just like as a response to injury,but as a preventative and a maintenance.
(14:29):
So you start Creating thislow, this, this world.
So the person who would achievethis goal would be doing this,
this, this, and this in dietitianslike, um, mental performance, mental
health, like you stack everything.
The person who will achieve thiswould be sleeping consistently.
(14:51):
These hours would be like consistentlydoing strength work this times.
And they'd have a trainer focused on.
their body, keeping it in balance, keepingthe strength, keeping the resilience.
You'd focus on the person who willdo that will be watching their
(15:13):
thoughts and correcting negativethoughts and purposefully and directly
using like inner dialogue and outerdialogue that supports their dream.
They wouldn't, they will always say,I am this, I am working on this.
I am, they would not Say somethingnegative about themselves.
(15:35):
They get meticulous with their word.
And the other idea is like, this,this was a great quote I saw
recently, um, Write your goal in pen,
but write your plan in pencil.
(15:57):
And that just opens up this really coolthing, cause like, as you're working
towards some major goal, if you'retoo focused on the path, you might
miss a path that would help you more.
Maybe it would look like it wouldbe a longer way, but it turns
out to be an incredible way.
Like, there's somebody I work withwho was doing a multi sport event,
(16:20):
and they're, they were like, they'regoing to the Olympics, and I'm like,
yes, you're going to the Olympics, and
just so inspiring, and every time, andjust everything they took on, and the
way they worked through everything,
and they did end up winning a medalin, in their multi sport, and it was a
(16:42):
qualification for the Olympics, and then
they, you can imagine, so, had theynot had that goal, can you imagine how,
where, like, How do you get to whereyou're going if you don't have a plan?
And if your plan is incrediblydifficult, how hard are you
(17:04):
going to work on that plan?
This person decided to, to focusall the energy on training.
Like Let's do it honest, honest effortand honestly, if you have a plan,
if you have a direction you want togo and you make an honest effort and
you do everything you can, in theend it doesn't matter the outcome.
(17:29):
But here's the magic in this.
So this person went to this world eventand they won a medal in a relay event
and then they realized that On theirvery best day, they still wouldn't
(17:54):
have made the Olympic qualificationteam and they were satisfied.
And this is a thing we only regretthe things we don't do had had.
You know, imagine saying, I'm going forsomething and you didn't do everything.
(18:16):
How would you feel?
Like, oh, if I would haveonly, or if I should have only.
On the other hand, say you put everythingyou got into it, and you did all the
work, and you fell short of the goal.
You could honestly look inthe mirror and go, hey, you
know, I did everything I could.
(18:40):
I don't feel bad.
I feel great.
I, I gave it such abeautiful, honest effort.
Like, I'm proud of myself.
Now the magic happens in this way, sosometimes we think the goal, we set
the goal, we think that's the way we'regoing, but this person actually, they
decided to move on from the sport itself,and they took a job, wasn't a great job
(19:04):
at the time, and then, you know, oneof their former teammates said, hey,
there's a job that you should take alook at, they took a look at the job,
they got this job, and it was workingfor a company, um, that puts on events
for, at major games, like the Olympics.
And they spent three weeks in Parisduring the Olympics, you know, they
(19:29):
achieved the goal, but they didn'tachieve it the way they thought But
that's the incredible thing about goals
So anyway, like I was saying, uh, I wasa perfectionist and this person told
me about achieving 90 percent of a goal
(19:50):
How that's a success so I did I I createdbefore I moved to Vancouver I created
this really big list of goals and Youknow a few years after I got here Um,
I looked back and I saw I hadnailed every, I wrote these down
(20:10):
and it's good to write them down.
I had achieved all but twoof those goals to this point.
I'm going to say that's not bad.
So let's talk about how do we write agoal, if you haven't heard this before.
(20:31):
I think the best way to write a goalis to start off like on or before.
So on or before a certain date.
Say on or before September 2025.
I have, or I completed,or I qualified for.
(20:56):
So you say it, you give it a, like,a timeline, but you open up that
timeline to the possibility ofachieving it earlier than you planned.
And then you do it in the affirmative.
I have, I qualified.
(21:17):
A, a couple things, so if you say on orbefore, like you, you know the date you
want it, you want it on or before, youopen the possibility of getting it early.
And by putting it in the positive, thenthat's, you know, that's going to put
more energy towards what you want, right?
(21:39):
And it's got to be specific,and it's got to be measurable.
So those are a couple thingsbefore you write down goals.
Now this is my idea ofhow goals would work.
Um, I mean, you've got todo what's best for you.
Think about it.
Say you're sitting in a lifethat feels a little mundane.
(22:02):
Probably you get offof work, you're tired.
Um, You sit around and watch TV all night,or you eat, you watch TV, you go to bed,
you wake up the next day, and on andon and on, you get more and more tired,
there's not really a lot going on in life.
(22:24):
What I'm saying is we have alot more time than we think we
have, and honestly, hey, I'm not,
if you know how much I work, I work 12hours a day, 6 days a week, well I'm in
the office 12 hours a day, 6 days a week.
Right now I'm running three times a week.
(22:46):
I started a mobility program anda strength program Which which I'm
incorporating in with that on theweekends when there's races I get my
camera out and I take pictures andthen I connect people with people That
I've taken pictures of in the raceand I send them through social media.
(23:07):
I'm not looking to make money offmy pictures It's just my love.
Yeah, and How did I getaround to taking pictures?
Well, I remember one of my athleteswas having a tough time and I asked
them, Hey, what do you have to leaninto when your sport isn't going well?
And they looked up at me and like,what do you have besides work, Kevin?
(23:29):
And like, oh, touche hypocrite.
And that's when I bought the camera.
And then later on, as I was doingtrips with athletes and it's just so
inspiring to work with athletes, therunners, and I did a few trips, um,
where I was supporting them overseas.
(23:49):
And I thought, oh, thiswould be so inspiring to,
you know, we, we get to the country, wehead to the hotel, we meet, they give
us the Team Canada gear, they give usour hotel room, and we go up and get
(24:10):
set up in our hotel room, and all theathletes throw on their running clothes
and they go out for a shakeout run,and I thought, wouldn't it be inspiring
if I said, hey guys, can I come too?
And that's when I I set the goalof running and I started with
very basic like, uh, okay, soI'd started one walk run program.
(24:35):
It was a very slowly progressing.
I was running every second day,rain, shine, snow, it didn't matter.
And the whole time I was lookingat this way down the road because
the goals, you know, getting outthere, doing the walk run program,
running 5k, running 10k, running.
(24:56):
Uh, 21.1, uh, running a 5K race, andthen I had a 5,000 on the track and
I've had a 10 K. And now in June, uh,June, 2025, I'll be doing a 21.1, and
next year, 2026, I'll do a marathon.
(25:20):
Now, I had all that that set up, but theone that really inspired me was to do
the shakeup, run with the athletes on.
on, on a support trip.
And I got to do that with theUBC women's cross country team in
London, Ontario a couple years ago.
(25:41):
They let me jump in on their shaker run.
And honestly, I probably only ran 750meters, but I'll tell you when I was
working through my walk run program, thething that inspired me the most was that
day that I got to, I was going to do that.
So, like I said, You start withsimple, achievable goals written in
(26:03):
the style of on or before X, I have.
So, and I call these trainingrule, training rule goals.
So you create some, it's almost like, youwrite them down, put a check box beside
it, and when you achieve it, check it off.
There's something really awesomeabout checking off a goal.
(26:23):
Like, I succeeded.
And after a while, after you'vedone a few, maybe you want to
create some moderate term goals.
So a moderate term goal.
You, you create it, but thenyou create a plan with some
checklist goals underneath it.
And then maybe you want to create a longterm goal, and a long term goal will
probably have two or more moderate termgoals with a number of check, checklist
(26:47):
goals underneath it to work your wayup, kind of a pyramid, into that goal.
But I think if you really want tohave an inspired and extraordinary
life, you need to go beyond that.
I think you need to create,
(27:10):
you, you create a lifelong,almost impossible goal.
And I would say
for that, I would say that throughthis kind of speaking, through
conversations with Kim and,
(27:33):
um,
I want to talk in front of acrowd of more than 5, 000 people
sharing this kind of thing,sharing, reframing, or sharing
(28:02):
the way you look at your lifeaffects how your life shows up.
So if you really want to change your life,you change the way you look at things,
and the things you look at will change.
The idea that that conversationthat's in the background all the
time has a beautiful purpose toprotect you, but how it does it,
(28:26):
it does it by keeping you small.
And if you don't want to besmall, you can't listen to it.
You have to go, thank you for sharing, andyou go and do what you gotta do anyway.
So I think you need, and I'dsay that's That's achievable.
Difficult, but achievable.
And I mean, I've got a planthrough that that I think I need
(28:48):
to get more solved on paper.
But I'm going to work on that.
And then,
if you really want to have the mostextraordinary life you could possibly
have, there's one more class of goal.
And this goal would be an operationof humility because it's impossible.
(29:11):
There's no way you accomplishit in this lifetime.
And yet, if you approach that goal.
As if somehow you can achieve it,you put everything you got into it
(29:33):
and you just focus and work as hardas you can try to achieve that goal.
You know, the analogy I use isimagine, imagine there's a trip you
want to take, you can only take byfoot and it's say 100 million miles
(29:54):
and there's no way.
In this lifetime that you can actuallygo a hundred million miles on feet
on foot, but you go for it anyway.
Can you imagine the difference betweenthe life where you honestly went for
(30:15):
it every day like that in the life?
If you never took on something likethat, can you imagine how humble you
need to be to go for something that youwill never achieve, but go for honestly,
you know, I was telling this to somebody.
a little while ago, andthey're really awesome.
(30:36):
They're like, so what's yourimpossible lifelong goal, Kimmon?
I'm kind of hummed and hon, and I'm stillworking on articulating it at first.
I said, well, I mean,
it'd be so inspiring to eradicate,um, stress, anxiety, and worry
(31:00):
from all people on the planetthrough conversations with Kimmon.
And then a couple days latersomebody pointed out, but aren't
those good things sometimes?
I'm like, yeah, I guess there aremotivators so I kind of shifted to
Eradicate debilitating stress worryand anxiety from the planet through
my work with conversations with Kimmin
(31:25):
And I'm sure it's gonnaevolve a little more
But I'll get back to you whenI really got it nailed down
Goals have power
(31:46):
When You're moving towards somethingthat excites you, that's when
you live a life of inspiration.
You may think you don't havetime, but hey, look at me.
I'm dropping podcast episodeslike they're going out of style.
And I find time.
All you gotta do isadjust some things, right?
(32:09):
Maybe you don't spend so much timeon your phone at night, maybe you
Go to bed a little earlier so youcan get up a little bit earlier.
Maybe you, rather than turning on the TV,you write something or you read something.
You know, life is notmeant to be monotoned.
(32:32):
And every one of us has gifts.
And sometimes we don't enhancethem, we don't use them, we
don't dig deep into them.
And maybe we don't even find them.
Maybe we
We get complacent.
But if you really want to live, andnot just displace air, not just exist,
(33:02):
then challenge it.
Take a look at goals.
You know, ever since Istarted the work I do now,
I wake up ready to go.
And I go all day.
(33:24):
And do I have bad days?
Yeah, everybody does.
I don't live there very long.
Because I've figuredout why I'm here, right?
I'm here to help.
And in the room at work, that's what I do.
(33:44):
And in the podcast, that's what I do.
Um,
somebody shared with me recently thatthey, they were having a, they just, they
just laid down on their bed, and theyturned on one of my podcasts, and suddenly
they felt like they were back in my room.
(34:07):
Where I work, with me.
That's pretty awesome, eh?
So I challenge you.
Take another look at goals.
Thanks for listening.
(34:30):
Thank you for listening to thisepisode of conversation with Kimen.
Please follow me on Instagramat conversations with Kimen
and feel free to direct message me.
Also, please share my podcast withanyone you may feel would benefit
(34:51):
from its content and let them know.
And you can find me atconversations with Kimen on Apple
podcasts, Spotify, and Podbean.
Have an amazing day.
Setting goals as a pathto being extraordinary.
I think we've all heard aboutsetting goals and that it's a smart
thing to do and a good thing to do.
But I feel like sometimes life getsjust so busy that something like that
(00:28):
would stop and stop being as importantor as relevant, maybe as we get older.
You know, we, we tendto get stuck in almost.
A rut, almost maybe, andmaybe it's not even a rut.
(00:49):
It's just, it's just thismonotone existence that we have.
That's great, but
it's not really inspiring anddoesn't really wake you up
in the morning, ready to go.
Yeah.
Some people feel like, okay, we're, we'rewhat else can I do with this life anyway?
(01:13):
Uh, maybe we just made it so far or.
You know when I was young it wasinteresting because I was a perfectionist,
but let's not confuse perfectionismwith obsessive compulsive See the
type of perfectionism I was Did notlike everything had did not have its
(01:38):
perfect spot Everything was createdto the exact angle It should have
been now my type of perfectionismwas it will never be perfect.
So I'm gonna quit OrI'm not even gonna try.
And I don't know, um, I feel like, Ifeel like perfectionism is a spectrum
(01:58):
too, so there, there probably isa level of perfectionism that hits
where everything has to be, likethat people actually achieve, um,
some results as a perfectionist,
uh, that wasn't me.
(02:20):
Yeah, cause I knew, I knew for a factthat nothing would ever be perfect.
And it was interesting, it'slike, when people told me To set
goals, I'm like, what's the point?
Like, uh, sure I can set littletiny goals, like almost tasks.
(02:41):
Um, but what's the point insetting any, like, difficult goals?
What's the point of, uh, stepping outof my routine, out of the life I was in?
Cause like, I wasn't a veryoptimistic human being at that time.
It's funny.
The difference between me then andnow, and it's hard for me to really
(03:04):
Kind of get back into that state even
but yeah I was living alife that was basically just
existing just barely existing.
I mean pretty much just taking upspace Displacing a little bit of air
(03:29):
and not willing to take myself out of life
But not trying anything to make myexistence better and just sitting
around waiting for The time to play out
and yeah I was a perfectionist and likeI said, my type of perfectionism was, um,
(03:57):
there's, there's no point in even tryingbecause nothing will ever be perfect.
And I remember somewhere along the line,
I was talking to somebody, Iwas in a course and they were
talking about like, you know, whatdo you want to go for in life?
I'm like, well, I don't know.
(04:17):
And it's not that
somewhere in the back of my mind Ididn't have a wish to have a dream.
It's just, I didn't believe that I couldever bring any kind of dream into reality.
So, any big dream wouldjust be a fantasy, you know.
(04:39):
And it goes back to the fact that Ilearned when I was 26 that I was dyslexic.
But,
you know, in school, um, myreading was incredibly slow
and my spelling was atrocious.
And, um, I just thought I wasn't smart.
I never really thought I could make it,uh, through university, any post secondary
(05:03):
education because I wasn't smart enough.
You know, even, even after I backpackedEurope and I came back to Canada with
this kind of goal of going back touniversity and going into counseling,
in a sense it was almost a reliefwhen I got back and the economy was
(05:25):
so poor that I had to take multiplepart time jobs just to survive.
And then when I realized that becausemy English score was so low and it was
too late to apply for a semester andI wasn't going to get any, um, student
loans, It was almost a relief thatI didn't have to go back to school.
(05:46):
I didn't have to like chase that dream.
Because you know, in the end itwouldn't have been perfect anyway.
And I probably wouldn't have done it.
Or I probably wouldn't have made it.
So I just kind oftraveled into life again.
Just kind of existing.
Taking whatever job I could get.
Um, doing the best Icould in the situation.
(06:08):
But knowing that You know, I wasn'tever going to really excel and I
wasn't going to be extraordinary,that my life was going to be a mundane
existence, um, just displacing air.
So I took some really incredible coursesand I remember somebody was talking to me
(06:30):
like, what do you really want out of life?
And it's like, I couldn't even say,like, like I couldn't even speak
what I wanted in life into existence.
I, I,
because I couldn't say it honestly likeI was going to go for it, you know?
Because it'll never be perfect.
(06:50):
I'll never achieve that.
So why would I even say that?
And I remember
going through these goals, settinggoals, and, you know, setting little,
little goals, and moderate goals,and setting these harder goals.
(07:14):
And I can't remember how the conversationwent, but somebody was saying like, Why
won't you set a more difficult goal?
I said like, What's the point?
I'm not going to achieve it anyway.
And they were like, What percentage ofa goal do you need to achieve to say,
(07:34):
That you had some success in that.
And I'm like, a hundred percent.
They're like, okay.
And they shared this thing with me thatreally kind of changed my thought process.
They said, what if youachieve 90% of a goal?
Is that a success?
I'm like, no, 80%, 70.
(07:57):
No, no, of course not.
And then they said something to theeffect of, do you realize if you
have a big goal and you honestlywork in the direction of that goal.
sets, um, little goals, little, littlealmost task goals, some moderate term
(08:18):
goals, and stacking some moderate termgoals to get to this, uh, longterm goal.
And do you know, do you realize that ifyou were to achieve 70 percent of that
goal, that you would be in a completelydifferent place in life than you are
right now, had you not even tried?
Because.
(08:39):
If it's, if you can't do a hundredpercent, if you can't, if you, if you
don't feel like you can do a hundredpercent success, then you don't even try?
I mean, it kind of blew my mind.
I realized that, oh man, youknow, is it really the goal
(09:06):
that's the success
or is it who we becomeon the way to that goal?
Is that the success?
Now, that's a really good question, eh?
Like I talked to some incredibleathletes who have a lot of trouble
saying that I'm gonna go for this.
I'm gonna, I'm going to Worlds.
(09:27):
They're like, well, I hope to go to Worldsor I hope to go to the Olympics someday.
And it's really hard for them to likesay out loud that I am going to Worlds.
It doesn't sound that hard, right?
But I wonder, like, athletesare so competitive and they've
(09:49):
got this competitive edge.
And so driving in the backgroundof that conversation of being
competitive is I'm not good enough.
Which is a beautiful thing in a sensebecause that's the high motivation
that gets them to move forward.
To keep on working up, getting upearly in the morning, doing all
these crazy workouts, tired, missingparties, missing times with friends
(10:14):
and family, going to competitions.
It's what drives them forward, but italso holds them back in some ways, right?
Like, when it doesn't gotheir way, they're devastated.
And so I can imagine that this wouldcreate this This place where you wouldn't
really be willing to put your name ona giant thing, like, out loud, like, in
(10:40):
your heart, in your mind, that's whereyou want to go, but it's really hard
because you've got this other side ofyou battling, battling with you, saying
you're not good enough, and that's whyyou've got to work so hard, and you just,
I feel like this could hold you back.
(11:02):
So this is why I'm doingsomething on goals.
And like, this isn't just for athletesis like for people in business and
sports and like, in the world andrelationship and in anything you want
to create right in creating a podcastin creating a social media platform,
(11:28):
you need to give your name your voice tosomething really big, bigger than you,
the dream, you need to say it out loud.
And it's It's probably really smart
to surround yourself with a circlewho believes in the beauty of
(11:51):
your dreams and believes that youare the person who accomplish it.
And people will hear you and go,that's how I will relate to you.
This is what I say to athletes, whenthey share a big goal with me, when
somebody shares a big goal with me, fromnow on, when I relate to you, when I
look at you, when I talk to you, whenI, everything, I will be looking at you
(12:13):
as somebody who's achieving that goal.
That's where you're going.
You are the person in my eyes.
Because it's reallycrazy that, like, when,
when somebody believes in you, like,they say, if you have one person in
this life who truly believes in you,that will give you a higher energy.
(12:38):
But in order to have peoplewho believe in you, you need to
be courageous with your word.
You need to actually state outloud that this is where I'm going.
Not like, I hope, not like I'd like to.
But I am going to this now, you don't haveto say, I am going to worlds this year.
(13:03):
You can just say, I am going toworlds and you start working,
doing the work to get you there.
Like I heard this goal, or this quoteon goals recently was just fantastic.
It's like, so you setthis massive goal, right?
(13:23):
And you don't focus on the goal.
You focus all your energy.
I'm becoming the person who will, notwould, but will achieve that goal.
You do all the work.
So your whole focus andis becoming that person.
You see who is that person.
(13:44):
Maybe you go out there and you lookat people in society in the world
who have achieved that goal and maybeif you if you're fortunate enough,
like if you're fortunate to be in theVancouver community, there's a bunch
of really incredible people here who'veMade the olympics who are so open
and like ready to support and have aconversation with you about what it
(14:08):
takes or how they got there and whothey became and like what they did.
And then of course you, you get all thework you see, you get your therapy, like
not just like as a response to injury,but as a preventative and a maintenance.
(14:29):
So you start Creating thislow, this, this world.
So the person who would achievethis goal would be doing this,
this, this, and this in dietitianslike, um, mental performance, mental
health, like you stack everything.
The person who will achieve thiswould be sleeping consistently.
(14:51):
These hours would be like consistentlydoing strength work this times.
And they'd have a trainer focused on.
their body, keeping it in balance, keepingthe strength, keeping the resilience.
You'd focus on the person who willdo that will be watching their
(15:13):
thoughts and correcting negativethoughts and purposefully and directly
using like inner dialogue and outerdialogue that supports their dream.
They wouldn't, they will always say,I am this, I am working on this.
I am, they would not Say somethingnegative about themselves.
(15:35):
They get meticulous with their word.
And the other idea is like, this,this was a great quote I saw
recently, um, Write your goal in pen,
but write your plan in pencil.
(15:57):
And that just opens up this really coolthing, cause like, as you're working
towards some major goal, if you'retoo focused on the path, you might
miss a path that would help you more.
Maybe it would look like it wouldbe a longer way, but it turns
out to be an incredible way.
Like, there's somebody I work withwho was doing a multi sport event,
(16:20):
and they're, they were like, they'regoing to the Olympics, and I'm like,
yes, you're going to the Olympics, and
just so inspiring, and every time, andjust everything they took on, and the
way they worked through everything,
and they did end up winning a medalin, in their multi sport, and it was a
(16:42):
qualification for the Olympics, and then
they, you can imagine, so, had theynot had that goal, can you imagine how,
where, like, How do you get to whereyou're going if you don't have a plan?
And if your plan is incrediblydifficult, how hard are you
(17:04):
going to work on that plan?
This person decided to, to focusall the energy on training.
Like Let's do it honest, honest effortand honestly, if you have a plan,
if you have a direction you want togo and you make an honest effort and
you do everything you can, in theend it doesn't matter the outcome.
(17:29):
But here's the magic in this.
So this person went to this world eventand they won a medal in a relay event
and then they realized that On theirvery best day, they still wouldn't
(17:54):
have made the Olympic qualificationteam and they were satisfied.
And this is a thing we only regretthe things we don't do had had.
You know, imagine saying, I'm going forsomething and you didn't do everything.
(18:16):
How would you feel?
Like, oh, if I would haveonly, or if I should have only.
On the other hand, say you put everythingyou got into it, and you did all the
work, and you fell short of the goal.
You could honestly look inthe mirror and go, hey, you
know, I did everything I could.
(18:40):
I don't feel bad.
I feel great.
I, I gave it such abeautiful, honest effort.
Like, I'm proud of myself.
Now the magic happens in this way, sosometimes we think the goal, we set
the goal, we think that's the way we'regoing, but this person actually, they
decided to move on from the sport itself,and they took a job, wasn't a great job
(19:04):
at the time, and then, you know, oneof their former teammates said, hey,
there's a job that you should take alook at, they took a look at the job,
they got this job, and it was workingfor a company, um, that puts on events
for, at major games, like the Olympics.
And they spent three weeks in Parisduring the Olympics, you know, they
(19:29):
achieved the goal, but they didn'tachieve it the way they thought But
that's the incredible thing about goals
So anyway, like I was saying, uh, I wasa perfectionist and this person told
me about achieving 90 percent of a goal
(19:50):
How that's a success so I did I I createdbefore I moved to Vancouver I created
this really big list of goals and Youknow a few years after I got here Um,
I looked back and I saw I hadnailed every, I wrote these down
(20:10):
and it's good to write them down.
I had achieved all but twoof those goals to this point.
I'm going to say that's not bad.
So let's talk about how do we write agoal, if you haven't heard this before.
(20:31):
I think the best way to write a goalis to start off like on or before.
So on or before a certain date.
Say on or before September 2025.
I have, or I completed,or I qualified for.
(20:56):
So you say it, you give it a, like,a timeline, but you open up that
timeline to the possibility ofachieving it earlier than you planned.
And then you do it in the affirmative.
I have, I qualified.
(21:17):
A, a couple things, so if you say on orbefore, like you, you know the date you
want it, you want it on or before, youopen the possibility of getting it early.
And by putting it in the positive, thenthat's, you know, that's going to put
more energy towards what you want, right?
(21:39):
And it's got to be specific,and it's got to be measurable.
So those are a couple thingsbefore you write down goals.
Now this is my idea ofhow goals would work.
Um, I mean, you've got todo what's best for you.
Think about it.
Say you're sitting in a lifethat feels a little mundane.
(22:02):
Probably you get offof work, you're tired.
Um, You sit around and watch TV all night,or you eat, you watch TV, you go to bed,
you wake up the next day, and on andon and on, you get more and more tired,
there's not really a lot going on in life.
(22:24):
What I'm saying is we have alot more time than we think we
have, and honestly, hey, I'm not,
if you know how much I work, I work 12hours a day, 6 days a week, well I'm in
the office 12 hours a day, 6 days a week.
Right now I'm running three times a week.
(22:46):
I started a mobility program anda strength program Which which I'm
incorporating in with that on theweekends when there's races I get my
camera out and I take pictures andthen I connect people with people That
I've taken pictures of in the raceand I send them through social media.
(23:07):
I'm not looking to make money offmy pictures It's just my love.
Yeah, and How did I getaround to taking pictures?
Well, I remember one of my athleteswas having a tough time and I asked
them, Hey, what do you have to leaninto when your sport isn't going well?
And they looked up at me and like,what do you have besides work, Kevin?
(23:29):
And like, oh, touche hypocrite.
And that's when I bought the camera.
And then later on, as I was doingtrips with athletes and it's just so
inspiring to work with athletes, therunners, and I did a few trips, um,
where I was supporting them overseas.
(23:49):
And I thought, oh, thiswould be so inspiring to,
you know, we, we get to the country, wehead to the hotel, we meet, they give
us the Team Canada gear, they give usour hotel room, and we go up and get
(24:10):
set up in our hotel room, and all theathletes throw on their running clothes
and they go out for a shakeout run,and I thought, wouldn't it be inspiring
if I said, hey guys, can I come too?
And that's when I I set the goalof running and I started with
very basic like, uh, okay, soI'd started one walk run program.
(24:35):
It was a very slowly progressing.
I was running every second day,rain, shine, snow, it didn't matter.
And the whole time I was lookingat this way down the road because
the goals, you know, getting outthere, doing the walk run program,
running 5k, running 10k, running.
(24:56):
Uh, 21.1, uh, running a 5K race, andthen I had a 5,000 on the track and
I've had a 10 K. And now in June, uh,June, 2025, I'll be doing a 21.1, and
next year, 2026, I'll do a marathon.
(25:20):
Now, I had all that that set up, but theone that really inspired me was to do
the shakeup, run with the athletes on.
on, on a support trip.
And I got to do that with theUBC women's cross country team in
London, Ontario a couple years ago.
(25:41):
They let me jump in on their shaker run.
And honestly, I probably only ran 750meters, but I'll tell you when I was
working through my walk run program, thething that inspired me the most was that
day that I got to, I was going to do that.
So, like I said, You start withsimple, achievable goals written in
(26:03):
the style of on or before X, I have.
So, and I call these trainingrule, training rule goals.
So you create some, it's almost like, youwrite them down, put a check box beside
it, and when you achieve it, check it off.
There's something really awesomeabout checking off a goal.
(26:23):
Like, I succeeded.
And after a while, after you'vedone a few, maybe you want to
create some moderate term goals.
So a moderate term goal.
You, you create it, but thenyou create a plan with some
checklist goals underneath it.
And then maybe you want to create a longterm goal, and a long term goal will
probably have two or more moderate termgoals with a number of check, checklist
(26:47):
goals underneath it to work your wayup, kind of a pyramid, into that goal.
But I think if you really want tohave an inspired and extraordinary
life, you need to go beyond that.
I think you need to create,
(27:10):
you, you create a lifelong,almost impossible goal.
And I would say
for that, I would say that throughthis kind of speaking, through
conversations with Kim and,
(27:33):
um,
I want to talk in front of acrowd of more than 5, 000 people
sharing this kind of thing,sharing, reframing, or sharing
(28:02):
the way you look at your lifeaffects how your life shows up.
So if you really want to change your life,you change the way you look at things,
and the things you look at will change.
The idea that that conversationthat's in the background all the
time has a beautiful purpose toprotect you, but how it does it,
(28:26):
it does it by keeping you small.
And if you don't want to besmall, you can't listen to it.
You have to go, thank you for sharing, andyou go and do what you gotta do anyway.
So I think you need, and I'dsay that's That's achievable.
Difficult, but achievable.
And I mean, I've got a planthrough that that I think I need
(28:48):
to get more solved on paper.
But I'm going to work on that.
And then,
if you really want to have the mostextraordinary life you could possibly
have, there's one more class of goal.
And this goal would be an operationof humility because it's impossible.
(29:11):
There's no way you accomplishit in this lifetime.
And yet, if you approach that goal.
As if somehow you can achieve it,you put everything you got into it
(29:33):
and you just focus and work as hardas you can try to achieve that goal.
You know, the analogy I use isimagine, imagine there's a trip you
want to take, you can only take byfoot and it's say 100 million miles
(29:54):
and there's no way.
In this lifetime that you can actuallygo a hundred million miles on feet
on foot, but you go for it anyway.
Can you imagine the difference betweenthe life where you honestly went for
(30:15):
it every day like that in the life?
If you never took on something likethat, can you imagine how humble you
need to be to go for something that youwill never achieve, but go for honestly,
you know, I was telling this to somebody.
a little while ago, andthey're really awesome.
(30:36):
They're like, so what's yourimpossible lifelong goal, Kimmon?
I'm kind of hummed and hon, and I'm stillworking on articulating it at first.
I said, well, I mean,
it'd be so inspiring to eradicate,um, stress, anxiety, and worry
(31:00):
from all people on the planetthrough conversations with Kimmon.
And then a couple days latersomebody pointed out, but aren't
those good things sometimes?
I'm like, yeah, I guess there aremotivators so I kind of shifted to
Eradicate debilitating stress worryand anxiety from the planet through
my work with conversations with Kimmin
(31:25):
And I'm sure it's gonnaevolve a little more
But I'll get back to you whenI really got it nailed down
Goals have power
(31:46):
When You're moving towards somethingthat excites you, that's when
you live a life of inspiration.
You may think you don't havetime, but hey, look at me.
I'm dropping podcast episodeslike they're going out of style.
And I find time.
All you gotta do isadjust some things, right?
(32:09):
Maybe you don't spend so much timeon your phone at night, maybe you
Go to bed a little earlier so youcan get up a little bit earlier.
Maybe you, rather than turning on the TV,you write something or you read something.
You know, life is notmeant to be monotoned.
(32:32):
And every one of us has gifts.
And sometimes we don't enhancethem, we don't use them, we
don't dig deep into them.
And maybe we don't even find them.
Maybe we
We get complacent.
But if you really want to live, andnot just displace air, not just exist,
(33:02):
then challenge it.
Take a look at goals.
You know, ever since Istarted the work I do now,
I wake up ready to go.
And I go all day.
(33:24):
And do I have bad days?
Yeah, everybody does.
I don't live there very long.
Because I've figuredout why I'm here, right?
I'm here to help.
And in the room at work, that's what I do.
(33:44):
And in the podcast, that's what I do.
Um,
somebody shared with me recently thatthey, they were having a, they just, they
just laid down on their bed, and theyturned on one of my podcasts, and suddenly
they felt like they were back in my room.
(34:07):
Where I work, with me.
That's pretty awesome, eh?
So I challenge you.
Take another look at goals.
Thanks for listening.
(34:30):
Thank you for listening to thisepisode of conversation with Kimen.
Please follow me on Instagramat conversations with Kimen
and feel free to direct message me.
Also, please share my podcast withanyone you may feel would benefit
(34:51):
from its content and let them know.
And you can find me atconversations with Kimen on Apple
podcasts, Spotify, and Podbean.
Have an amazing day.
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