What do lemons and goal setting have in common?

Have you ever awoken with your mouth already “puckered” because you just know that life is going to give you lemons today? And of course as you open your front door and look over at the neighbor’s house, the gorgeous babe who lives there is getting a bushel of beautiful sweet Georgia peaches delivered. Okay, so come back to reality. Take your eyes off the UPS delivery guy with the tight pants and get off your porch. Come back into your cave and let’s figure out what to do.
First, go collect the lemons that are all over your house. Put some ice on the head wounds where those little yellow rocks hit and try to smile. We have a lot of work ahead of us. Take your collection of lemons to your kitchen sink and get a sharp knife. Cut the ends off and drive your thumb nail down between the skin and the meat of the lemon and start ripping. Gently now! You don’t want the lemons to open up and ooze juice into that little cut you have on your finger. OUCH! And save those peels. We will need them later. And then take a moment to stop and smell the lemons. Notice how fresh and clean your kitchen is beginning to smell.
Once you are done peeling, get a pitcher and some sort of strainer. Squish the lemons through the strainer over the pitcher and watch it fill. You can throw the leftover junk from the straining process out now. But take the peels and carefully scrape the lemon zest from the inside. If you have a Zester, all the bester. If not, the old-fashioned way will work. You will certainly find a use for the zest in some recipe you will be fixing later on. But put those leftover peels in your pockets for our final “alte
ative uses test.”
It is now time to sweeten the deal. If at some point you have not either bartered with or strategically partnered with a bee keeper or a sugar cane farmer, do it now. They are all over and they love to partner. No, you cannot trade sex. That is still illegal. But there are many other possibilities for trading services and goods. Get creative. Of course you can always go study bees and harvest your own honey. Now, take your new sweetener and add it to your pitcher.
Take your pitcher and open your back door. If this is a truly “Lemon Day” then it will be pouring rain outside. Yes, your arm is going to get a bit wet, but stop whining. We are about to get that next ingredient, that valuable chemical combination we need, the H2O. After all, lemon juice and sweetener alone would be like a day without water. Once your pitcher is full, go stir it all up. Yes, go ahead and taste it, but just a little bit. Now cover it, grab some Dixie cups and you are ready to sell sell sell.
Oh, right, the leftover peels. First, take note that you now smell fresh and clean like your kitchen. Not the effect you were going for? Oh, well, get over it. But the most important thing is that if you run into an angry chimpanzee, just whip out those peels. Primates love lemon peels and you will be able to make a clean get away.
Goal setting is very much like the lemon process. You mastered the first step right from the get-go, thinking with the end in mind. You always need to know where you are going. There would be no point in mapping out the steps to New York City if you wanted to go to Chicago. They say “When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.” You will notice that all they did was to tell you where you are going. The goal steps and what you will do once the process is done must be ascertained by you. That is the second step to goal setting. Do you just want to drink lots of lemonade while you watch Desperate Housewives? Or do you want to be an entrepreneur? If it is the latter, then there is more to do.
You need a recipe and tools. Then you need to assess what your resources are, both internal and exte
al. You have the arm, the pitcher, and the stamina to stand in the rain. You have the strength to peel, your partner has the sweetener and God provides the H2O. A good goal-setter always answers the question, “What am I capable of doing?” But then they ask the even more difficult question, “What am I willing to do?” Do you know all of the steps to reach the goal or do you need more education? And remember the three aspects of the “acid test” of a true strength. Do you have the natural talent? Have you developed the knowledge and skill base? Do you have the passion? If any one of the ingredients is missing, it could be a recipe for disaster. The mediocre goal setter might just respond, “Make lemonade” when faced with that existential question of what to do “When life gives you lemons.” The great Goal-Getter, on the other hand, answers, “I’m making zest and fending off chimpanzees and good golly, of course I’m making lemonade. But first, I’m going back for the sugar and water.”
Keep in mind that Opportunity just knocks. It does not kick the door in and take you away on a white horse. You must open the door, recognize the opportunity and go after it. There is always a lot of work involved. It may look like that Peach Lady has it all and life is easy, but it’s just an illusion. While she is basking in the glow, those beautiful Freestones could be rotting. But worse is the fact that her Lemon Days are coming. We all get them, some now, some later. Life is designed to be filled with setbacks and losses. But after all of this, you will be prepared. You will be accustomed to creative problem solving and to hard work. You will be used to turning Goal-Setting into Goal-Getting and you will smell fresh and clean in the bargain.