ADOPTION: YOU CAN DO IT! Blog Post #17, Chapter 12 — Long-term Goals and Short-term Gains
Thanks for reading this week’s chapter excerpt from my latest book ADOPTION YOU CAN DO IT! A Husband-Wife Date-Study for Successfully Raising Adopted Children in the Christian Home. Watch for it to be out in softcover and e-book by late December!
- Long Term Goals and Short Term Gains
His lord said to him, “Well done, good and faithful servant; you have been faithful over a few things, I will make you ruler over many things. Enter into the joy of your Lord.” Matthew 25:23
Our family has one extra-curricular activity that we have enjoyed for many year: 4-H. Through 4-H there are a number of opportunities in which youth from kindergarten through high school age can become involved. The main focus is on the hundreds of projects which can be learned through studying the project manuals, developing project-associated skills in a hands-on manner, producing an article to exhibited at the county fair along with a project record book documenting time and expense. If the project exhibited receives a blue ribbon, it can be considered for a unit champion purple ribbon, which then would qualify the project for state fair exhibition.
My children’s 4-H careers spanning more than 20 years have included a combined total of 200+ project record books. My favorite part of the record book has always been the ‘goals’ summary. At the end of the project they are to write a story in their record book which includes an explanation of their goals, the steps they took toward them, and whether they reached their goals or not. If not, they are to explain why. Typically, my children set very high goals. Usually they meet them, but not always. I appreciate reading my children’s honest descriptions about not reaching their goals, why not, and then prescriptive plans to reach the goal next year by altering something in the project to achieve a successful outcome.
Through the years, our family has learned the following regarding setting and reaching goals:
- In order to reach goals, first you have to set them. They should be identified as short or long term goals. Two or three goals are plenty to start with. It helps to write them out.
- For each goal you set, you should assign three or four action steps to help you reach the goal; write those out as well. Each step should be something tangible you can pursue.
- Pray over your steps and goals. Review your goals now and then to see what you have or have not accomplished toward attaining them.
The raising of an adopted child should include a number of long-term goals. A few goals we set for our adopted children, which were the same goals we had for our biological children, included:
- Receive salvation through Jesus Christ alone (not in works)
- Know the Ten Commandments and strive to live a moral life by obeying them
- Complete their education connected to what they want to accomplish in adulthood
- Wait for marriage before they have a sexually intimate relationship
- Trust in the Lord for everything large and small in their lives
- Live life to their fullest capacity
- Learn to be content and have joy in all circumstances
These are lofty goals, but all of my children seem to be on track to reach most of them. They each have embraced most of the goals we set for them, and have made these a part of their personal goals as well. In daily life, as the weeks, month, and years pass, we have assisted each child who is still at home with taking steps to achieve both the short and long-term goals for their lives.
We set a few additional long-term goals for our adopted children, and these included:
- Bonding with us as their forever family
- Learning to put their past in perspective
- Realizing that their background might shape, but does not determine, their future
- Healing from the trauma they were forced to endure as young children
Notice that none of these long-term goals include: saying please and thank you; not getting angry all the time; not running away; not harming themselves; not sexually ‘acting out’; not destroying property; not speaking hatefully; not becoming violent towards another person; not hoarding food; not stealing; not wetting the bed; not running away; not disobeying on purpose; not cursing; not, not, not…. This list of ‘not included’ items might become some of your short-term goals. They did become some of ours. It was a long and slow process to even begin to meet these short-term goals. Over time, things changed and improved, and goals were met both short and long term.
Adoption goals are not the easy cut-and-dried goals of a 4-H project! Along the way, we admonished, disciplined, and corrected these behaviors over and over again, all the while trying to connect with positive moments and continue loving unconditionally. Ending these bad behaviors were short-term gains, even though many lasted for more than a decade before we saw them gone for good. Some are still hanging around….
