goal (s?)

first grade traumatized me. at a religious school, bad choices resulted in a choices card to be placed on the altar, in hopes for god's holy forgiveness for talking to your friend about their new tissue box. good behavior received a sticker, and ten stickers meant a toy from the box. after the first few weeks of this procedure, my friends and i were at the same "good child" standing, and we all go to pick toys on the same day. until that fateful day when my card was placed on the altar. i had hopes and dreams of having a clean record, and mental gold stars galore. i did, however, break the rule that you were not supposed to tip the legs of your chair off the ground, and i was demoted to the altar. ...demoted isnt the right word, but....its okay. roll with the punches. i ran out of class, locked myself in a stall, and sobbed. i felt my entire life's work was lying in shards around my feet, but that my tears could flood the feelings away.

in third grade we made 8 goals a month and recorded them all in our goal-setting book. we wrote about the chapters of a book we aspired to read, what level of the speed math pyramid we wanted to get to, and how we wanted to expand our social lives and self-confidence. it was private and confidential between my teacher and i. we were never judged.

memories of later years include writing goals that "mattered" to us. what. does that mean. are we supposed to be "deep" "introspective" pre-teens? yeah, right. then, after we poured our delicate dreams onto a 3 by 5 index card, our teacher collected them and proceeded to read selections out to the class. not. okay. as anyone who knows me will understand, i do not do well when i feel embarrassed. all heads turned to me as my face crimsoned, ears burning, as my life's hopes were read aloud. my world quickly shattered around me as my secrets were revealed. oh gosh, i can feel the heat rising behind my cheeks even now, but i wanted to be a world renowned actress who won awards for excellent performances. i wanted to be a movie star; a child actress amongst the greats. that goal transfigured into a mystical wish with the passing of time.

all this makes me wonder. why do we really set goals? and is it okay to give up? if so, when?