One of life’s challenges is to train ourselves to get results. If you’re not getting the results you want in your business— or in other areas in your life— you have two choices: you can give up or you can reformulate your goals.
Human nature is such that our thoughts, our plans, and our dreams are always larger than our capacity to fill them. Despite this, most of us are stunned or distressed when we don’t reach our goal the first time out. The underlying reason is because we don’t necessarily have the skills to immediately get the results we want. And then most of us quit. We make a huge dream; we make a huge goal… Way beyond where we are today. And then we quit! We rationalize our disappointment by saying, “Well, that was too hard.”
What we need to do instead is recognize that
if we had the capacity today, we’d already have that goal or that dream in our life. We’d have that successful business. We’d have that desired income. (Or, on a personal level, we’d have that relationship. We’d have the ability to run a 5 minute mile or lose that extra weight.) If we had it. But we don’t have that capacity. So we need to train ourselves to see the gap between the goal we’re striving for and where we are today.
Just like any physical exercise which gradually builds up our muscles, we need to train ourselves—our minds and our spirits—to create results larger than ourselves. And the key to discerning what’s happening is to break the project down into a manageable chunks that you can actually see and track. One of the tricks for doing this is to set a specific outcome for the week.
For example, if your financial goal is to earn $100,000 per year, what would you need to earn per week in order to achieve that? Recognizing that there is a building process with any business, you might set an initial goal to earn $1,000 in a week. $1,000 is something that you can see. You know if you achieved that goal or not. So
the first step is to take whatever your final outcome and break it down into manageable segments by setting a target to be achieved during a seven day period of time.
At the same time, you want to open yourself to the idea that
every time you fall short of a goal, you should use it as a time for celebration. It gives you an opportunity to reflect on what was
missing. In other words, the purpose of this goal is really to identify what’s stopping you. (And the benefit from not achieving the goal is actually going to be more sustainable to your future plans than if you get it the first time out of the box.)
So, you’ve set a goal of making $1,000 per week. Ask yourself these questions:
- Now where is that revenue going to come from?
- If you have a product or a service that you offer, how many customers will you need to have?
- Are they going to be new customers?
- Are they going to be repeat customers?
Break it down to the level of exactly what it is that you need. Now it’s time to examine your investment to reach your goal.
- What are your resources for finding those customers?
- How many contacts do you need to make in order to get 1 new customer?
Now as you’re creating your plan (and reading this article), I want you to observe how you feel. Because in this process, you are going to be able to identify what you are not willing to do.
And this is your clue as to what’s missing, or stopping you from achieving all of your dreams.
It’s going to be something very simple. For example, “I don’t like cold calling.” There is always something for each of us that we are not
willing to do. But that’s what
we have to do or hire someone to do it in order to accomplish our ultimate goal.
The final piece is to create a structure for holding yourself accountable. Simply making a promise to yourself that you’re going to take the steps you’ve outlined for the week is not enough. You need a third party who can function as a sounding board and who will hold you accountable for the actions you planned to take to meet your weekly goal.
So, to recap the key points:
1. Train yourself to see the gap between the goal you’re striving for and where you are today.
2. Break the larger goal down into a weekly goal.
3. When you do not achieve your weekly goal, use it as an opportunity to reflect on what was missing, i.e., identify what is stopping you from achieving the goal.
4. Observe how you feel—what is it that you are not willing to do? (This is the clue to what is missing and, ultimately, what it is you need to do or find someone who can do it for you.)
5. Build a structure with a third party who will hold you accountable to your plan.
When you are ready to be accountable to yourself, you are ready to shift your business to the next level. Take on the challenge of surpassing your wildest expectations, you’re worth it.
