The Wrong Way To Think About Your Goals (And How To Fix It)

Written by Dave Navarro on March 12, 2008

As a coach, I’m always talking to people who feel overwhelmed, overloaded, and over-stressed about how they are going to make their goals a reality. (Sometimes I’m talking to myself in the mirror about it as well. ) When you’ve got big plans, it’s easy to feel intimidated and hesitant about all that has to be done to accomplish them. It’s an easy state to get in - as I said, it happens to me frequently as well - but I’ve learned how to pull myself out of it quickly and move forward with a$$ kicking action. And the solution is so simple, you’ll be smacking your forehead when you realize how easy it is. (At least I do every time I have to remind myself. ) Here’s the deal.

Old And Busted: Thinking “Of” Your Goals

If you spend too much time thinking about where you want to be, you open yourself up to overwhelm and the dreaded “paralysis by analysis.” Why? Because you’re essentially focusing on one thought: “I’m not there yet.” That’s a pretty draining thought, and it hampers your ability to take action.

Now, keep in mind I’m not saying you shouldn’t do any thinking on your goals - you need to. Planning activities, brainstorming, strategizing, that’s all good (and finite) work. What I’m talking about is the constant wheel-spinning “When I reach X, I’ll be happy,” or “When I finally have Y, everything will be easier,” kind of thinking. That gets you nowhere. It certainly got me nowhere when I was treading water, trying to start a coaching business, but stressing about how I was going to make a name for myself.

In fact, over-thinking and worrying about your goals gets you worse than nowhere. It causes you to backslide. You begin to worry how you’re going to manage everything. You begin to second-guess strategies to the point of not taking enough action. You focus on small-time worries rather than big picture activities. You let your business run you, instead of running your business. And ultimately, you take less action - and weaker action - than you really need to.

Sound familiar? Everyone on this earth goes through these feelings sometimes, to some degree, as they head towards their goals. But they don’t have to.

The New Hotness: Thinking “From” Your Goals

If you want to really boost the level of motivation and satisfaction you get out of taking massive action to make your goals happen, think from your goals, not about your goals. Imagine that the goal you’re after is inevitable, that you’re going to have it eventually no matter what. In fact, imagine that you have it right now. Identify with it. Act from it.

Here are some examples:

• If you’re telling yourself you’ll save money “one day” when you have more, start saving now - even if it’s $1 a week. Instead of saying you’ll be a saver someday, do it now, and you’ll have ten times the motivation to take actions that will let you put more money away every week.
• Conversely, if you want to pay off debt faster, don’t wait until you have more money. Pay $1 more per payment this month. See yourself as being a debt destroyer now, and you’ll take more action to accelerate the pace.
• If you’re a blogger, don’t tell yourself you’ll write more when you have a larger audience. Imagine you have that larger audience now and act the way you would if you had 1,000 people a day reading your site. You likely soon will.
• If you want to lose weight, don’t tell yourself that you need to lose 30 pounds. Ram it into your head that deep inside, you are the kind of person who is supposed to be 30 pounds lighter. Identify with that, and you’ll boost your motivation now to do the things that will help you lose weight.
• If you are building a business and are just starting out, imagine yourself as an authority in the field, and immerse your thinking in the mindset that you’d have if you were already there. Take action now like you’d take it then.

This isn’t positive thinking or some law of attraction nonsense. This is about making a shift in psychology where you view yourself as already having the result, and so you act according to it. It’s the same technique Olympic athletes use when they visualize winning. Once they make that picture in their minds of winning the event, and they make it vivid enough, everything they do supports making that happen. They don’t say “I want to win …” and just hope it goes well. They say,“I am a winner,” and their body and mind work together to match their results with their perception.

The Psychology Of Certainty: Why This Trick Works

There is an enormous psychological difference between how our brains process hope and certainty. Hope allows us to feel the euphoric sensations that come with what might be, but it also triggers a lot of stress around what might happen if we fail. We all know this feeling. Think of how you feel when you “hope” you’ll get a raise. When you “hope” the customer will commit to you. When you “hope” something will go your way.

There’s joy, to be sure, but there’s stress as well. Should you go all out? What if it doesn’t pay off? What if despite your best efforts, you fail, or the customer decides to take her business elsewhere, or nobody responds to your ads … what will you do? These kinds of questions can paralyze you.

On the other hand, acting from a position of certainty gives you great motivation. If you know for certain that doing X, Y, and Z will 100% guarantee you a raise, damned right you’ll do it with enthusiasm. If you know for certain that by doing A, B, and C, the customer will be yours, you’ll do it. If you know for certain that investing in Stock XYZ will give you a 100% rate of return, you’ll do whatever it takes to get all the money possible to invest in it.

Certainty drives the willingness to take action, in spite of the work involved. Knowing that a payoff exists is the motivator that causes you to take massive action and keep a productive attitude despite all the challenges you face. Being certain means making that reality part of your identity, because you act according to what you believe about yourself.

Your Identity Is Your Mental Thermostat

Years ago, when I was trying to get from 215 tubby pounds to my muscular college weight of 185, I couldn’t get motivated because I just didn’t believe I could do it. I believed I was destined to be 215 pounds forever. I just couldn’t see myself ever breaking past 200. But a runner friend helped me focus on identifying with being 185 pounds, by forcing me to remind myself that I was an in-shape person, deep down … I’d just gotten off track.

Once I saw myself as 185, it became a lot easier to start running and lose weight. I’d look at the trail ahead of me and while I knew it would be exhausting, I knew it would get easier every time. It was just a matter of showing up, dealing with the work, and walking out lighter. I started getting irritated with the things that were keeping me overweight, and I almost subconsciously began to change my behaviors to line up with the 185 person I knew I was supposed to be. I had sealed my identity - I had succeeded in thinking from my goal, so I was acting in accordance with it almost naturally.

Your identity is like a thermostat - you’ll take whatever action you need to in order to get to where you think you should be. But most people don’t consciously set that thermostat - they just let it happen. So while they hope they’ll make more money, they have this inner sense that they won’t rise above their income level. Or they hope the next diet will work, but they see themselves as fat. Or they hope their blog will grow, but they see themselves as a small-time player.

Wherever you’re doing this in your own life, please realize that the answer doesn’t start with working harder. It starts with adjusting that thermostat, consciously changing what I call your success identity, and acting from that, rather than trying to get to that. That one distinction changes your life forever.

How To Tap Into This Certainty Today

You can start tasting the fruits of this strategy today - you simply don’t have to wait until later. All you have to do is think of where you want to be in your business, when you’re finally “there.” What does success mean to you? How will you feel? What kinds of activities will you be doing on a day to day basis? Who will you be interacting with? What standards will you be living by? How will you treat other people? How will you treat yourself? What will be making you feel fulfilled?

Before you do anything else today, stop and think about this. Where are you letting stress and overwhelm hold you back from taking action because you feel you’ll fail, or you feel you’re not good enough? Invest what could be the most valuable few minutes of your life and start putting yourself in a state of certainty that you will achieve it, because that’s who you are.

Share Your Certainty With Us

I encourage you to take a moment and post your new certainty - and how it will affect your actions moving forward - in the comments below. Writing things out can be one more step in making things real to you, so do it now. And if you found this post helpful, subscribe to this blog for more life-rocking tips in the future. I’ll see you in the comments!

You know what to do,

Dave