What’s Stopping You from Reaching Your Goals?   S. 4  E.  46

Listen to this episode to find our why you aren’t achieving goals and how to rethink goal setting for the new year. 

Show notes:

Episode Summary:

What’s stopping YOU from achieving your goals? Goals are good for us. Goals give us something to strive for, they give us purpose and when we achieve them, can be a great source of satisfaction and pride. Goals give us direction and help us realize our dreams are within our reach. If goals are so good for us, why do we struggle so much to achieve them? What can we do to ensure we set goals that we can actually achieve? Today, we discuss common mistakes people make when setting goals and tips to make sure you are setting goals that you can achieve.

In this episode: 

The following is a summary of this episode. To hear all of the stories and examples, please listen to the podcast.

Introduction: 

At the time of this recording, it is just a few days into the new year. Everywhere we turn, people are making New Year’s Resolutions, setting goals for the new year and hoping to make those dreams a reality.

Goals help us turn our dreams into reality and remind us that our dreams are within our reach. However, no matter how great our intentions, many people will struggle to meet the goals they set this week and this year.

According to the University of Scranton, only 8% of people achieve their New Year’s Resolutions.  75% keep their resolutions for 1 week. After that, the percentage of people keeping their resolutions decreases each week. Within one month, only 64% of people are still trying to achieve their New Year’s resolutions. Within 6 months only 46% are still working at their goals and as we mentioned only 8% of people ultimately achieve those New Years goals.

That means 92% of people are left with unmet New Year’s Goals. With more than 40% of people making New Year’s Resolutions, that equates to a lot of disappointed people.

Let’s reiterate: 92% of people do NOT achieve their New Year’s resolutions! Not achieving our goals leads to feelings of failure, which leads to lower self-confidence. The good news is, that we can do better.

What goals have you set that you haven’t met?  What goals would you like to set and achieve in the future?

6 Tips for Creating And Achieving Your Goals in 2024

1. Start with your vision for how you want your life to be, then align all of your goals to that vision.

Before we can really talk about setting goals, we need to talk about your vision for your life. What are your values?  What is important to you? Who do you want to be in your life and how do you want to show up?  What do you want to feel?  What do you want to have?

If you don’t start here, you run the risk of creating goals, and maybe even achieving them, only to find out that you aren’t happy or fulfilled. The world is full of very high achieving, miserable people.

Your goals need to align with the life that you want. That makes them important to you and crucial for your fulfillment.

This is where vision boards come in. This is where life assessments come into play.

Think about the image of climbing a ladder to achieve your goals.

Stephen Covey that says, “If the ladder is not leaning against the right wall, every step we take just gets us to the wrong place faster.”

Doing this step also means that you will set YOUR goals, not allow your goals to be set by someone else. You are not here to live someone else’s dream.

Research shows we are less likely to meet goals set by someone else. Why? Because it often is not meaningful to us or does not align with our values and what matters most to us.

When something is more meaningful to you, when it will help you live an inspired life, you are more likely to stick to it and achieve it.

Consider a goal that you want to set in the new year. Does it align with your values and vision?

2. Be Clear and Specific. The more clarity around the goal, the better chance you have of hitting it.

Edwin Locke, a psychologist who has been central to the body of research about goal setting has been studying goals for over 40 years. His research has given us great information on why people do not meet their goals.

Make sure your goals are clear and specific.

Goals where you decide to just “do your best” at something are often not successful. Neither are goals that are convoluted to the point that they aren’t clear.

To give yourself the best chance of meeting the goal, be clear about what the goal is and what specifically you hope to achieve.

Here are a few examples:

• A goal to “Do my best to lose some weight” is not as clear, specific, or simple as “I will lose one pound per week for the first 12 weeks of the year”.
• A goal to “eat healthier” is not as clear, specific, or simple as “I will not eat chips, candy or ice cream for 4 weeks”.
• A goal to “start working out” is not as clear, specific, or simple as “I will work out at the gym on my way home from work 3 days per week.”

Consider a goal you are working toward or would like to set.

Is it clear and specific? If not, what extra details or clarifications do you need to add to your goal to make it more specific?

In order for goals to really work, they need to be specific and they have to sufficiently challenge you.

3. Make goals challenging but not too challenging.

Locke’s research also showed that challenging goals improve performance more than easy ones.

Locke found that 90% of the time, specific and challenging goals led to higher performance than goals that were easy or  vague “do your best” type of goals.

As Locke and other researchers have discovered, there is a sweet spot for challenge when setting a goal. People who set goals that are too easy, are actually less likely to achieve them. However, if you set the goal so high that it is nearly impossible to meet, you will quickly lose motivation.

You need to find the “Goldilocks” of challenge level for your specific goal.

We have all used this and understand this when working with students. There is also a sweet spot in instruction. When things are too easy and there is no challenge, students lose motivation. When something is too hard, students may just give up. That attitude is, “ I’m never going to be able to do this, so why should I even try?”  It’s the same with goals.

Consider a goal you are working toward or would like to set:

• If it is too easy, how can you make it more of a challenge?
• Is it too challenging and complex, if so how can you simplify or pick one aspect of it to focus on?
• Plan for that challenge- what will you do when it gets difficult- “If this happens, then I will bounce back by….”

4. Break the goal down into smaller, achievable and attainable pieces. 

Like many things in our lives, goals are not nearly as overwhelming when they are broken into bite sized chunks.

Compare this idea to IEP goals – daily or weekly actions that are taken and tracked, all working toward an annual goal.

Consider a goal you are working toward or would like to set.

• Would it be helpful to break it into smaller chunks?
• Determine what you want to achieve by a specific date and write down the dates.
• Track your success. Seeing a visual is motivating when you are seeing positive progress.

5. You need to believe you can achieve the goal.  

Ultimately, the person who needs to believe in your ability to meet your goals the most is you!  This is about your mindset and self-efficacy. If you think you won’t be successful, it can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. When you hit an obstacle, if you don’t believe in yourself, then you may be tempted to use that obstacle as confirmation of your inability to do the task. However, the opposite is also true. If you believe you CAN do it, then when you see a minor success, you can use it as confirmation of your ability to meet the goal.

Belief in yourself will get you through bumps in the road, and minor setbacks as they occur, so you don’t just throw up your hands and say, “See, this just wasn’t for me.”

This is confirmation bias, you get when you expect to get, just as you see what you expect to see.

“Henry Ford said it well, “Whether you think you can or think you can’t, You’re right.

6.  Surround yourself with a star system of support.

We’ve talked about the importance of a star system many times. You may think of it as a dream team, but we like Shawn Achor’s vision of this. He says, “ You can be a superstar; you just can’t be one alone. What you need is a star system; a constellation of positive, authentic influencers who support each other, reinforce each other, and make each other better.”

When setting a goal, it is important to have someone who believes that you can reach your goal. Who can you find who will believe you can achieve your goal and remind you of it regularly? Those are the people will help you by serving as your support system. It doesn’t have to be a huge group, but it is important to have support from at least one person.

Part of a successful support system is accountability. The other part is that we all benefit from others’ beliefs that we can achieve. If you are not comfortable sharing your goals and dreams, you don’t have to tell your support system every detail. Tell them as much as you are comfortable with or tell them when you are comfortable enough to do so. Find people who believe in you.

Consider a goal you are working towards or that you would like to set. Who can you find to share in your dream and help you by supporting you on your path?

A Little More Motivation

We leave you with this quote from motivational speaker Les Brown:

“If you set goals and go after them with all the determination you can muster, your gifts will take you places that will amaze you.”

Recap:

Setting goals in life is important because goals give us something to strive for, give us purpose, remind us that our dreams are within reach, and when you achieve them, can be a great source of satisfaction and pride. However, it is important to be intentional in our goal setting, aligning them to our values and vision for our life and then setting goals in a way that is achievable. Our goals should be clear and specific, challenging but not too challenging, and broken down into smaller steps. Then, with support, we can go after whatever our heart desires.

Quote:

 “If you set goals and go after them with all the determination you can muster, your gifts will take you places that will amaze you.”

Les Brown

Resources mentioned in this episode:

To learn more about Edwin Locke and his goal setting theories go to

https://edwinlocke.com/

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