Goals: How to Acheive Them

Maybe it's that grid-iron football mentality that many of us were taught at a young age: If you have a problem, you just tuck your head down, double your efforts, and plow through it, inch-by-painstaking inch. Goals shouldn't be easy, after all. If they are easy, something's wrong. Yet, we all successfully do things all the time that are easy. We just don't pay as much attention to them, because, well, they're easy.

I know folks with all sorts of goals--fitness goals, professional goals, emotional health goals, artistic goals. I often hear the same things: I just gotta push myself harder, I just gotta make myself do it. And then when they inevitably fall off the wagon, therein starts the cycle of self-flagellation and mea culpas. Unless guilt and shame are your true goals, this method usually doesn't produce the desired results.

There's no question that self-discipline is a vital characteristic of anyone who achieves their goals. It's important to have an underlying current of self-discipline at all times, at least in the background somewhere. You need to kick it in when times are tough and to be able to muscle through a problem when all else fails. But that's exactly it: You need the "all else." If you continually find yourself going against the grain, maybe there is a way to change the grain.

Are there strategic decisions you can make with your life to put yourself in environments, cultures and conditions that are more favorable to your personal style and thus more conducive to your goals?

Goals are hard enough just by themselves. There is no sense reaping on yourself additional burdens (and the guilt that comes when you fail) by making such an issue of your own self-discipline. I think some folks need to prove something to themselves, perhaps they feel they need to earn something in order to have it. I also suspect that all this talk about self-discipline may just be another method of avoidance. In true tragic irony, focusing so much on the process may just be a distraction from the true goal.

It really doesn't matter if Mozart wrote his pieces effortlessly or in gruelling agony & ecstasy. The important thing is that they got written.

It's a good exercise in being human to acknowledge that we have limitations and weaknesses. That is actually a moment of true empowerment. I can say to myself, "I really want to work out every day, but I know there is no way in hell I'm going to muster up the self-discipline every single day to do it consistently." I know that about myself. I also know that I will work out in a different environment. I'm much more likely to work out if I join a gym, have workout buddies, or change other factors in my life that bring working out closer to the regular infrastructure of my day. I could also think beyond the gym, and realize that I will work harder every day in my backyard vegetable garden than I ever would in a gym. Knowing this I can make some changes to accommodate.

Admitting limitations can be a moment of depression, but it can also be a moment of opportunity. Once you identify a problem, you can more easily identify a solution.

My roommate and I walked every day when we lived for a semester in Spain. Walking was just about the only way to get anywhere. Due to cost, the bus was only for emergencies. We lived on the outskirts of town, so that meant there was at least a mile to and from class, to and from the internet cafes, to and from restaurants, clubs and shopping. We walked 2-5 miles every day. When we did break down to occasionally take the bus, we noticed we didn't feel as good that day. We walked and we loved it--rain, sleet, or shine. We loved it so much and enjoyed such tremendous health benefits for mind, body and spirit from doing it that we said we would continue walking even after we returned to America. Guess what? We probably walked once or twice then let it slide. No matter how good it felt, no matter how convinced we were of its importance, once it was so far removed from the daily routine it quickly fell away.

Walking was hard enough. We had blisters, blistery weather, and some late mornings trying to hoof it to class. But at least we weren't fighting ourselves. When left to my own devices, I can't tell you how much time I would spend trying to convince myself to take a day off, quit or rationalize my way in or out of any other excuse. Being in an environment where walking was essentially the only option took that whole debate right out of the equation. We could spend our energy working through whatever problems arose rather than wasting all that energy deciding whether to get on the horse at all.

Daily, rigorous self-discipline is not what it's cracked up to be. It is also important--and perhaps essential--and perhaps easier and smarter--to put yourself into an environment that is conducive to your goals. It doesn't necessarily get any easier at that point--but at least you can apply yourself to achieving the goal itself rather than spend all your energy just getting yourself to show up.

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This is part 3/5 of the series "Strategic Goal Setting."