This is the last newsletter for the year. Many people are withdrawn from the world, resting and thinking about their goals for the next 12 months. Another school of thought suggests that New Year’s resolutions are a waste of time, after all, plans never go according to plan, so why bother?
Which of these camps are you part of? While you chew on that, here are some facts and statistics on goals-setting:
- The Power of Written Goals: Research by Dominican University psychologist Gail Matthews found that writing down goals increases success by 43% compared to simply thinking about them.
- Specificity Matters: A study in the Journal of Applied Psychology revealed that specific and challenging goals lead to better performance than vague or easy ones.
- Accountability Boost: Having an accountability partner can supercharge your chances of success. A study by Statistic Brain showed that 65% of people with accountability partners reach their goals.
- New Year’s Blues: A whopping 92% of New Year’s resolutions fail. Lack of specificity, unrealistic expectations, and insufficient planning are often to blame.
- Procrastination’s Pitfall: Research suggests that delaying taking action on goals significantly reduces the chances of success. Starting small and building momentum is key.
The facts and statistics above are barely news. We all know that gyms will be packed at the beginning of the year, but only for the first month. We also know that energy levels are high in the first few weeks of the year, but slowly dwindle as things get back to the old normal. We also know that self-doubt, procrastination and a host of negative voices remain in our heads, slowly grinding away our motivation.
What is the solution? What truly sets apart those who set goals and achieve them from everybody else? What is that one thing? Is there a “one thing” or is this one of those fantasies where we believe there’s an easy answer because we do not want to do the hard work?
Either way, there is one undeniable truth. If we do not plan and aim at something, we become instruments and tools to achieve somebody else’s plan, and that sucks.
Where should goals come from?
My biggest complaint with our content age is that we no longer take useful information seriously. Instead of reading one important book and taking action on a topic, we want to read short reviews and watch every video on the subject to average out the recurring information.
But if we look seriously at the best people among us, we find that they are not averages; they lurk at the fringes of reality, dangerously pursuing what most of us deem impossible or even irresponsible. From the safety of the herd, we cackle, gossip and wag our fingers at their idiosyncrasies. Nevertheless, humanity moves forward when these unacceptable midwives of society puncture the womb of normalcy and deliver us into a new world; a new normal.
One such new normal – at any rate for me – is the realisation that goals are not simply dreamt up. We often say one should not look at other people, for example, and wish that one’s life were like theirs. In a deeper sense, even if one envies the lives of others, one must recognise that of all the people to envy, one is drawn to a certain type of reality. In other words, one’s envy and possibly one’s dreams are a reflection of an inner complex of desires that seek to address the world as it should be.
Therefore, it seems to me that a good starting point is not setting goals, but seeking to understand one’s needs. For this, I found a useful tool called The Wheel of Life, best explained by YouTuber Ali Abdal here.
I will come back to the wheel of life in a moment.
Understanding Personal Wealth & Life Categories
In my personal mission statement, I define wealth as things that bring quality of life. I declared that my wealth is derived from three areas: personal well-being, family and work. Further, I declare that I will invest all my waking hours in improving my wealth.
Within each category there are sub-categories. My subs are organised as follows:
- Personal: mental, physical, spiritual
- Family: wife & children, extended family, friendships
- Work: hobbies, profession, philanthropy
These three categories are what one could call Life Categories. You can create your own categories if you like, but this brings us back to the diagram above. If you look closely, there are nine slices in the circle. Some are solid and others are dotted. The solid slices represent the main categories, and the dotted slices are the sub-categories.
The idea is to look at each slice and give yourself an honest rating out of ten. This reveals the areas of life that require attention. Importantly, the idea is not to “balance” the wheel of life; the idea is to arrive at a clear understanding of where things stand in one’s life.
Setting Goals: Inside Out
I must say this again. The wheel of life will not reveal anything new, but it will clarify the thoughts in one’s mind and place them in specific buckets. This way, one can attend to them methodically.
My assessment revealed improvements I want to make in the personal (physical) category. Simply, I recognise that as I enter my 40s (in the next two years), my physical health will become important to maintain. Therefore, my goal is to improve my physical strength, knowing that the success will spill over positively into other areas.
As you can see, the goal is set from within. In a sense, the goal emerges automatically by assessing one’s life categories and asking important questions about what must improve and why.
Breaking down goals into action steps
This section warrants a separate newsletter, but briefly, the idea is to recognise that there are different types of goals. Again, I will draw a lesson from my cycling journey. Remember, I had two goals: a) cycling from Musina to Cape Town, and b) raising funds for 10,000 school shoes.
These are two entirely different types of goals, requiring a different approach. Here’s a deeper look:
Individual Goals: Cycling from Musina to Cape Town was an individual goal. It depended solely on my willingness to keep going (and not dying in the process).
Social Goals: Raising funds was a social goal; its success depended on encouraging (or persuading) other people to participate in the cause, which is an entirely different skill.
I have since discovered a third category of goals, but like I said, this requires a separate newsletter altogether. Sticking to the two categories for now, one can appreciate that the approach to both is entirely different. The main difference is that individual goals require discipline and social goals require persuasion.
With this in mind, look at your wheel of life, identify individual goals and separate them from social goals. Then, as Steven Covey put it, begin with the end in mind. Start by visualising, writing and articulating what the end goal looks like. For me, it was simply, “Green Point Stadium and 10,000 school shoes.” Be clear about the end goal.
Next, forget about how you will get there. I say this simply, but it is a big insight. No one gets to their goal as planned – and this is where people believe “plans never go as planned.” This is true, but it’s not a bad thing. Pursuing a goal is like going on an adventure. Become an explorer.
Start with the next logical step on your individual goals right away. Remember, social goals need cooperation from other people, therefore they are a bit more complicated. The biggest lesson from my journey is that the more people donated to the cause the closer I reached Cape Town. In other words, the pursuit of individual goals is itself a persuasive tool for unlocking social goals.
To Be Continued (but briefly, the biggest challenge of all)
You might know that I was working on an online course called theAchiever program. Most of what I shared today comes from research into creating that course. I put the idea on ice because I could not solve the biggest challenge of all – human motivation.
At some point, we all know what we must do yet we struggle to find the motivation to do it. For some, this is pure procrastination; but for others, there are deeper issues of a lack of self-confidence, which have no easy solutions.
I am researching human motivation, and hopefully, that work will reveal insights into what makes us tick. When I find the answers, as you can expect, you will be the first person to know about them through this newsletter. And maybe I will regain the confidence of completing the course.
Here’s some padkos
My biggest takeaway from investigating today’s topic is the following:
- Goals must be deeply tied to an important personal agenda.
- The wheel of life is a cool tool for revealing and setting one’s personal agendas
- Individual goals are different from social goals: one depends on self-discipline and the other on persuasion.
- The pursuit of individual goals often unlocks social goals.
- Don’t plan the whole mission, take the first step and the next step will reveal itself.
What were your takeaways? How do you plan for the year? I’d love to hear from you.
Until next week! I wish you a spectacular year.
Vusi Sindane
