How to Set Goals You’ll Actually Follow
Alright, now that we’ve discussed the tradeoffs and systems that come with goals, let’s talk about how to set goals you’ll actually follow.
There are three basic strategies I like to use when goal setting. Let’s talk about each one now.
1. Ruthlessly Eliminate Your Goals
Psychologists have a concept they refer to as “goal competition.”
Goal competition says that one of the greatest barriers to achieving your goals is the other goals you have. In other words, your goals are competing with one another for your time and attention. Whenever you chase a new goal, you have to pull focus and energy from your other pursuits. This is basically The Four Burners Theory in action. When you turn one burner up, you have to turn others down.
Now, there is good news. One of the fastest ways to make progress on your goals is to simply press pause on less important things and focus on one goal at a time. Sometimes you just need to reorganize your priorities a little bit and suddenly progress comes much more quickly because you are now fully committed to a goal that was only getting moderate attention previously.
This is an important insight. Typically, when we fail to reach our goals, we think something was wrong with our goal or our approach. Experts tell us, “You need to think bigger! Pick a dream that is so big it will motivate you every day.” Or we tell ourselves, “If only I had more hours in the day!”
These excuses cloud the bigger issue. What often looks like a problem of goal setting is actually a problem of goal selection. What we really need is not bigger goals, but better focus. You need to choose one thing and ruthlessly eliminate everything else. In the words of Seth Godin, “You don’t need more time, you just need to decide.”
Our lives are like rose bushes. As a rose bush grows, it creates more buds than it can sustain. If you talk to an experienced gardener, they will tell you that rose bushes need to be pruned to bring out the best in both their appearance and their performance. In other words, if you want a rose bush to thrive, then you need to cut away some of the good buds so the great ones can fully blossom.
Our goals are similar. They need to be consistently pruned and trimmed down. It’s natural for new goals to come into our lives and to get excited about new opportunities—just like it’s natural for a rose bush to add new buds. If we can muster the courage to prune away a few of our goals, then we create the space we need for the remaining goals to fully blossom. Full growth and optimal living require pruning.
I’ve written about a variety of strategies for getting your priorities in order and focusing on one thing at a time, including:
- The Ivy Lee Method
- Warren Buffett’s 25-5 Rule
- The Eisenhower Box
- The 20 Slot Rule
- The Myth of Multitasking
Take a look at those strategies and try out one that resonates with you.