How often do you set a goal and not follow through? You work at it for a little while, get bored with its difficulty and decide that switching goals is the answer? Switching goals is a way of avoiding a more significant issue at hand in your life. This destructive behavior can become a habit and you know what they say, old habits die hard.
When you find the need to run away from a goal due to its difficulty there is a problem. Choice and options are drowning the modern world. You think you have more dating options than ever before. You can get food delivered and have a million different choices. Choice has become the expectation, and we tend to follow the path of the least resistance. The problem with this path is that it rarely leads to a life of fulfillment.
If you want to be successful, you need to change how you see yourself. Stop seeing yourself as a person who is trying to be something and start being it. Ask yourself right now what a successful person would do? If you want to be successful in any area, this question applies.
Develop Fortitude of Will Instead of Switching Goals
When you switch goals because what you wanted to do is too hard, it means that you are too weak. Chasing what is comfortable is no challenge, and it brings no long-term fulfillment. Chasing after what is difficult, will build your character. You discover your courage, will power, persistence, and your grit when you stick it out.
These are traits that you need to succeed. There is NO successful person that has not developed the character traits above. The character you have is the person that shows up when no one is looking. Most of life consists of time when no one is looking. That is a strong sign that character is everything.
Weakness Creeps In and Old Habits Die Hard
When you are switching goals, it's a sign of weakness. The weak inner-voice in you is being allowed to win. The voice is the same one that convinces you that you don't have another rep when you workout. The voice shows up when you are confident and tries to make you doubt yourself.
Tell that weakness to shut up!
Success is doing a lot of small things right over a long period. The critical part here is time! You will not see anyone who is a master of any skill without some time passing. The NBA shooter spent time shooting, the baker spent time baking and that writer spent time writing.
What are you spending time doing? Are you working towards mastery, or are you trying to show up and win? Did you go into your goals expecting results to show up at your door? It never works this way. Weakness wants things to be easy. Being challenged is how a strong person gets that way.
What would a successful person do?
If you want to be successful, you need to change how you see yourself. Stop seeing yourself as a person who is trying to be something and start being it. Ask yourself right now what a successful person would do? If you want to be successful in any area, this question applies.
If you answer this question and you are not doing those things yourself, how can you expect to be successful? One thing successful people do not do is switch their goals. They set their goals and review them daily to make sure that they focus on what matters most.
You cannot reap the benefits of cumulative work if you keep switching what you are aiming for. You need time working on the same skill to succeed. All the collective work you have gained will go out the window each time.
What to do when you are thinking of switching goals?
You may know that switching goals shows a lack of focus and grit, but you still can't help to do it when the moments arise. All you have to do is take the time to fast forward to the next ten years. In the short run, the new things seem so irresistible. What will happen in the next five years, though when you see something else that looks too good to be true? You will switch again because you have formed a new habit.
When you think of the long run, it gives you time to reflect on all that you have done. You may be a marketer that has spent the last three years working on SEO and social media marketing. You decide that there is a lot more money you could earn in cryptocurrency and you are ready to make that your thing. The problem is SEO, and social media marketing are not skills that cross over to the crypto world.
Now you have two skills you have spent three years working on them, and you are throwing them all away. You will start from the bottom with crypto. No one starts a new skill without having to be a beginner. Some may learn fast, but they all start at 0.
Now does this mean there is never a time to switch? Of course not but there is a time and place. In modern society, we do it too much, and as a result, we never get to stay on the road to mastery.
Embrace the Boring and Stop Switching Goals
The difference between a success and failure is what they do when things get boring. Kobe Bryant put up over 400 shots a day. People talk about this without thinking about what this means. He did not put up 400 shots when he felt like it or when the Lakers were winning. He put up the shots daily!
Most people would do it for a week or so, and they would begin to complain about how bored they are. They would want to dunk and do more fancy things like taking half court shots. They would see others working on things that seem more exciting and wish to do that. Once they had tried it all, they would decide basketball was not for them. They would take their talents to baseball and then go through the same path with that sport.
Kobe Bryant, and anyone who masters a craft understands that the basics are usually dull. You can't build anything on top of a weak foundation. You have to be able to crawl before you walk. Even before that, a baby must learn to hold their head up. You can't forget that. If a baby never learns to hold their head up, how can they walk? But babies never get bored of trying to hold their head up so that they can do some sprinting. They know that the basics need mastering.
The Best Advice on Switching Goals
Don't do it unless you are damn sure that what you are working on is not what you want.
The guy who has a vast website started with 0 fans, but he kept going.
The NBA player kept shooting.
That CEO stayed with the same company and learned the ins and outs for years.
The cook kept whipping it up in the kitchen.
All the above examples found mastery because they stopped switching goals.
How Can Habit Stacker Keep You Focused?
Habit Stacker helps you set goals and review those goals daily. The app makes you focus on the habits that bring your goals alive. The app is not about the big picture but the daily work that leads to accomplishing the big picture.
Too many people focus on the outcomes they want. I want to be rich. I want to lose weight or learn a new language. What they forget about is how the process and our own identities play into this. Habit Stacker helps you set a mission and "I AM" statements that help you attach to a new persona. If you have always been a business, you can declare that "I am fit and healthy."
Once you have your "I am statements," it is time to work on your goals. If switching goals is something you want to avoid, Habit Stacker will help you do that. The first reason is that you will have accountability. Each goal attaches an accountability partner who can help you. If you switch goals, you will have to explain it to your accountability partner. Habit Stacker will keep you focused over the long run so no one can ever say "old habits die hard" again.