Why Do People Fail at Goal Setting and How to Finally SucceedGoal Setting: 25 High Achievers Reveal How to Succeed at Achieving Your Goals

Candice Coppola

«Here’s an interesting reason why your goals might be failing year after year: you’re confusing goals with aspirations. You see, there is a difference between goals and aspirations.

Goals are defined as the object of a person’s ambition or effort, an aim or a desired result.
An aspiration, on the other hand, is a hope or ambition of achieving something.

Simply put, goals are the “how” and aspirations, they are the “why”. Goals are how we train for the marathon and aspirations, my friends, aspirations are what happens and how we feel when we cross that finish line.

David Kirkaldy put it really, really simply. He says that “an aspiration is attained over time on the bedrock of many goals”.

Don’t get confused, my friends, between aspirations and goals. Set your aspirations and then start working on actions steps a.k.a. goals to get yourselves there. This process, this process helps us to dig deep enough that we hit that bedrock that David Kirkaldy talked about.»

Ashley Barnhart

«My name Ashley Barnhart and I’m the host of a podcast called Adult Struggles, where we talk about overcoming life obstacles and the journey of adulting.

I actually just had two guests on the show this past month talking about goal setting, so this is very top of mind for me.

One of the big takeaways that I learned from those two guests was the importance of having purpose behind your goals.

So I think one of the biggest reasons people fail to accomplish what they’ve set out to do is because they haven’t determined their reason why. They don’t think about the outcome of the goal or what the future could hold if that goal were to be accomplished.

So, for example, you could have a very empty, surface-level goal of losing weight — which is great. But, if you don’t form that personal connection behind the goal and think about “okay, like, why do I want to lose weight? What’s going to be the outcome? How is this going to change my life?”, then you’re most likely not going to accomplish it.

So putting that purpose and that why behind the goal is one of the most important aspects of succeeding.»

Nadalie Bardo

«Hey there, it’s Nadalie Bardo, the founder of ItsAllYouBoo.com, a blog dedicated to helping you slay your goals in life and business.

I would say that the number one reason that people fail with goal setting is that they don’t look beyond the goal itself.

So, when you’re setting a goal, don’t just have an outcome, a destination in mind, but tie it and anchor this goal to something deeper, something deeply personal to yourself like an intention, your purpose, or your why.

Don’t just focus on where you’re going, but have something that you can draw on to keep you motivated and inspired because, let’s be honest, motivation comes and motivation goes. It’s really hard to stay committed.

That’s why you need to have the “something deeply personal” from the beginning. That’s why I created my “Slay Your Goals Planner” — it helps you go from intention to action. It’s not just about the goal. It’s about why it matters to you, what it means to you and what accomplishing this objective that you have would mean for yourself.

So, next time you set a goal, think about: “what does this mean to me, what is the purpose of this goal, and how is it going to change my life?”. That’s how you’re set up for, not just goal setting, but goal-slaying success.»

Dr Shannon Irvine

«Hey Louie. Dr. Shannon over here. So I have seen over and over again the reason why people do not achieve their goals that they set out for themselves is they never ground them in the way they want to feel and they never ground them in what they want to produce in their live, the end result.

So a lot of times people set “well, I want to make more money”, but then they’re not talking about how… what does that get them, you know, what does that do for you, what’s important about that for you and really grounding in that as your “why”.

We hear it all the time “you got to know your why, you got to know your why”, but then 98% of people dismiss that and it is the fuel that keeps it burning.

And then, one of the things that happens, too, is a lot of people will set goals in January and then never look at them again.

That’s not what high achievers, high performers do. They revisit their “why” every single day. In fact, right in front of me right now is my “why”. I’m staring at it as I’m sitting here in the office.

Every single morning, I rewrite my goals not as if I hope they happen, but as if they’ve already happened. And starting to become the person that that type of goal requires and do that now, so that it just becomes easier and more effortless for your goals to be accomplished.

So those are some things that I know high achievers, high performers do and you can really shift the game, if you start to do ‘em.»

Lisa Linfield

«I’m Lisa Linfield from Working Women’s Wealth.

For me, one of the major reasons people don’t achieve their goals is that goals exist to achieve a vision that you have. And, in many cases, people don’t set a big enough vision.

In my mindset or goal setting courses, one of the techniques that I use is very strong visualization. And I give people permission to dream big. So I say to them, “dream a dream that is so big that there is absolutely no constraints, no “but’s”, no “ah’s”, no “why’s”, nothing.

And what I’m always fascinated by is so many times people respond and they say, “it is so great to have permission to dream”.

And it’s always struck me as something really interesting, because why do we need permission to dream? When we were little, we used to dream unconstrained dreams all the time. And for me, the answer is because our hopes have been dashed. We’ve had a hope for something and it hasn’t come to pass.

And so, when do these visualizations or goal settings, there is a natural, protective safety mechanism in us that says, “Don’t be stupid, Lisa! Make sure that you set dreams and goals that aren’t going to hurt you or disappoint you.”

And so, if your goal or dream isn’t big enough, it doesn’t have the excitement, the emotion, the feelings attached to it of something better for you or your family or whatever it is that you’re setting that goal for, then I don’t think that we create a momentum, a pull from our goal or from our vision that is strong enough to impact our goal.

In addition to the fact that your vision doesn’t pull you, one of the reasons I think we don’t achieve our goals is because we don’t set time aside to prepare each week.

And, in an interview that I did with a woman called Lisa Raleigh, who was one of “The Biggest Loser” fitness coaches, her answer to the question as to“why don’t people achieve their New Year’s diet resolution” and she mentioned preparation, that it takes very big organization and preparation to achieve a weight loss or an exercise goal.

And I thought about it a lot in terms of women’s finances. And, if you have a birthday party for your child’s friend and you’ve got half an hour before you go to buy that present, what ends up happening is that you spent way too much money on that present because you’ve got half an hour and the first thing you see is good enough and you buy it, but it’s too expensive.

If you are prepared and you make sure that you go to a wholesale toys shop and buy a whole bunch of toys at a cheaper price, you will be able to achieve your financial goals a lot better.

So, that element of preparedness impacts all aspects of goal achievement; is that it takes work to achieve your goals. And it takes that discipline on a Sunday or on a weekend to prepare your meals, to prepare your exercise plan, to prepare whatever it is, such that when the week hits and you are tired and it’s flying at you at a million miles an hour, you don’t have to think too hard as to what it is that you need to do. You’ve already set it aside, you’ve already prepared for it and it helps you to achieve your goals.»

Candice Dick

«When looking at goal setting and why we fail at our goals through the eyes of emotional intelligence, a key thing we look at is the awareness that goals involve change.

And change involves us, people. And people are much more complex often than we acknowledge, or accept, or even understand.

We have conditioning from our past, we have habits from our childhood, we have motivations and intentions we aren’t always aware of or haven’t actually identified. We don’t always get in touch with the true desires of our hearts. Sometimes, we work from a place of the desires of our heads or “should’s” or “must-be’s”.

And, actually, if we’re going to make change, the powerful thing is to get in touch with our heart. The energy of our heart is 4,000 times more powerful than the energy of our head. And, when they two are aligned and work together, it’s the equivalent of riding an elephant towards our goal as opposed to trying to push an elephant towards our goal.

So it suddenly becomes a lot more powerful, if we have our heart and our head aligned as we set our goals and we move towards them.

And then, within that complexity, is to not set ourselves up for success or failure as though achieving a goal is a black-and-white issue. That is either we have or we haven’t, we got there or we didn’t.

But, actually to understand the gray area in between that it takes to reach success. And then use that space when we fail to acknowledge that we failed, to reflect on what we’ve been feeling, to reflect on what’s going on for us, to reflect on the habits, the external factors and demands that mean we haven’t been able to follow through on goals.

And then to unpack in reflection and then to start again with more wisdom. And, as we repeat that process, it may take us months or years even longer than we expected to get where we want to go, but the reality is in the long-term. We are able to get there as wiser people with greater self-awareness, greater understanding of self.

And so the goal, then, doesn’t just become something we need to tick off our list, but the process of achieving the goal actually transforms us, as well.»

Linda Schwartz

«As a creative person, goal setting has never really been a linear, rigid-structured kind of thing for me. And, up until recently, doing a S.M.A.R.T. goal was like pulling teeth for me, because I just didn’t feel inspired or connected to, not just the acronym, but the methodology.

So, for me, I discovered that, if I set an intention and a theme for myself that was emotionally driven and highly inspired, I could really allow the inspiration to move forward and move through me as a channel, as a creative channel, to get things done.

So for instance, my 2018 intention and theme was “prosperous soul play” and the intention behind that was to get paid to share my gifts and talents with the world. And, for me, that has a lot of emotional and inspired pull to it.

And so, one of the things that happened in 2018 was: number one, I was inspired to do stand-up comedy again. And once that inspiration hit and once I knew that was what I wanted to do, the things that I needed to do quickly followed behind like signing up for a class and, you know, working on my set and working on my material, writing, doing those things.

And then I was inspired to start my podcast — She Shed Comedy Podcast and that inspiration came forward to me at the end of May of 2018. And from the moment I was inspired to do that in the date that I actually launched, it took about 90 days for the dream or for the podcast to manifest. And so I did everything that would have normally had to be done. Just being open to and moved by what was coming forward through my inspiration and intention.

And so, for me, goal setting has always been a feeling practice, not so much a rigid-structured practice. And the rigid-structured practice works for a lot of people, it just doesn’t work for me. And I think that goal setting is a relative experience; it’s a relative experience and that everybody operates on a different level at different capacities.

And I also think that goal setting in the structured and linear and in the S.M.A.R.T. goal way is also a very masculine approach to getting things done. If you think about all the people who are behind or most of the people that are behind the S.M.A.R.T. goal and how it came forward, I believe a man probably… invented that or came up with the acronym.

And for a woman, for a creative woman who’s driven by my emotions and my, you know, liking to be inspired or feeling like I need to do something that the S.M.A.R.T. goal just really wasn’t ideal for me to live into. And so one of the things that I found that worked, again, like I said, was something, was creating something that worked for me that was tailored to my own quote unquote operating system.

And for me, knowing that I am a highly inspired and highly intuitive person, setting an intention and a theme for myself really has worked wonders for accomplishing all the things that I want to accomplish. So that’s my take on goal setting. Thank you so much.»

Heather Christian

«Hi, this is Heather Christian with the Blast the BS Podcast.

Now, the number one thing I think people do wrong when they are setting goals is they have this “set it and forget it” mentality.

They get all gung-ho, like, “I’m going to start this new thing and, you know, in a week from now my life is going to be totally different” and then they just think about it one time… and then it’s out of their mind.

I mean, we are all super busy people and so you have to have a way that you are sticking to your goals so that you make it through that 21 days that it takes to create a new habit.

So here’s what I do. I write down my goals every night before I go to bed and then I write them again every morning when I wake up.

Now, I know this sounds like a lot, but it really isn’t — it only takes you about 5 minutes. And here is what it does for you.

When you go to sleep at night and you write down those goals, you are telling your subconscious mind, like “hey, figure out ways I can make this happen”.

And then, in the morning when you do it, you are basically telling your subconscious mind to look for clues to make your goal happen. It’s similar to when you’re thinking about buying a new car and you see that car everywhere… that’s what you’re doing.

So, don’t just set it and forget it with your goals. Write them down, morning and night, your top 3 to 5 goals — you can do it really quick — and then you’ll see how much faster those new goals become habits in your subconscious mind and they just become part of your everyday beliefs.»

Shannon Mattern

«Hey there, it’s Shannon Mattern from the Pep Talks for Side Hustlers Podcast, where I share marketing tips, motivation and expert advice to help you grow your side hustle.

So, why do I think people fail at goal setting? Well, the main reason is that they don’t really truly believe that what they want is possible.

So I see this happening in my own life over and over. When I first started my side hustle teaching WordPress to entrepreneurs I knew deep down in my bones that someday I would grow my business big to the point of quitting my day job. I just knew it and I actually did it.

And, on the other hand, when I have set the goal many, many times in my life to lose weight over and over again deep down I haven’t believed that it’s possible. I haven’t believed that I’m capable of doing it. And therefore, my actions follow my belief.

And until recently when I worked on changing my belief to believe that it is possible, my actions are now following my belief and I am seeing results and working towards that goal.

So, let me ask you this: if you want to make six figures in your side hustle, but you don’t quite believe that it’s possible, what can you start believing?

Can you believe that you can make $100 this year? Can you believe that you can make a thousand? What about 10,000? Where does your belief stop? I want you to set that as your first goal and then, when you actually believe that that is possible, you will take action towards reaching that goal.

And then, when you accomplish that goal, move through this exercise again to find out what you believe is possible for yourself and see how much your belief has grown, set that as your next goal and watch yourself just knock it out of the park.

So I actually have a resource that can help your audience, Louie, check out peptalksforsidehustlers.com/158 the first episode in my series on creating a strategic plan for your side hustle so that you can reach your business goals.»

Jason Skinner

«Good day, Louie. Jason here from the Business Made Easy Podcast.

The reason I think most people fail at goals — and myself included over the years, where I’ve set goals and failed to meet them particularly in the areas of things like weight loss and that sort of thing — is that we don’t change the belief system.

We set the goal, which the goal is the end target, and that’s what we want to get to, that’s the reward at the end, but we don’t spend enough time on changing our underlying belief system.

And that belief system and the habits that go into that belief system are the critical things that I think is where people fall down with their goal setting.

James Clear talks about this extensively in his book “Atomic Habits”.

And, unless we get a real, burning desire in our belief system to actually move towards that end result, we’re not going to get there. We’re going to fall short, because we haven’t put in place the systems and processes to drive us towards that.

So achieving your goals is basically made up of the succession of regular, persistent habits and that’s the bit, I think, is where people fail.

I know, myself, I’ve failed in that area over the years. And I’d recommend checking out James’ book if you get the change to do that. It’s an awesome book and he spells it out really clearly in there.

Something I do now is actually spend a lot more time, when I set a goal, I go “okay, that’s what I want, that’s the end result, the reward at the end, but what’s the path, what’s the journey?”.

Then set up sort of micro wins along the way and, bit by bit, you’ll get there. Rather than looking at it as one big, long task that you have to do, breaking it down into smaller bite-sized pieces that you can earn smaller victories along the way.

So “if I can just, in the next two weeks, get to this point; if I can get to the next two weeks…”

And change the language, change your language so that you’re talking as if you already have achieved it. I think that’s where… I see.

I know I’ve failed in that regard over the years and that certainly has made an impactful difference to me now in my life and in my business.»

Pauline Longdon & Rae Brent

«[Pauline Longdon and Rae Brent] Hey Louie! This is Pauline Longdon and Rae Brent and we’re from BreakingThroughTheBS.com.

[Pauline] Anyway, we’re here today to answer your question which is…

[Rae] “Why do people fail at goal setting?”

[Pauline] So the biggest mistakes that Rae and myself have seen people make when it comes to goal setting is that, sometimes, their goals are just too hairy and audacious and they get overwhelmed by them.

[Rae] They do. And it’s a case of making something so big and putting a time frame on it that is just realistically unachievable, because it’s outside of their actual control.

[Pauline] Yeah, and that’s a big thing, isn’t it, Rae? That we’ve seen in mistakes is that people who try to set goals and time frames for things that they cannot control themselves.

[Rae] That’s it. And they’ll set that time frame on something that they can control, but then they won’t actually backfill and set smaller stepping-stone goals, as we call them…

[Pauline] Yeah.

[Rae] …to actually help them to achieve that big, hairy audacious goal.

[Pauline] Yeah. So what they do is, by not setting the smaller stepping-stone goals, they set themselves up for failure.

So that big hairy, audacious deadline will come along and they haven’t achieved that goal, so they feel that they’re a failure.

Because I used to be a goal aphobe, because I did this very thing and I finally learned that by just reverse-engineering what that big hairy, audacious goal was, setting mini-deadlines within the time frame.

And having an outcome, because just say that I want to be an A-list copywriter. Well, if I put a firm date on that but I can’t control what kind of clients run my copy, then I’m setting myself up for failure.

But if I say that I want to be an A-list copywriter in the next five to seven years and then do everything that I need to have that happen, then that’s what I can control.

[Rae] Yeah, you’re controlling what you do on a daily basis and then, as they say in the metaphysical world, the universe will actually conspire to help you achieve, because you’ve actually started to achieve and do things to make that happen.

[Pauline] Yeah. The other mistake I wanted to quickly discuss is that people set goals that do not excite them.

[Rae] Yeah, this is a really big one, Pauline.

[Pauline] So someone may say that they have a goal of reaching a 10K income within a year, but when they look at what it will take for them to go from, maybe what they’re at now, 3 or $5,000, to get up to $10,000… It’s going to take double the effort. It’s going to result in more time away from their family. It’s going to be more work. It’s going to be more of everything.

[Rae] More stress.

[Pauline] So, when you look at it, that goal interests them, but it doesn’t excite them.

So always make sure that you have that visceral response when you set a goal, that it excites you to your very core. Otherwise, I can guarantee you can do all the goal setting, all the magical little things, but it will not happen unless it makes you tingle on the inside.

[Rae] Yeah, it’s got to be something so amazing that it actually drags you through the desperation, or the drudgery of the day-to-day.

[Pauline] And the bad times.

[Rae] Yeah!

[Pauline] Because if you are not excited by you goal at the first obstacle that’s too much, you’ll give up. So make sure your goals excite you.

[Rae] Yeah. And if you don’t already have a track record of success, set yourself smaller goals first up and achieve those. And then, as you build that track record of success, then start to flush out those goals; make them bigger.

[Pauline] Yeah.

[Rae] Make them a little bit more scary so that actually…

[Pauline] You’re pushing yourself and stretching…

[Rae] …to do more.

[Pauline] Yeah, excellent.

So, there you go, Louie. I hope we’ve answered your question and thank you for giving us the opportunity.»

Ellen Jackson

«Hi Louie! Ellen Jackson here from Potential Psychology. Thank you for the opportunity to contribute to your expert roundup on goal setting.

Why do people fail at goal setting? Well, we now have over 40 years of psychological research into goal setting and what it tells us is that, like most human behavior, the process of setting and achieving our goals is actually far more complex than we’d really like it to be or that we imagined it to be.

And the most common thing that I see as a coaching and workplace psychologist (and I am guilty of this myself) is making our goals big and ambitious and exciting, which is great and very motivating, but then quickly becoming overwhelmed by them. Because we sort of just don’t know where to start.

It’s like sitting at the bottom of a really tall mountain and looking up at the peak and wondering how we ever going to make it to the top.

And that feels overwhelming. And then, of course, we procrastinate because we feel overwhelmed. And then we feel guilty. And that makes our procrastination worse and it becomes this vicious cycle that really stops us in our tracks, despite being otherwise really motivated to achieve these goals.

And the reason this happens is that we somehow think, at least maybe subconsciously, that we need to make it to the top of that mountain, to achieve that big goal, in one or two enormous leaps. And that’s just not the way it works.

We achieve any big goal by taking small consistent steps in the direction that we’re heading or that we want to head.

So my advice to clients who have big, exciting goals but who are starting to feel overwhelmed or are finding themselves procrastinating — and, of course, that elicits all kinds of other confusing feelings or what we call “dissonants”, because we’re really motivated, but we’re also procrastinating and then we’re confused about why we really want to achieve this goal but we’re not doing anything towards making it happen and that’s a confusing feeling — is to break the goal down into as many small steps as possible.

And then to sit for a while and then break those first steps down even further. And then to start with one really small thing that they can do straight away, because we know that that first small step is the first step to the top of that mountain and achieving our goals.»

Amanda Crowell

«Hello! My name is Amanda Crowell and I am a coach for coaches and therapists to help them to get more clients and make more money. And I was asked to answer the question “what is it that stops people from actually achieving their goals?”.

What I like to tell people is that they are taking on too much, all at the same time. So people will say, “I want to run a marathon”, and then they’ll get so overwhelmed by that big of a goal that they’ll get stuck, they’ll become overwhelmed and they’ll begin to shut down.

It’s okay to want to run a marathon, it’s just really important that you understand that it’s going to take some time to do that. And then, help yourself to see how you can get a little closer this month, this week and today.

So I suggest that people, you know, set a someday goal of running a marathon and then set a 90-day accomplishment. It’s because, looking out over the next 90 days, you can legitimately figure out what’s possible for you.

We don’t overestimate when we look at our calendar and really think about, like, literally the next three months of February, March and April or whatever it is. “I know I could probably accomplish this; it’s aspirational, but achievable.”

So, if you can identify a 90-day accomplishment, then the next thing you need to do is to figure out — without any concern — that you’re getting, you know, 1/12 of the way there. You ask yourself, “how can I get a little bit closer to that accomplishment this week?”.

That’s a really important way to put it. Like, get a little closer to that accomplishment this week. And that starts to make you get concrete with yourself.

You begin to have to do things that actually fit into your schedule. And it holds you accountable to actually taking a step. Because you’re not asking yourself to transform; you’re asking yourself to get a little closer this week.

For some people that’s enough. For other people it’s really helpful to say, first thing in the morning, “how can I get a little closer to that today? Is there something I can do today?”.

And then, celebrating and savoring each of those accomplishments. Whatever it was that you did today, savoring it and being grateful for it and then allowing your success, your accomplishments to lead you forward.

Because, if you’re getting a little closer today, then you’re getting a little closer this week and you’ll have some success. You’ll see if you can follow your bright spots towards the goal that you set for yourself in 90 days.

And I think that what this does for you is it takes you out of that place where you’re over-ambitious and overwhelming yourself, because overwhelm is what throws the brakes on change. Whereas hope, which comes out of doing a little bit and being successful, is actually change fuel.

So that’s my suggestion. Make sure that you’re staying in the land of hope, following your bright spots, taking on the smallest possible step forward and following those bright spots towards an achievable but aspirational 90-day goal. Hope that helps!»

Bill Widmer

«So the question was, “why do people fail with goal setting? What are some mistakes people make when setting new goals and trying to achieve them?”.

Well, the biggest thing that held me back in the beginning, and I see hold a lot of other people back when it comes to goal setting, is tackling to big of a goal and getting discouraged when you’re not making progress towards this big, massive, audacious goal.

So, one thing you can do to avoid that and to actually succeed in goal setting is to break that goal down into smaller steps. And you do that by reverse-engineering the goals.

So you’ve got this big end goal like losing 50 pounds or making an extra $1,000 a month or whatever it looks like. You take that end goal then reverse-engineer it. So, “what do I have to do this year, what do I have to do this month, what do I have to do this week, what do I have to do tomorrow, today, right this second in order to achieve that goal?”.

And then, every step along the way, whenever you achieve one these sort of mini-goals, celebrate that and realize that you’re making progress.

And then, the other thing you can do to further increase your chances of success is to actually track your progress.

So, write down your big goal, write down your sub-goals, so this month, this week, today and then track each step along the way. So when you finish it, check it off and you can see in the bigger picture “all right, I finished this step, that’s exactly the step that I needed to take to get me closer to the next step and then the next step”. And it creates this kind of momentum, this snowball effect, if you will.»

Zac Johnson

«Hey, Zac Johnson here from Blogging.org and today I’m going to be talking about why people fail at goal setting.

Now for myself, when I have a goal and I know I want to hit it, the first thing I do is take out a piece of paper and start writing some ideas down. You can also do this in mind mapping programs and it’ll really help you plot out how you’re going to accomplish everything and put into place.

Most people fail at goal setting because they just say “I’m gonna to do this” and then they don’t have a plan in place.

So if you actually want to have a goal that you’re going to accomplish, you need to have a way to get to that end goal. It’s just like building a house; you can’t complete it without a foundation.

So the next time you have a goal, be sure to write everything down. Not just what your goal is, but how you’re going to get there, what are you going to do once you accomplish that goal and the many obstacles that you might hit along the way.

If you do all this and you actually follow through, you’re going to be that much more likely to accomplish your goal.»

Maven

«Hi, this is Maven from the Go Informed: Build a Better Vacation podcast and I think people fail to have a good vacation for the same reasons that a lot of people fail to meet their goals. They don’t prepare.

If you show up at Disney World with no ticket, no idea what’s there and no plan for how to deal with obstacles like crowds and bad weather, you are sure to have a rotten vacation. You might blame Disney, but the truth is that you could have the best vacation ever, if you just go prepared.

The same goes for most any goal. Arriving at your destination with no preparation is a sure way to fail in your attempt.

So, next time you set a goal, spend the time to determine what you need to know to get there, ask for help, think about how you will handle challenges along the way, find out what those challenges are likely to be. And set yourself up for success, so you can enjoy the journey as well as the destination.»

Meg Brunson

«Hey, Meg Brunson here from the FamilyPreneur Podcast. So why do people fail with goal setting? I think there are two main elements to this question.

First of all, when setting goals people don’t often pick measurable goals, so things that you can track and measure and see progress even if you’re not seeing completion of those goals. So that’s mistake number one, is identifying how you’re going to measure progress and measure success.

Mistake number two is that people perceive success as black or white. So they may set a goal in the new year, or anytime during the year, and it’s all or nothing.

If they don’t meet that goal, they get discouraged or, if they are trending to not hit that goal, they get discouraged and give up. Instead of tracking those measurable steps and seeing that progress is getting them closer to the goal.

So, it’s a long game, but people have this short-term vision.

When you are thinking about setting your goals for 2019 or anytime, my recommendation 100% is to set your goal big, but break it down into measurable segments so that you can track your progress along the way.

And don’t get discouraged when you hit obstacles or speed bumps that seem to set you back. As long as you’re making forward motion, you are on the right track and you are closer to your goal than you were yesterday.

Keep up the good work, keep setting those goals and, before you know it, you’re going to achieve them and surpass them.»

Annie LaCroix

«Hi! This is Annie LaCroix from the Brainy Boss Podcast.

When I think about why people don’t reach their goals, it is because goals are generally set up to be binary. Either you achieved them or you did not.

For example, if you set a goal to organize all your paperwork before the end of the year and you only get halfway through your paperwork, you believe that you’ve failed that goal, where in actuality, you’re 50% closer to being organized.

So, instead of setting a goal that is either I did or I didn’t, I suggest that people put in place systems that help them become closer to what they want to be.

For example, if you’re trying to organize your paperwork, it’s because you want to be more organized and you want to feel less stressed about your paperwork, right?

So, put a system in place that allows you to organize your paperwork over time and as you use that system, you’ll get closer and closer to having everything set up the way you want it and one day you’ll realize “hey, I’m organized!”.

That feels a lot better than getting halfway through something and considering it a failure when you’re actually halfway closer to where you need to be.»

Jacques Hopkins

«Hi, this is Jacques Hopkins from PianoIn21Days.com and TheOnlineCourseGuy.com.

And my answer to the question “why do people fail with goal setting?”, I can tell you that when I failed with goal setting most is when I try to set goals that my actions aren’t going to necessarily 100% be responsible for reaching that goal. It’s when I try to set goals that aren’t based 100% on my actions.

So, let me give you a couple of examples. If I say “okay, I want to reach 100,000 YouTube subscribers by the end of the year”. Okay, I could do everything possible to try to grow my YouTube channel and still not hit that number.

But I think a more actionable goal, a goal based on exactly what I can be doing is much better, because you know that if you do it, than you’ve achieved your goal.

So, if my goal is to grow my YouTube channel, ultimately, and if I’m first thinking “okay 100,000 subscribers”, well, instead of saying “my goal is 100,000 subscribers”, let’s say my goal is “to post a new YouTube video with, you know, this, this and this criteria, meaning it’s got a good thumbnail, it’s got a good description, and so on, every week over the course of this year”. That’s something I know I can do and once I do I can check the box that that goal is complete.»

Doug Cunnington

«Hey, what’s going on? It’s Doug Cunnington here. Thanks a lot Louie for inviting me on to the show.

Generally, I think people fail at goal setting because they set bad goals, alright? They set non-specific goals; they’re vague, they’re kind of uninspiring.

Here’s a couple examples. They wanna lose weight, for example. Or maybe, exercise more. Or, work harder, get more done. And, it’s just non-specific.

Back from my corporate career, I was exposed to the idea of S.M.A.R.T. goals. And S.M.A.R.T. is an acronym that stands for specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and on a timeline. And it really makes you think about the details of achieving a goal.

So, instead of being a non-specific goal like “exercise more”, maybe it’s “to run a half-marathon”. And, in that case, you kind of have to be specific. So you’re gonna run a half-marathon is definitely measurable, it’s 13.1 miles.

Is it achievable? Well, you can look at other people that have done the same thing and then you can sort of back into it based on your current fitness level.

So, maybe you need to run like two or three times a week and you need to train for several weeks. Say, 10 to 12 weeks, increasing the distance maybe like 5 to 10 percent per week to make sure, you know, you don’t overload your system and get an injury or something like that.

Further, you could look at if it’s realistic and see that 2-3 times a week is doable. You can set aside that amount of time and you understand that it is indeed realistic.

And then, finally, a timeline. Continuing with our half-marathon analogy here, you can sign up for race and, of course, that is on a specific day at a specific time. And you can back into what you need to do for training on a week-by-week basis to make sure that you are running enough, that you are training properly.

So, just to summarize, people don’t set great goals because they don’t dig into it enough and, like, look at what it will actually take to achieve those goals.

Thanks again, Louie, for having me on the show. You can get more information from me, in fact, on productivity and goal-setting, specifically, at NicheSiteProject.com. And, I’ll give Louie a couple links on goal-setting and helping identify what you should work on and when and what, maybe, you shouldn’t work on at all.»

Brendan Hufford

«Goal setting is something that I think about constantly. In fact, it was kind of the focus of the whole beginning of my own podcast, the Entrepreneurs and Coffee Podcast.

The core thing that the podcast was about when I started was not necessarily my experience, but just about taking action in your business.

If you want to take action in your business, like, you have to have some sort of goal.

There’s all sorts of trite sayings about goal setting, you know, “without a goal you can’t score” and all those things. And they’re true, they’re true, you have to be aiming for something. You can’t just, you know, start an Instagram account being like “I’m going to blow up” and then opportunities just gonna happen. That’s not how it works.

Two of the first people that came on my podcast gave me really, really good advice

The first one was Hal Elrod — he’s actually the first guest of my podcast, is the author of “The Miracle Morning” and an incredible human — he told me that when he was really struggling with sales… (He was like a national leader with, like, Cutco knives.) When he was really struggling with sales, he just focused on the process.

He just said, “all right, to make this many sales I have to make this many calls on average. So, every day I’m just gonna focus on making that many calls. I know that even if the first 90% don’t pan out then I know that, by the law of averages, the last 10% will, so I won’t be disheartened”.

And he focused more on the work. I’m not big on quotes but I am big on things that are meaningful and I’m big on the work

That’s one of the reasons that I think people fail at achieving their goals. And they failed goal setting is because they focused on the end result and not the actual work that it’s going to take to get there.

There was a quote that I have on my homepage of my website. Brendon Burchard said (you know, right, great name, right?), he said “When you knock at the door of opportunity, do not be surprised that it is work who answers”.

So, if you’re going to look for opportunity, if you’re going to look to set some big goals and all of this stuff, like, you’re going to have to be willing to put in the work.

And you’re going to have to map backwards. This is something I learned from my 10 years of experience as a classroom teacher and a principal, is this idea of backwards planning. “I want my students to know X, cool, let’s play in backwards and figure out how to get them there. What are the steps to get them there?”

I can’t just give them a hundred math problems and hope they learn how to do it. That’s not how it works. So that was really meaningful to me.

And then, the other guest that I had on the podcast was also Michael Hyatt. Michael has this program called “Best Year Ever” and one of the pieces of advice he gave me, that really mattered to me, was just being really selective about who I’ve shared my goals with.

We get a little micro kind of adrenaline… adrenaline is the wrong word, like endorphine or something. There’s some sort of like good, good thing that happens. I’m not a doctor! It’s a nice thing that happens in your brain when you share your goals.

It’s why we, you know, share Harvard Business Review articles, cuz we want to look like a person who reads the Harvard Business Review, right? We retweet things that we already believe to be true. And it’s simply because we get, like, this nice little feeling of sharing things.

Like, let’s be honest. Everybody is going to nod their head at this. And if you’re not nodding your head you’re a liar. How many people listening to this have posted a picture of a book online that you still haven’t read?

I’m guilty. I’m guilty, for sure. I know a lot of people are, because we posted the picture of the book and we’re like, “oh cool, everybody, like, they think I’m reading this book”.

Like, I still haven’t finished “Bird by Bird” by Anne Lamott, one of the best books about writing, ever, by all accounts. I’m, like, only halfway through it and I have been for years. Cuz I… I made the mistake of sharing with people and they’re like, “oh, that’s such a good book, that’s so cool you’re reading it!”. And I got… I got the feeling of finishing, I got the feeling of, like, being done.

And those people have never come back to me and be like, “hey man, did you finish the book? How was it? Have you applied it to your business? Have you applied it to your life? Or your writing?”. They’re not checking in with me.

You have to share your goals with people who care about you and will hold you accountable. It’s very important we have those two things: that they’re going to hold you accountable and they actually give a crap about you.

For me, that’s my spouse and it’s my mastermind group. I don’t pay for a mastermind group. You know, it’s not like one of those like guru-lead ones. It’s just me and three other people who meet on a regular basis. We’ve been meeting for 4 and a half years — that’s extremely rare. And they really care about me.

So I share my goals with them, because I know they’re going to be like “hey Brendan, did you do the thing you said you were going to do?”. And “are you doing…” — let’s take it full circle here — “are you doing the actions that you identified were going to get you to that goal that you wanted?”.

I read “Think and Grow Rich” — I actually read that whole book. The problem after reading “Think and Grow Rich” was simply… I thought I just had to write it down on a note card that I was going to be a millionaire by 35 and it would just happen.

And that was a huge mistake, because I didn’t see the actions. I don’t believe in “The Secret”, I don’t have a vision board, I don’t write down my intentions and think that they’ll manifest themselves in the world.

I write… I just write down my actions, I put it in my Google calendar. So I do the things that are going to actually get me there. I think that’s extremely important and I think that that is one giant thing that people miss.

Kind of to wrap this up: when I’m thinking about the reasons that I see most people fail…

So we talked about a bunch of different stuff, but it’s truly that they don’t want it enough — and they think they want it, but they don’t.

I really believe that actions indicate priorities. That whatever you’re doing shows what your real priorities are.

If your real priorities is to set a world record for how much Netflix you can watch, like, you’ll do that. And the thing is you’ll get whatever you want out of life. Whatever you want out of life — it’s not what you think you want. You think you want business success or relationship success or whatever else, but what you really want is to watch Netflix, because that’s what you’re doing.

There’s a great book by Jairek Robbins called “Live It!”. And if we’re really honest with ourselves, if we really did that stuff, if we really took that action…

I mean, let’s be honest for now, I’m recording this into my iPhone. You can probably hear it in the audio quality. That’s because I believe in taking action, not waiting, not leaving barriers.

Russell Brunson has recorded every single episode — he’s got like 400 episodes of the “Marketing Secrets Podcast” — he’s recorded every single one of them into his phone in his car, but when the signal cuts through the noise and you actually have something to say, it’ll come through and people can tell.

You can tell that I clearly had something to say on this it. It doesn’t matter what I’m recording it on. I’m not letting anything get in my way. I’m just taking action.

I hope all this is super helpful for you and I appreciate being a part of this.»

James Travis

«Hi, my name is James Travies from Godspeed Development, it’s a podcast that teaches you all about financial literacy so you can become economically self-sufficient.

As you’ve probably heard a bunch of times before me, the question of the day is, “why do people fail at goal setting?”. A lot of answers that you’ve previously heard probably focused around internal motivation, habits and other things, but I want to take the time to talk about something different.

First, I want you to consider what “normal” means to you.

If you’re like me and not 100% self-employed, you probably listen to a lot of podcasts about entrepreneurship.

The other day I was listening to a show with Noah Kagan which was titled “what to do if you hate your job?” and I’m thinking “ah, he’s finally got a guest that I can relate to me!”. Turns out the guy owns his own business, he just hates what he does. And this made think, “does this Noah guy have any friends that aren’t entrepreneurs?; do any of his friends work regular 9-5 jobs?”. And the more that I sat back and thought about it, the more that I really came to the conclusion that the answer is “no”.

Noah wants to be a better entrepreneur so he surrounds himself with people who are exactly what he wants to become. It’s not normal for him to work 40 hours a week and hate every minute of it, it’s not normal to make decisions that have an impact on other people without weighing the consequences of those decisions. It’s probably not even normal for him to get paid on Friday.

So let’s circle back to why we don’t reach our goals. It’s because our goals aren’t normal to us yet. We may still be thinking from the perspective that our goals are huge and, you know, maybe a little bit unachievable.

Let me put it this way. About 78% of people in North America live paycheck to paycheck. That means there’s about 22% of people who don’t. For that 22% of people, even though the majority of people live paycheck to paycheck, it is abnormal for them to spend most, if not all, the money that they earn.

Now, when it comes to goal setting you must choose which camp you’d like to be a part of. Are you going to stick with the same results that you had in life because that’s what you’re used to? Or, are you going to make a change? Are you going to create your new “normal”?

In conclusion, I’d like you to redefine what “normal” means to you.

If it’s your dream to control your time and money by starting your own business, then you should know it is completely normal to have growing pains and times that you feel like you just want to give up and quit. It is normal to try, fail, to try again and fail a dozen times.

You’re not gonna always have everything figured out, but if this is the life that you want to live, this is your new “normal”.

Surround yourself with the people that will help you along the way, because this is their life as well. It’s normal for them. You don’t have to make the shift from one norm to the next alone. That’s why mentorship is so important. Find someone who’s already accomplished the things that you want to do. Not only will you have an accountability partner, you’ll also have a guide to help you reach your goals.

Thank you so much for listening to this answer. Hopefully, you can use it to help you get to where you want to be.»

Monica Louie

«Hey, I’m Monica Louie. I’m a Facebook and Instagram ads strategist from MonicaLouie.com.

And people often fail with goal setting, because they aren’t truly committed to achieving the goal.

Now, we’ve all heard of S.M.A.R.T. goals and I definitely structure my own goals using that method but, if you aren’t 100% committed to achieving the goal, then the format of the goal doesn’t really matter.

So, I love setting big goals that push me out of my comfort zone. For instance, before I became a Facebook ads expert, I blogged about my family’s journey out of debt. So, when we were 32, my husband and I decided to pay off all of our debt, including our mortgage, all $320,000 worth before we turned 40.

It was a huge goal that we weren’t sure we could actually achieve but, because we were committed to paying it off, we ended up taking massive action and paid off $120,000 of debt in 2 years, all on a single middle-class income with two young kids at home.

Now, people are capable of so much more than they often give themselves credit for, but they only truly realize just how much they can do when they’re committed to doing whatever it takes to achieve their goals.

So, if you’re falling short of reaching your goal, then do a gut check on your commitment level. If you’re truly committed to achieving it, you’ll find a way to make it happen.»

Azul Terronez

«One of the biggest mistakes people make or things that people do when they’re setting goals is they think that they are their goal, that that defines them.

And I really see goals as just an opportunity to reach a vision or place where they want to go to.

So, like, if you imagine that you would like to achieve something, the bigger thing is who is it that you are now. Who you want to be has more to do with who you really are, currently.

And I think goals can easily become something that people think of “I want to get there, then I’ll be who I am” and that’s why a lot of people who achieve goals have to achieve even larger goals, more audacious goals.

And that’s not to say that having great goals and big goals and achievements isn’t important, but it can be the danger of setting goals that keeps you in a mindset that I’m always not enough.

So I think goals should be an affirmation of who you are and who you are striving to continually be in the moment, in this time.»