It is the end of the month of love and if the statistics are correct, most of the people who took time to set goals for this year have either given up on some of them or are thinking of throwing in the towel soon.
However, before you give up on this year and make the decision to live life by default and or accident. Allow me to make a case and show you how you can join the group of people who live life on purpose and not by accident. As a proponent of goal setting, I know that when we set goals the right way, and have the right plan in place to follow, we can achieve our goals and attain the fulfillment this brings.
Begin By Celebrating Your Small Wins
Despite what you think, if you look closely enough, you have been able to accomplish somethings so far. You see the mistake we make is choosing to look at our glasses as half empty instead of half full. As long as you focus on what is lacking or has not gone well this is what will be magnified. Instead count your wins and name them one by one and it will surprise you what you have done so far.
Maybe you set an ambititious goal to go to the gym everyday but have so far only managed twice or thrice a week. Celebrate the fact that this year you have actually put that gym membership to use. Next do some reflection to discover what you actually enjoyed doing at the gym so that you are able to do more of the things you love and enjoy and that will get you back again.
I believe that when we celebrate the small wins, this will evetually get us to our big victories. I think that is why Ray Popham cautions us thus “success is the result of many small steps. Celebrate movement as much as you do accomplishment”.
Lift Your Leadership Lid
In his book The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership, my mentor John C Maxwell introduces us to the law of the lid which simply states that “leadership ability determines a person’s level of effectiveness”. You see, the mistake that we all often make is focusing on professional growth and personal success instead of personal growth first. When we focus more on the former than the latter what we end up with are growth gaps. Growth gaps exist in different forms like, lack of consistency, discipline, resilience, mindfulness, selfdoubt self awareness and self control the list is endless. When we do not begin by doing the work to identify the growth gap that we need to close so that we can lead ourselves better, we end up falling short of what we want to achieve or throwing in the towel too soon.
Going back to our law of the lid, we know that leadership is all about influence and that the first person we influence is the one who looks back at us in the mirror every morning. It follows therefore that if we want to achieve the goals we set for ourselves, we need to lift the lids that hinder us by closing the growth gaps in our lives. Life often gives us many lid lifting experiences and the ones who grab these opportunities and do the work needed to grow are the ones who enjoy the results of their hard labour. For example, it was not easy for me to identify that one of my growth gaps is self doubt and then have to invest in an executive coach to do the work needed to lift that lid. Whereas the work continues, what I know for certain is that I am not where I was two years ago and I am reaping the benefits of first of all being aware of the need to lift that lid and then doing the necessary work.
So my dear achiever, instead of again burying that goal that you have wanted to work on for a long time, why not become aware of the growth gap before you and then do the work to close it by lifting your leadership lid in that area. You will be raising up to a challenge and I can assure you that is a way you will be loving yourself to success.
Create & Follow Your Growth Plan
Another way that you can love yourself and keep going forward with your goals for this year is by creating and following your growth plan. We have shared about growth gaps and how we need to close them so that we can achieve our goals, visions and reach the desired places we want to be in life.
John C Maxwell in another book called The 15 Invaluable Laws of Growth introduces us to the Law of Intentionality. This law simply states that “growth does not just happen”. Infact, John shares his own story of how he was asked whether he had a growth plan and his answers included things that were meant to keep him busy but not better. He tells how his strategy was to work hard and hope that would get him to where he wanted to go. However, he soon discovered that “working hard does not guarantee susccess and hope is not a strategy”. He finally came to the conclusion that “if you focus on goals, you may hit goals but that does not guarentee growth. However, if you focus on growth, you will grow and also hit your goals”. I do not know about you but for me, show me anything where I can hit once and get two results and Iam definately in.
John goes on to discuss in detail some growth gap traps that we tend to fall in which in turn keep us stuck and unfulfilled. Allow me to share thress of these growth gap traps with you. Please grab a copy of this book HERE. I believe mastering and living out these invaluable laws of grwoth will enable us to grow and also hit the goals we set.
The first growth gap is the assumption gap. This one is where we mistakenly assume that growth is automatic. This is far from the truth. Whereas by God’s grace we each celebrate a birthday every year, this does not mean that we are growing. In John’s words, “we do not improve by simply living. We have to be intentional about it”. John in fact quotes musician Bruse Springsteen who correctly observed that, “a time comes when you need to stop waiting for the man you want to become and start being the man you want to be”. This ineffect means, me and you need to stop wishing we were a certain way and do the work required for us to be who we want to be.
The second growth gap I want us to look at is the timing gap. This is when we convinvce ourselves that it is not yet time to begin taking action on what we want to achieve. I know I belong to this group because how many times have I had ideas and sometimes started but ended up leaving the task unfinished. I convince myself that the new idea will get me results that will enable me go back and finish the old task. Othertimes, I go against what John refers to as the law of diminishing intent which simply states, “the longer you wait to do something you should do now, the greater the odds that you will never actually do it”. The cousin to this law is procrastination. I have actually shared what we can do to beat procrastination.
I am learning that in order to overcome this growth gap, I have to constantly remind myself to move from Intention to Action. I need to always remember that being intentional is the key to getting to my vision. However, this is never enough and I have to move from mere intent and act on my desires. This is simply because, “action is what will produce your desired results. On the 6th of March 2023, we will have a Masterclass to discuss strategies of how we can move from Intention to Action. You can sign up for this masterclass HERE.
The last growth gap that I would want us to tackle is the comparison gap. We have all fallen prey to this growth gap. Unfortunately, inspite of all the good things that social media can do for us, there also some evils it presents and one of them is falsely showing us that everyone is doing better than we actually are. The comparison gap is one that discourages many people and holds them back from moving forward with their goals. All of a sudden one maybe moving in the right direction but when they look to the left or the right it looks like they are too far behind and they end up throwing in the towel.
It does not matter what growth gap you have to contend with, we all need a clear growth plan that can address the areas we need to grow in and what resources will help us. It is also imperative after we have created the growth plan, that we are patient with the growth process. I like to advice that we take steps not leaps. Steps are often small enough for us to keep disciplined and motivated. They are also good in case we have to pivot to a different direction.
Finally,
In order for us to love ourselves and keep moving forward with the plans we have set for this year, let us ensure that we surround ourselves with people who will celebrate with us. As agreed above, it is the small wins that we celebrate that will eventually motivate us to go for the big wins. In addition, when we identify our growth gaps and do the work of closing them, we will lift the lids that hold us back from soaring to where we were meant to be. Lastly, as we create growth plans that we stick too, we will be able to experiment and see what is working and let go of what is not. Our growth plans will also allow us to pause and reflect so that we are able to keep focused and avoid letting the urgent things of life crowd out the important things. This will eventually move the needle and bring us the contentment we all desire.
We would love to hear from you. Please share in the comments section below, what do you think is the biggest growth gap that you need to close so that you can achieve your goals for this year?
Rosette is a Transformational Leadership Coach she is also a Certified DISC Trainer with the Maxwell Leadership Team. She Co founded The Africa Women Leadership Summit which brings together women in leadership and helps them sharpen and grow their leadership.
She helps her clients live a Simple, Productive and Contented life. She has qualifications in Law, Business Administration and Human Resource Management and Development.