5 steps that will actually help you achieve your goals.

If you want to stop something, make it difficult, if you want to start, make it easy.

These things will all help you achieve your goals, but they won’t achieve them for you — sorry, I don’t have a magic motivation, ability, and prioritisation wand, you’ll still have to do the heavy lifting there. But, they will give you a framework that will make it easier (not quicker!) to get to where you want to be.

Some people are naturally motivated and need no encouragement to get up at 4.30am, drink a pearl-barley-infused-no-milk-no-caffine-mixed-berry-latte before holding their breath underwater in an ice pool for 20 minutes, and then running a marathon just in time to give the kids up for breakfast, give a quick French lesson, teach them the meaning of life, all in time to get to work 23 minutes early, crush all 7 start-up pitch presentations they give for the 5 different companies they own, on a Wednesday, in the freezing cold, leading to them retiring at 23 years old on the Friday, and living the rest of their life writing a book a day, curing the world’s ills and winning a life long residence on the cover of People Magazine because they just couldn’t be more perfect. But, I’m guessing that might not be you (yet!), so, read on…maybe by the end of it, you’ll be able to make yourself a coffee.

1) Figure out where you need to go, and why.

With most things, motivation is at least half the battle, so spending a little bit of time working through why you are trying to do ‘the thing’ is going to help:

a) Check it is the right thing

b) Give yourself a motivational boost before you commit.

To do this, list all the things that achieving that thing is going to do for you. Imagine what your life will be like after you’ve got there. Are you happier with future you? If not, why not? What would make you happier? When you’ve answered that, and you’re sure you’ve got the right goal…

2) Break it down to the first achievable step

Rome wasn’t built in a day. Slow and steady wins the race. How do you eat an Elephant? There are endless quotes to summarise this, but you’ve got to take everything one mouthful at a time.

Imagine that end goal and work backwards, thinking about the path that will get you there. Work that path all the way back to where you are now, and look at that first step. Once you’ve got that, commit to when you’re going to take it. Then look at the second step, and third, just keep going one at a time.

3) Do the prework

If it's things that you want to start doing, then you need to give yourself every chance to take that first step. To make this easier, think about the prework you could do to minimise the chance your lazy brain resists. It could be:

✍️ Writing — sketch the drafts

📚 Reading — 10 minutes at a time, book by your bed.

🧆 Changing your diet — Prep, do it gradually, substitute.

🏋 ️Working out — layout your clothes, undo the laces.

🌐 Learning a language — put the app in the place of your usual go-to social media.

📊 Presentations — just start with the titles.

⏰ Getting up earlier — start with 15 minutes.

If it's something you want to stop, then make it harder for yourself, so your lazy brain can’t be bothered to force you into that negative action. It could be:

🍺 Drink less alcohol — don’t store beer in the fridge, or put the drinks in the room furthest from the TV.

🍕 Eat less rubbish — either don’t buy it, or again, store it somewhere you won’t casually see.

📱 Use social media less — move the apps around on your phone, put them somewhere obscure, and replace them with apps you DO want to go on.

Nobody who got to where they are on their own merit did so without taking the first small step. Sure, some people are naturally more talented at certain things, and, sadly, the world is not equal — inequality is an illness inside each of us, and maybe its worth taking a mental step to address that each day —

4) Check progress and adjust

So, you’ve taken those first steps, maybe they were difficult, maybe they were easy, either way, it's important to think about whether the goals you’ve set yourself are still realistic. If they’re not, adjust them! Do not set yourself up for failure. It's OK to change your goals. It's OK not to get it right first time. It's OK to miss the mark. We are human, failure is a part of life.

5) Celebrate success, and keep track.

You did it, that thing, go you!