Why You Are Falling Short Of Achieving Your Goals?

Are you pursuing a life-changing goal? The life-changing goal could be learning new technology so you can change jobs or get well paid. It could be creating a POC so you can become the CEO of your own company. It could be going back to school so you can advance faster in your career. Though you created the goal, wrote it down on a piece of paper, developed a strategy, you seem to be falling short of achieving it. You are consistently missing your goal, and you are thinking of giving up or have already given up.

The primary reason you are falling short of accomplishing your goals is your beliefs underlying your goals. Such beliefs can be better understood using the below scale. Let’s say the scale is from 1 to 10, with 1 being zero motivation and 10 being the highest motivation.

Levels 1–5:

If your motivation levels fall between 1 and 5, the goal is most likely a “good to have” goal. You are pursuing the goal like a hobby. You are not serious about it. You may often set the goal intending to be serious, but you really treat it like a hobby. Everything is pretty good even without accomplishing the goal, so you have little to no motivation to accomplish it. If it is easy and fun, you may accomplish the goal. In most cases, you will not accomplish the goal, especially if it is a challenging goal.

In such cases, instead of pretending to be serious about the goal, be true to yourself that you are exploring something different. Suppose you pretend to be serious but aren’t serious. In that case, it will only make things worse as you beat yourself up, which will further destroy your confidence. Stay true to yourself that you are exploring this goal to see if you can accomplish it.

Level 6–7:

Now you are serious about the goal. You are willing to do what it takes to accomplish it, but things keep coming in the way. It is your boss who is making you work extra hours. It is your kids or wife who is taking up your free time. These are the clients I typically work with. Behind all the external challenges, there is most likely an underlying fear. I help them overcome the fear so they can perform at a higher level: 8–9.

Levels 8–9:

You are dead serious about your goal. You have crystal clear clarity about it. You know why you are pursuing your goal. You know it is very much aligned with who you are and what you want. However, even with motivation levels 8–9, you might not still achieve your goals because there is a small voice in the head that gives you a 1% doubt that you might not achieve your goals. The 1% fear is enough to destroy your 99% chance of achieving your goals. David Cameron says, “either you set out to do something with total faith or do not. Never set out to try to do it.”

Here is where it becomes further tricky. A common school of thought for people at this level is that they are unsure when they will achieve the result even though they are confident they will achieve the result when all the stars align. If you are unsure if you will make your first 10,000 dollars in one year, there are high chances you won’t make it. Any minor piece of doubt is enough to shatter your goals. To overcome this, David Cameron says, “decide with certainty that you will accomplish your goals.” Don’t leave an ounce of self-doubt. You can never understand this logically. So don’t try. Instead decide with certainty that you will achieve your goal by a certain date. When you do this consistently, you will step into level 10.

Level 10:

When you are operating at level 10, you are fearless. You are unstoppable in achieving your goals. Those who accomplish the highest levels of success operate in level 10. Elon Musk says, “No, I don’t ever give up. I’d have to be dead or completely incapacitated.”

In summary, we discussed a framework to determine your motivation levels. If you are not accomplishing your goals, the only reason is that your motivation levels are anywhere between 1–10. I would love to hear from you in the comments, what motivation level you resonate