3 Things to do when achieving goals isn’t easy…

 

Have difficulties and setbacks been a consistent challenge during your journey? Discover strategies to conquer these obstacles and persist despite them.

 

Goal setting helps you to create a roadmap for success.

See, setting goals and writing them down is the first step in turning your dreams into reality.

A lot of the time, conversations about goal setting go hand in hand with a positive, upbeat, and motivational frame of mind.

In the same breath where people say things like:

Set goals to achieve success…

People will also tend to say things like:

• You can do anything you put your mind to. 
• You can achieve whatever you want for yourself in life. 
• If you can dream it, you can do it.

Well, I agree with these things. 

And I love it when people think and speak in a positive and optimistic frame of mind—especially when they’re talking about setting goals. 

But today, I want to talk about an aspect of goal setting that people don’t often talk about:

The fact that sometimes it just doesn’t go the way you planned it. 

• What happens when you have bad days? 

• What happens when you struggle? 

• What happens when your best laid plans just don’t work out the way you wrote them down? 

Robert Burns once penned a saying:

“The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry.”

This is an old saying, but it’s as true today as it has ever been.

Even when you meticulously plot out your goals and do your very best to take those goals from the dreaming phase to the reality phase, there’s a good chance that you’re going to face setbacks, challenges, and sometimes even defeat. 

So what do you do when that happens? 

Well, I’m certainly no stranger to defeat. 

I’m certainly no stranger to hardship. 

And in this post, I’d like to share three tips for how you can work to overcome challenges and setbacks in your life so that you can get back on the horse and keep striving to turn those dreams into goals.

1. Treat Failure As A Lesson 

It isn’t easy to face failure. 

It can be very discouraging to make plans, only to see them fall apart. 

Sometimes life throws us curveballs. 

It’s just the way it is. 

But it’s crucial for you to understand that failure isn’t the end.

In fact, when it comes to turning your dreams into goals and dreaming big in life, failure is sometimes one of the best things that could happen to you.

Why? 

Because every time you experience a failure, you can learn from it to make your next attempt even better.

See, when Thomas Edison was working to invent the incandescent light bulb, he said:

“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”

The same is true for you in your everyday life. 

When you face a problem, a challenge, or a setback that knocks you down—rather than telling yourself that you’ve failed, get into the habit of telling yourself that this was a valuable lesson you could learn, and it sets you up for an even greater success down the road. 

Why? 

Because these lessons will give you the wisdom you need to persevere and to make an even better attempt next time. 

2. Challenges Build Character 

Once again, this may not be something that you want to hear if you’ve recently suffered a setback or a defeat.

But I just want to encourage you today by helping you to understand that challenges, though not often much fun in the moment, are sometimes the greatest opportunities for learning to become the people we need to be in order to succeed in the future. 

In my life, adversity helped me to learn vital lessons and build character. 

And to be honest, I needed these things to overcome the major obstacles that stood between me and the realization of my dreams. 

Had I not embraced those challenges, learned from them, and allowed them to mold me into a stronger, more confident, more educated, wiser person—I might never have achieved all of the big dreams written on my goal sheet. 

In fact, just the other day I dug out my very first weekly goal-setting sheet and took a look at it. 

It was interesting to note that one of my goals on that sheet was to make a certain amount of money by the time I reached a certain age. 

Back when I was 20 years old, I wrote a number that I thought was huge. 

I thought to myself:

“If I could actually achieve making this much money, my life would be so successful.” 

And guess what? 

I encountered a lot more challenges than I ever thought I would. 

Life threw me more curveballs than I ever would have expected. 

And yet, today, when I looked back over that sheet, I realized that I’ve actually earned twice as much money in my life as I wrote down on that sheet. 

Not only did I succeed at some of my biggest goals, but I also managed to double some of them.

But once again, the only reason for why I was able to achieve those successes was because I faced my challenges head-on, and allowed them to shape me and mold me into the kind of person I would need to be to succeed in the future.

3. Be Ambitious, But Also Be Patient

It’s in your best interest to be ambitious in life if you want to turn your dreams into reality. 

Ambition is awesome. 

To wake up every day motivated to accomplish big things is an incredible way to start every day. 

But don’t get it twisted.

You also have everything to gain by being patient. 

Yes, you want to be ready to make the right moves at the right moment. 

In the words of French microbiologist and chemist Louis Pasteur:

“In the fields of observation chance favors only the prepared mind.” 

You want to have those goals written down and be putting work into them every single day to give yourself your best odds for success. 

However, it’s also so important to understand that Rome wasn’t built in a day. 

Overnight successes don’t really happen. 

And even if they do, they’re often short-lived. 

That’s not the kind of success you want for yourself.

You want real success, where you turn your dreams into goals, write those goals down, and then pursue them to achieve the dreams, passions, and purpose that’ll empower you to create incredible success for yourself. 

But these things take some time. 

And there’s nothing wrong with that. 

Some of the greatest entrepreneurs of the modern age talk about how there’s never been so much opportunity. 

And this is so true. 

Even starting this blog, despite the challenges, has proven to have a very low barrier and cost of entry when compared to other businesses I’ve started in the past. 

That’s one of the amazing things about modern technology. 

But make no mistake:

These same modern-day entrepreneurs (the real ones) who acknowledge that we do have incredible opportunities in this world also acknowledge that it still takes patience, perseverance, and dedication to build something real.

https://youtu.be/yrozQfYqCos

Building the life of your dreams is no small errand.

It’s going to take time, devotion, ambition, and patience—and that’s totally fine. 

So give yourself some time, and be forgiving of yourself. 

Don’t push yourself so hard that you give up hope or get discouraged. 

It’s a marathon, not a sprint. 

Trust me. 

I’ve learned this from experience. 

In Conclusion

There you have it. 

Three tips for what to do when your goals just don’t seem to be working out the way you imagined. 

Trust the process. 

Start setting some goals for yourself today. 

Start working to turn those dreams into goals. 

Be patient, and don’t stop pursuing your dreams until you’ve turned them into an amazing life for yourself. 

You’ve got what it takes. 

I believe in you. 

Now get out there and make it happen.