Attracting more of the right kind of clients, getting your 10k under 50 minutes, reclaiming your weekends from your inbox – whatever your goals are, wouldn’t it be great if you could just click your fingers and have them sorted?
Alas we all know that getting what you want doesn’t come easy. Achieving goals is often a slow burn, becoming a better you takes time and effort, and success can feel like a grind.
But the key could lie in taking the smallest of steps. In building better habits that over time can help you crack the big stuff.
There’s no magic instant formula for cracking your goals, but there is a formula that can help you start on those all-important habits that will get you there.
In the Compound Effect, Darren Hardy explores how “The difference between becoming fabulously rich, happy and healthy — or broke, depressed and unhealthy is the choices you make throughout your life.”
According to Hardy your life comes down to this formula:
Your Choices (decisions) + Behaviour (action) + Habit (repeated action) + Compound Effect (Time) = Goals.
At the heart of the formula is identifying the things that you need to more of (and those you need to less of) to make sure you’re on the right trajectory to achieve your goals.
Knowledge is power
The first step is to work out what habits you need to add and take away from your life?
It’s a lesson in honest reflection about the choices you make that will set you on the right path.
Are the hours you spend scrolling on Twitter bringing you anything? Is your 30-minute PT session helping you towards your goals? Are the weekly 1:1s with your team productive?
Once you’re aware of where your time is really going and what behaviours bring you benefit you can identify the habits to work on every day.
Track, track, track
Change won’t happen overnight. But by tracking the little changes you make, the extra 15 minutes with the PT, the half hour limit on your social scrolling, the hour on a personal project, you’ll see how over time these small habits can start to have a collective result – the Compound Effect.
As Hardy says “Consistency is the key to achieving and maintaining momentum.” It will take some patience but keeping at it for a few weeks will turn those small actions into habits. And those habits are the foundations for achieving your goals.
Get your momentum
By being present and focused on the impact that even the smallest actions can have on our goals we’re taking control of our future. Hardy talks a lot about momentum – once a rock is in motion it’s harder to stop it going down the hill, it’s that first push that takes the effort and then the journey is easier.
What’s the area of life you want to set in motion? The goals you want to start achieving, one small habit at a time?