Forget “Facebook/IG/Snapchat Official.” Forget other people, period. This is about you. But if you just can’t resist, know that people will only take you as seriously as you take yourself. So, it’s time to stop talking your talk. Instead, put your money where your mouth is.
“Hmmmm how?” you may ask.
Well, read on my friend…
Step 1. Shut up. Say less, do more.
This is probably the seventh time this year you’ve said that you’re going to do something from shedding weight, buying a new ________, get a new job, traveling, winning a scholarship, moving to a different state, “getting your life together”, starting a new business, writing a book/blog, glowing up in 3, 2, 1 (#glowup2017) etc etc etc. Over promising and under delivering is routine for you.
Have you noticed that whenever you do tell aaaaalllll your friends and associates in person or online what you’re going to do without actually doing any ground work… you end up not accomplishing shit? (Ummm *cough* guilty) Well, talk is cheap and majority of the people on your timeline don’t genuinely care. You’re inviting fake ass negative energy into your space by certain snakes that secretly want you to fail.
Derek Sivers discusses the science behind telling others about your goals in his TedTalk. He says, “when you tell someone your goal and you acknowledge it, psychologists have found that it’s called a “social reality.” The mind is kind of tricked into feeling that it’s already done. And then because you’ve felt that satisfaction, you’re less motivated to do the actual hard work necessary.”
Don’t get it twisted though; you do need to know when to tell the right people about your goals. Sivers later states, “but if you do need to talk about something, you can state it in a way that gives you no satisfaction, such as, “I really want to run this marathon, so I need to train five times a week and kick my ass if I don’t, okay?”
The right individuals will show you exactly how to do what you want to accomplish. Additionally, they’ll give you the encouragement to keep going while holding you accountable to do what you said you’d do. But, it doesn’t stop there.
Step 2: Write that shit down.
I don’t care if you have a so called, “photographic memory” of all of your ideas, who you’ve met with, what someone said or what you need to do. That’s BS – you’re human and every human being forgets things. If you don’t have a notebook that you use actively, you’re truly missing out on some magical shit.
Seriously. If I have a random idea or come across something inspiring, I write it down in my notebook. If I don’t have my notebook at the moment, I write it on whatever I can find. Then, I transfer it in my notebook as soon as I can.
“But why??? That’s doing the most.”
It really isn’t. I genuinely believe that there’s power to releasing your thoughts on paper. Your idea/goal is no longer in your head. It’s no longer just a thought. No, what you’re thinking isn’t dumb nor impossible. It’s concretely on paper and one step closer to being acted upon.
I genuinely believe that there’s power to releasing your thoughts on paper. Your idea/goal is no longer in your head. It’s no longer just a thought. No, what you’re thinking isn’t dumb nor impossible. It’s concretely on paper and one step closer to being acted upon.
When you think of a legal or business document, you take that shit seriously, right? It’s an official document containing fine print and is signed and dated in pen and ink. When I write my random ass dreams/thoughts/goals down in my notebook, I take them more seriously because I think of the filled pages as mini contracts to myself that I have signed, dated and can look back at as references and past sources of inspiration.
3. Strategize. How sway?
Once you strategize on paper what you plan on doing, that’s when your dream transforms into a solid goal that you can execute step by step.
Here are some basic introductory questions that I ask myself:
• What do you want to do? Be hella specific.
• Who are you trying to impact?
• How are you going to accomplish it?
Quick tip: Compartmentalize your goals. Basically, break your goal down to the smallest unit. For example, annually, monthly, weekly, daily, hourly etc.
• When do you want to accomplish it by?
• How do you plan to evaluate yourself?
• Where does it ranks as a priority in your schedule, (Do you even really care?!) and what are you’re going to do to make time for it?
• Why the hell you do you want to accomplish the goal in the first place?
A prime testimony of this whole writing shit down thing is exactly what you’re looking at right now. Once I finally stopped posting and snapping “I should write a blog” and finally wrote my ideas down in a notebook, that magical shit I was talking about earlier happened. Ideas turned into notes, and notes turned into actions that took place over a course of several months. Now it’s a reality and I’m publishing my second post… whoop whoop!
Challenge of the week:
- Before you tweet your next tweet, snap your next snap, or post your next caption on Instagram or Facebook about your next moves in life, shut up. Under promise, over deliver.
- Purchase a fresh notebook, some sticky notes, a pen and a highlighter. Keep them close.
- Whatever goal you have in mind, don’t tell the world for the sake of getting praised. Save the talk for those certain individuals who can actually help you make the moves towards accomplishing your goal (Plus…with less talking, your haters can stay mad because they won’t be aware of your failures if your publicized goals didn’t quite follow through. Boop!!).
Author,
Yasmine Nur
Founder, The Werk-aholic
www.werk-aholic.com
