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How to NOT set goals for 2024... And still achieve them 😎
As the New Year begins, the air (read: your social feed) is filled with the traditional unsolicited announcements (read: ads and virtue signals) of people setting New Year’s resolutions, and the methods they’ll use to achieve those goals (with a link to an affiliate site so “you can, too”).
Now don’t get me wrong, reflection, intention, action and ambition are all good things that often lead to even better things. And sharing ‘what works for you’ is often a thoughtful act of generosity and empowerment.
But too often, business owners and marketing professionals get so attached (or tethered) to S.M.A.R.T. goals - that are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound - that they miss the bigger picture or lose faith in the whole process.
This can lead to anxiety as the pressure to achieve a goal mounts, burnout, as the stakes continue to rise, and complete disdain for or abandonment of an endeavor as obstacles pile up and the finish line gets pushed back further and further.
Or, you do achieve your goal, and the result is even worse: complacency. You set your goal too low, or you got there too fast, and now you think it’s time to rest or cement this method in stone as the one true path to success.
This false sense of start-up achievement is where a lot of new businesses go to die. It is the antithesis to progress. It is a recipe for stagnation, founded on practices that worked yesterday.
And I’m over it.
I’m over setting out to achieve something, throwing on some blinders and killing myself to cross the finish line only to look up and see another finish line… and another one… and another one. And all the things I missed along the way.
It’s not just disheartening. It’s cruel. And it does not make me want to keep going. It makes me want to quit.
So how do we push ourselves without placating, patronizing or punishing ourselves?
The answer lies in our DNA.
Embracing The Negativity Bias and Anti-Goals
One way to pursue a New Year/New You mentality without setting anything in stone is to accept the human predisposition to avoid pain over achieving pleasure and use our “negativity bias,” the tendency to give more weight to traumatic experiences than positive ones, in our favor.
This goes way beyond ‘reverse psychology’ and does not mean that we let fear or primal instincts guide us. I am a huge fan of positive reinforcement and fully believe that focusing on what you don’t want is the fastest way to end up precisely where you never wanted to go.
But one must understand and accept their own nature in order to control it, or allow it to exist as a co-creating force rather than a driving one. And this tendency toward more deeply feeling loss than gain is a very real, very powerful one we cannot ignore.
So to that I say: Don’t try.
Don’t try to force yourself to adhere to something you don’t believe in and don’t lie to yourself about how happy you’ll be ‘once this is all over’ or ‘as soon as you reach that milestone.’
The magic if-then scenario of goal-setting and -getting to linearly move you from an undesirable situation into a projected better one is a desert mirage.
Your problems will not all melt away if you… graduate, get that promotion, lose 10 pounds, move to the mountains, or finally discover the entryway to the wizarding world.
Here’s what to do instead:
Acknowledge what you don’t want to happen and why.
See it. Feel it. Know the repercussions.
And then… move confidently in the opposite direction.
Or, more practically, take the steps that reduce the risk of that perceived scenario.
Don’t want to be homeless? Go to work. Don’t want to crawl back to your 9-5? Make a pot of coffee and up your e-game (entrepreneur ;). Don’t want to feel exactly like you do right now anymore? Get up, go outside, and do what it takes to break the cycle.
It’s a helluva lot better than doom-scrolling insta-rich influencers you’ve decided ALL have a better, easier life than you and crumbling into paralyzing despair over what you don’t have and why you’ll never get it.
Simply making a different decision or moving in a new direction can turn tragedy into triumph where only envy or imagination previously existed. It’s much more visceral.
And it works.
Embracing the counterintuitive concept known as "anti-goals" has been around for some time and plenty of best-selling authors and coaches have incorporated it into their broader approach to business.
In fact, it stems from the ancient recognition that a Pyrrhic victory – or achieving a goal at the expense of unbearable losses – can leave you worse off than when you started.
It's a strategic shift that prompts you to assess not just the benefits but the potential pitfalls of your ambitions. And it actually builds your resilience so you’re not blindsided when things don’t go as planned.
Nurturing Small, Identity-Based Habits
Another method of moving yourself and your business in a positive direction this year without pinning yourself to waypoints is the qualitative 1% rule rooted in aligning yourself with who and what you want to become.
Rather than trying to achieve greatness overnight, focus on becoming a fraction better today than you were yesterday for slow but steady, incremental change that is more sustainable and allows for the natural highs and lows of quantifiable variances.
This is a nod to the law of physics and acknowledges that big, wrecking ball sweeps of success usually result in a pendulum swing in the opposite direction.
The Solution: Walk the line.
Just because things don’t go your way one day, does not mean you need to double down the next day. Losing a customer does not mean you have to replace them by EOD.
It’s not an eye for an eye because it’s not all about the numbers.
In his book "Atomic Habits," author James Clear suggests that instead of focusing solely on specific outcomes, you should concentrate on embodying the person you want to be.
Most small business owners are their own bosses for a reason. We tend to forget that reason when we’re in the trenches, but if we stay true to ourselves and our original vision for the company, we can course-correct without tipping the boat over every time there’s a storm.
By aligning your mentality, decisions and habits with your desired identity, success becomes a natural byproduct of your daily actions.
So instead of writing in your daily journal, “today I want to make 10 phone calls,” ride the wave of phone calls during the time you allotted to make them, and do what you can to make the most of each call. Feeling good about 5 phone calls is always better than stressing over 10 just so you can say you did it, check a box, or convince yourself you did ‘more’ than the next guy.
New Age or not, how you feel has a bigger impact on what happens in your life than what you do. So rid yourself of the metrics martyrdom and embrace the baby steps that lead to the internal locus of control where you determine your destiny simply by being it.
Keep Going
I’ve already touched upon the fact that sometimes, the negative effects of not achieving a goal can be more damaging than not setting one at all. The disappointment, self-doubt, and frustration that accompany unmet expectations can create a toxic cycle, hindering progress and inhibiting your ability to continue on.
But it’s worth bringing up again to emphasize my final suggestion:
Perseverance.
We all know failure is an inevitable part of any true success story. It’s not about how many times you get knocked down, it’s whether or not - and how - you get back up each time.
In Brene Brown's "The Gifts of Imperfection," we are encouraged to embrace our vulnerabilities and short-comings, as it is through these experiences that we truly grow.
But something else Brown emphasizes in that book is that “courage, compassion and connection,” her ingredients for living a whole-hearted life, takes practice.
Meaning, growth, and living your best life, is an on-going process, not a certification that once you have, you put in a frame and place on a wall to gather dust.
So you met your monthly or quarterly goals. Do you stop? Do you increase next quarter’s goals to give yourself something to work harder towards?
Point is, achieving your goals can be just as detrimental as not achieving them.
But not creating any goals just to avoid those two outcomes is not what I’m suggesting either.
I’m merely suggesting that there are plenty of ways to achieve progress that do not require a pen and paper.
More importantly, I’m suggesting a qualitative, long-lasting and holistic approach to success over a numbers-driven, task-oriented uphill battle that goes against our nature and results in more losses than gains.
This year, I encourage you to stop hustling, stop judging and stop forcing. Instead, acknowledge and avoid the downward spirals, align yourself with who you want to be and how you want to feel, and accept and encourage slow and steady momentum.
…And for the love of all that is alive:
Keep going.
Here's to a year of growth, resilience, and becoming the best version of yourself.
You’ll do it. I know you will.
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