High Performance Mindset | Learn from World-Class Leaders, Consultants, Athletes & Coaches about Mindset - 84: How to Achieve Your Goals

Episode Date: January 16, 2017

High Performers have clearly written goals that are slightly difficult to stay hungry and excited for their sport, business and life. They work hard every day to reach their goals and are deliberate with their daily activities. They go the extra mile to achieve their goals because they are gritty.   Week’s Affirmation: I know what I want and every day I work towards my goals. I go after my goals with passion and excitement. I stay focused and gritty.

Welcome to High Performance Mindset with Dr. Sindra Kampoff. Do you want to reach your full potential, live a life of passion, go after your dreams? Each week we bring you strategies and interviews to help you ignite your mindset. Let's bring on Sindra. And it's been a little while, but she's back. Dr. Sindra Kampoff with us today for High Performance Mindset here on Minnesota 93. Good morning, Sindra. Good morning. It's great to be here. Happy New Year. It seems weird to say that on the 9th of January, but we haven't seen you.

So here we are. Happy New Year. Happy New Year. It's awesome to be here. We are today talking a little bit about something that in regards to our goals and resolutions for 2017, and that is how to achieve your goals. And we like to hear thanks to you, often not call them resolutions, but call them goals. So I see at the top it says, a goal is a dream with a deadline. And you have sort of an example to share with us on that.

One of the people that I recently interviewed on my podcast, her name is Ruth Brennan-Morrie, and she's actually a local example from Rochester. And she's a great example of that it's not too late to go after your goals and doesn't matter how old you are. And so a little bit about Ruth in case you don't know her story is she was a Division One soccer player throughout her athletic career, accidentally qualified for the 2000 Olympic trials. Whoops. Yeah, right. How sick does that make you when you're a runner and you're just like, what? You're so good, you accidentally qualified for the Olympic trials.

And did really, really well at the Olympic trials. She finished 34th. But she took like 10 years off of racing and competing for many reasons. Burnout, just competing for the wrong reasons, injury. And it wasn't until 10 years later that she actually decided she had this burning desire just to do something more and do something different. She started getting into Ironmans and Half Ironmans.

And it wasn't until age 37 that she actually decided to become a professional triathlete. And in her first Ironman, she finished second, which is amazing. She closed with a 3.02 marathon, which is a really, really fast marathon. And in the interview that I did with her, she talks about how she stays fueled, how she competes, even though she has three young children, ages 11, 8, and 6. And she really shared how her goals have made all the difference and how she kind of stays fueled to go after those goals. And even how she sees kind of roadblocks as part of her plan to reach her goals. And so she wouldn't have been able to do that if she didn't have goals. And just like all of us, if we don't have goals,

we don't have the motivation and the desire to really move forward. And I think we don't necessarily reach our potential because we don't have necessarily direction of where we're going. And so that's exactly what we're talking about is what do you want in 2017 and how do you go after it? All right. So goals, you've said that a lot. Not resolutions.

We don't want to set resolutions, but we should set goals. Why is that? Why do we change that phrase, rephrase that? You know, when we think of resolutions, they tend to be all or nothing, like black and white. And we tend to focus on what we don't want instead of what we do want. And so, for example, we might say, you know, at the start of the new year, I'm going to stop eating chocolate, you know, and so we don't necessarily have a plan of how we're going to move forward with that. And that's why only a small percent of people

actually reach their New Year's resolutions because they don't have a plan and they tend to be all or nothing. We don't necessarily think about how we're going to move forward with those. So there must be some research on that then. How do we know, what do we know about goals and success compared to those resolutions that we seem to fail at consistently? Well, we know that successful people are goal-oriented,

meaning that they have a vision for themselves and they know what they want. They have their goals written down and they know what they want to accomplish throughout the year, throughout the month, and then even what they want in the day, in the meeting, in the workout, in the game, if they're an athlete. And so we know the most successful people have long-term goals, but they have short-term goals and their short-term goals are connected to their long-term goals. I think you've kind of started to build the structure here. But so with those long and short-term goals that are all part of the process, then how does this all fall into

place and work out for us then when we set the goals? Well, it helps you, goals help you turn in kind of your vision and your dreams into reality. That's why you started with the quote, you know, a goal is a dream with a deadline. And so what I notice is once I write those goals out, like I start making different decisions, I see that my performance and my dedication and my attention just changes because I know exactly what I want. And then, you know, I just start making different decisions once I write them down. So if you don't have goals and, and especially if you don't have them written down, I think that's what's really important is what we're going to be talking about today. You know, you're just going to have less direction in your life and in your

performance and your job. So that's why it's so important to write them down. All right. So can you tell us how you would go about this with your gritty goal guidelines? The three G's, right? Three G's, three G's. So yeah, today we're talking about four gritty goal guidelines. And the first guideline is to set multiple goals stated positively. So a good idea is to have like three or four goals for the year. More than that kind of just gives you too much to focus on. And what you want to write down is what you want to do, not what you don't want to do. So let's say if you said, well, I want to avoid eating sweets this year.

I wouldn't encourage you to write that down. Instead, I would encourage you to write what you want. I'm going to eat two or three vegetables or fruits every day, for example. Okay. Okay. And then the second guideline would be? Ink it, don't just think it. So what that means is-

Seems more real when you write it down. And you're more accountable to yourself if you write it down. Okay. So we know that the more successful people have their goals written down. And one of my favorite studies is called the Harvard Alumni Study, surveyed people who had just graduated from Harvard. And they found that only 3% of the Harvard students actually had their goals written down. But 30 years later, when they followed up with them, they found that the 3% who had their goals written down made more money combined than the 97%.

Wow. Interesting. That's great. Write some stuff down now. You got to write it down. What's the third guideline for us? Set specific and just slightly difficult goals. You don't want it to be like too difficult that you lose motivation, but you want to try to write it as specifically as possible to keep you motivated and excited. Okay.

So beyond your reach, but not that far. Exactly. Okay. Slightly beyond your reach. And the fourth guideline? Is to plan out what you're going to do weekly and daily to accomplish those goals. Obviously, it's a good idea to write them down for the year, but then you need to really

think about how you're going to move forward with that. And I think we tend to, at the beginning of the year, think about what we want, but we don't necessarily write it down or come up with a plan. How to get there. Exactly. All right. Exactly. Good.

So we've used the baby steps term a million times before, or small bites, chew, chew, chew, chew away at it to get to where you're going. How do you summarize this whole thing today? This is some good stuff to kick off 2017 with. High performers, so those who are working to reach their greater potential, clearly have goals written down, and they're slightly difficult, so they stay excited and hungry for their life and for their business and their sport, and they work every day to reach those goals.

They go the extra mile to achieve those goals because they're gritty. Nice. Gritty seems to always come into play somewhere, doesn't it? Always. Yep, be gritty. And if we follow along with you on social media and through the website, we get an affirmation every week. What is this week's affirmation?

I know what I want, and every day I work towards my goals. I go after my goals with passion and excitement, and I stay focused and gritty. There it is again. All right. Gritty. All right, now if we want to get up to date on what's going on with you, I notice there's some more podcasts coming up

that I need to get caught up on. Social media is always a good spot, too. What's the best way for us to connect with you? You can head over to my website, Dr. Sindra, so it's D-R-C-I-N-D-R-A, and all the podcasts, including Ruth Brennan-Maurice, is on iTunes. So you can go over there and just search High Performance Mindset. Excellent. It's great to have you back

in. It's great to be here. Thanks for coming in. Dr. Cinder Kampoff with us today. High Performance Mindset, Monday mornings on Minnesota 93. Thank you for listening to High Performance Mindset. If you liked today's podcast, make a comment, share it with a friend, and join the conversation on Twitter at Mentally Underscore Strong. For more inspiration and to receive Sindra's free weekly videos,

check out DrSindra.com.