The Mindset Mentor - Why You Should STOP Focusing on Your Goals

Episode Date: March 4, 2021

This is a big hole in the personal development industry, no one ever talks about this. Today we are going to teach you why you should stop focusing on your goals and what you should do instead. Follow me on IG here: @RobDialJr https://instagram.com/robdialjr Want to learn more about Mindset Mentor+? For nearly nine years, the Mindset Mentor Podcast has guided you through life's ups and downs. Now, you can dive even deeper with Mindset Mentor Plus. Turn every podcast lesson into real-world results with detailed worksheets, journaling prompts, and a supportive community of like-minded people. Enjoy monthly live Q&A sessions with me, and all this for less than a dollar a day. If you’re committed to real, lasting change, this is for you.Join here 👉 www.mindsetmentor.com My first book that I’ve ever written is now available. It’s called LEVEL UP and It’s a step-by-step guide to go from where you are now, to where you want to be as fast as possible.📚If you want to order yours today, you can just head over to robdial.com/bookHere are some useful links for you… If you want access to a multitude of life advice, self development tips, and exclusive content daily that will help you improve your life, then you can follow me around the web at these links here:Instagram TikTokFacebookYoutube

Welcome to today's episode of the Mindset Mentor podcast. I am your host, Rob Dial. And if you have not yet done so, hit that subscribe button so that you never miss another podcast episode. Today is Thursday, which means that it is the business edition of the Mindset Mentor podcast, which also means that my best friend and business partner, Dean DeVries, is also here as well. Dean DeVries, welcome, my friend. What's up, brother? Happy Thursday. Happy Thursday. Today, we're going to talk about something that might seem like it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to you, and it's definitely not preached too much. I don't know if I've ever

actually even heard it preached in the self-development category. And what I'm actually going to tell you is that you should not focus on your goals. So what Dean and I are going to talk to you about is why you should stop focusing on your goals, right? Yeah. And I'll just tell you like my, in my life, when I really started, you know, experiencing more abundance in my business and in my life, it's when I stopped focusing on my goals. Yeah. Yeah. And we're not saying don't have goals. You need to have goals. They're good guides to get you to where you want to go. We all want an amazing life. We all want to have,

you know, happiness and millions of dollars and the relationships that we want and to travel the world and to have an amazing family and joy and peace and love and all that stuff. But today we're going to talk about why focusing on that future may actually be the thing that's holding you back. You know, if you want an abundant future, what you shouldn't do is focus on that future. What you should do is focus on right now. And right now is the only thing that actually truly matters. Right, Dean? Yeah. Yeah. And it goes back to that idea of success isn't something that we do, right? It's something that we attract because of the person that we become. So it really comes down to the identity, right? The person that we are, which really goes into how we're showing up right now,

today, right? And I love that if you, if you want an abundant future, don't focus on the future, focus on the now. The only thing that we have is right now. Yeah. And it, you know, it seems counterintuitive, but the future when it actually happens will just be another present moment. And so if you're constantly just focusing on the future, you're actually never living in the present moment ever. And too many people focus on all of the stuff that they need to do to get to where they want to go. But when they worry about all of those things, it sometimes can be paralysis by analysis. And they're thinking too much about all of the stuff they need to do and they get nothing done. And the thing that I always say is that the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single

step. I didn't make that up, obviously. but if you're too worried about mile 745, you're not going to actually even take the first step, you know? Yeah. Yeah. I really just want to unpack this a little bit more and, and, and put some substance to this conversation because this is a, um, you know, a concept that I don't think, you know, to your point from earlier, I don't think we talk about enough just in the personal development space. And so, you know, the, the first concept that really just comes to mind is how much our choices today really matter. And every single choice that we make really defines our destiny, right? We're either moving in the direction of our, of what it is that we want to create in our life and living the life that we want, or we're moving away from that. And so, you know, oftentimes the reason why we're not getting the results in our business,

in our life, it's because we're not showing up in a way where we're making the best choices, right? The choices, even though, you know, we can't control everything that is around us, right? There's things that happen outside of us that are beyond our control. But the one thing that is 100% in our control is how we respond to it. And that's a choice. Our response is always our choice. Yeah. And if you're not getting the results that you want, it's because of your choices. I mean, it's really not hard. Like people make success in life really way too difficult. They think way too much about it. It's extremely simple. Your actions are not yielding the results that you want. to do is make different choices, which will give you different actions, which will give you different results. So if you're sitting in a life that you don't currently want, you have created that life that you have and your actions have not yielded the results to get you a different life.

And life isn't about controlling all the things that happen around you. Sometimes, like you said, it's just about controlling how you respond. And what you have to realize is that you take a step back and you go, okay, if I want this goal in this future, yes, I do want to know where I'm going, but then I need to look at the next action that I'm going to take. And then I ask myself, is this the action that's going to get me to where I want to be? Is this the action that's going to line up with the person that I need to become in order to achieve that life. Yeah. And just to double click on that, like everything that happens is meant to be, or else it wouldn't have happened. Right. So, you know, if, if we really just believe that,

that everything happens exactly the way that it's supposed to, we can't control what that is. We can't control what happens, but we just have to assume that it happened exactly the way that it was supposed to, because that's what happened. But what the one thing, like I said, that we can control that's a hundred percent in our, you know, our realm of influence is our choice. And so what comes up for me in this is, you know, also just really focusing on the journey rather than the destination, because, you know, when we give up this idea of, you know, also just really focusing on the journey rather than the destination. Because, you know, when we give up this idea of, you know, Hey, I'm, I'm on the path and I want to,

I want to get to this goal. And once I get there, then I will experience this. Then I'll be happy. Then I'll be set. Right. And like, I know you and I can definitely relate to this going back to our Cutco days. Like, you know, you and I were always in the, you know, the top, you know, top people in the entire company. And I remember those conversations that we had as we were kind of leading up to or just like, man, you know, if we create this, then we're going to be set. That's that's what life's all about. And then when we got there, I remember having conversations where it's like, yeah, no, it's good. But like, I thought it was going to feel better, you know? And so that's the result of focusing on the destination because there's always another destination.

There's always another level. And so if we're trying to get our gratification based on when we arrive to that destination, So if we're trying to get our gratification based on when we arrive to that destination, then number one, it's not going to feel as good as you think it'll feel when you actually get there. But also it's going to take away from your ability and your willingness to be consistent and really finding the enjoyment in the journey. Finding the destination is actually the journey. You're already there.

You are on your path. And so if you enjoy the path and enjoy taking the actions and enjoying the process, it doesn't matter what the results look like. Yeah. Yeah. It's kind of like you hear with a lot of really successful people, excuse me, is people who win the Super Bowl and people who win a championship in some sort of way. I mean, is people who win the Super Bowl or people who win a championship in some sort of way. Sometimes the most depressing day for them is the day after they win that championship because they've built their entire life around this destination. And now they hit the destination and their entire identity was built around that destination.

They're kind of like, well, what the hell do I do with myself now? I don't feel any different than I did before. And it's corny and cliche. But the reason why it's cliche is because it's true. You know, the whole thing that you're trying to do is you're not trying to, I mean, if you want to make a million dollars, yes, you do want to make the million dollars, but really the whole fun and excitement is to be able to become the person that is worthy of achieving that goal of having made a million dollars. And that's why Jim Rohn always says success is something that you attract by the person that you become. So it's not really the

going and making the million dollars. Yeah, you want to do that. But what you're really trying to do is become the type of person that can make that million dollars. Yeah. And when we're too focused on the destination, we focus on it being perfect, right? We focus on the perfection rather than the progression and finding the joy and finding the, the, the, the appreciation and gratitude in the progression. And, you know, another thing that just, you know, really pops up in this. And if you're listening to this right now, I know that you're a human. And if you're a human, I know you've experienced this and it's called the, I deserve it. Right. Where we get this glimpse of success, right? We've got this, this goal, we've got this destination that we're on the path for. And we start to see this

glimpse of success, whether it's like, Hey, I just, you know, got a huge bump in my income because I had a really great month or, you know, Hey, I just, you know, lost 10 pounds when I've been, you know, I've been wanting to lose weight for a really long time. Right. There's so many goals that we can have that once we get that glimpse of success, if we're focused on the destination, then that glimpse of success makes it more real. It's like, wow, you know, I'm actually getting there, but then the brain kicks in and we start to self-sabotage, right?

We start to wonder like, oh shit, well, what if I am successful or what, what if, what if this is it? What if I fail? Right. And it's impossible to self-sabotage at the glimpse of success when you're really just enjoying and appreciating the journey because it, the journey is so much more rich than the results that come from the journey. Yeah. It's funny you say this. We had, you and I run Business Breakthrough where we teach coaches how to actually grow coaching businesses. And we talked about this on the call Tuesday, where one of our most successful students, Misty, had been making more money than she ever had. And she's probably going to be super excited to hear her name on the podcast. So hey, Misty.

Hey, Misty. But she's at the point where she's about to, in her first few months of working and running her own, her coaching business, about to make more money than she ever has in an entire year. And she's already starting to notice that she is almost on the path of starting to, she's coming up with thoughts that aren't even true in front of her to almost start to self-sabotage. And so, so often we get stuck in comfort zones and we don't realize that our brain will actually start to trick us to self-sabotage us, to keep us in that comfort zone when we start to expand past it. But if we're not looking like you're saying at the amount of money that we're making or how much it is, but just going, I am doing so well in my business right now.

And I'm so enjoying the person that I'm becoming in the path that I'm on. And if I'm focusing on that present moment and not this possible future that might be coming down the road, it makes it easier for me to not self-sabotage, you know? Yeah. And if all you knew was that your habits dictate your results and you want results, all you have to focus on are the habits, right? Which all come from our choices. Our choices turn into behaviors, right? Every behavior that we have and every habit that we have all literally started with a single choice that we kept on choosing over and over and over again. It became a behavior pattern. And then once it became a behavior pattern, it then became a habit that was ingrained into our identity of who we are. So the habits that we have actually dictate

the results that we have in the future, but the habits are really about today. Going back to the initial, how we opened up this episode, that it's not about, if you're focusing on the goal or the initial, you know, how we opened up this, this episode that it's not about, you know, if you, if you're focusing on the goal or the destination, right, you're taking away from the very opportunity that you have to create the best results, which is the moment where you can really make a, an empowered choice and, you know, success. Like you can, you can tell

a successful person, not by looking at their bank account, not by looking at their status, not by looking at what kind of job they have or what kind of business they're operating or how much income they're bringing in or what cars they drive or house they live in. You can tell a successful person simply by just looking at their daily habits. What do they do every single day? Is there something interfering with your happiness or preventing you from achieving your goals? Maybe it's anxiety or stress or worry with how much is going on right now. Well, BetterHelp will help you assess your needs and match you with your own licensed therapist. So you can start communicating with them in under 48 hours. It's not a crisis line.

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and join over 1 million people who have taken charge of their mental health with an experienced professional. And Mindset Mentor listeners get 10% off their first month. So all you have to do is go to betterhelp.com slash D-I-A-L. And usually the way that you can usually tell a successful person just by the kind of the aura that they have like you can see a confident person when they walk in the room and the reason why confidence is not something that people are born with I say this all the time confidence comes from results and so that person has focused on becoming the type of person to focus on this. Like if, if I'm going to walk from my garage to my truck, I have to literally take steps to get there. Right. That makes sense. But if I'm just focusing on, oh my

gosh, I've got to get to my truck. Oh my gosh, I've got to get to my truck. Oh my gosh, I got to get to my truck. And I never actually take a step towards it. Then nothing's ever going to happen. Now, obviously that makes a whole lot of sense, but how many people out there are so focused on the journey and the destination that they need to get to that they forget the fact that they even have to take the next step, right? So the way that somebody becomes confident is from getting the results, but it doesn't mean that they're focusing on the results to go from garage to truck. It means that what they're doing is they're going one step in front of the other, one step in front of the other, one step in front of the other. And here's what's really interesting about confidence that I don't think people understand. Confidence comes from

getting the results that you want. Yes. But one thing that's really interesting, sometimes confidence also comes from failing. The reason why is because you at least stepped out of your comfort zone. And even if you did fall on your face, you still get confidence knowing, you know what, at least I did something that I was afraid of. Yeah, you know, one thing that just I was reminded of as you were using that analogy

of going from the garage to your truck, it is, you know, going step by step, but it's also the direction of those steps. And, you know, the most important step, but it's also the direction of those steps. And, you know, the most important thing about this is awareness, right? Like we always say it all the time where it's, if we could equip one superpower to every single person on the planet that would literally change the world, it would be awareness because anything that happens within our awareness now becomes our choice. So, you know, when it comes to our choices, we have to have

enough awareness and we have to really look at ourselves in the mirror and just be honest with ourselves and say, are my choices are, is there a better step that I could be taking? Because going from the garage to the, to the truck, you might take a ton of steps, but it might be in the wrong direction. Right. And if we're not aware of how our choices are actually impacting our future, then we might find ourselves in a circumstance or a situation where it's like, wait a second, this isn't what I wanted. Well, let's look back to see what choices created that, you know, and it goes for not just our business. It goes for everything. What choices are you making around your health? What choices are you making around your finances, your relationships, your mindset? The other thing that comes to mind is also the fact that our perspective, the way that we look at the world, the way that we receive our experiences is also a choice, right?

And we kind of talked about this earlier on our mastermind call. talked about this earlier on, on our mastermind call, but you know, when it comes to art, when it comes to looking at things and receiving our experiences and determining if this is an empowering perspective or disempowering perspective, we really have to ask ourself, like, is this perspective giving me energy or is it taking away energy? And you know, the, the, the perspective, one of the perspectives that just like, you know, is a, is a guiding principle for me is I believe that everything happens for a reason. Now, by the way, I can't prove that. I don't, I, there's no way for me to prove that. I can't tell you that that's 100% the truth, but that's 100% what I believe because that perspective gives me energy.

Yeah. Yeah. And it goes back to, you know, the choices that you make really comes down to something that we've been saying for 14, 15 years now. And if you're making, you know, the choices that you make are going to dictate the actions that you're going to take, which are going to dictate the results that you're going to have. So instead of focusing on that long future, that's way ahead of us, five, 10 years down the road, you focus on this very moment. And you ask yourself, is what I'm doing right now getting me closer to or further from my goals?

So if I want to have the body that's going to look incredible on the beach this summer, and I'm in the middle of eating a big old tub of ice cream, I can ask myself in that moment, is what I'm doing right now getting me closer to or further from my goals of having the best body possible on the beach? Looks like it's probably getting me further away from my goals. Okay, then I need to change my present moment to get a future that I desire. Okay, you know, if my alarm clock goes off and I hit the snooze button, I ask myself is what I'm doing right now getting me closer to or further from my goals? Well, if I had the goal of waking up so that I could get done whatever it is I need to get done to create the life that I want, well, then sleeping in is getting me further away from my

goals. So one of the simplest things that people can just simply ask themselves, if they're trying to recalibrate in the moment to create the life that they want, is to focus on this present moment and say, is what I'm doing right now getting me closer to or further from my goals of X, whatever that X is for you. And there's so many levels to this because, I mean, we could really go down a rabbit hole here, but when it comes to hitting the snooze button, if your commitment, if you're like, man, I am so committed to waking up tomorrow at 5 a.m., 6 a.m. whatever the whatever the the time is and you hit the snooze button the choice of hitting the snooze button is yeah number one you're not waking up as early as you wanted to so that you can achieve more but also

the choice of not honoring the commitment to yourself is also a choice and if and oftentimes how we do one thing is how we do everything so if you're not honoring the commitment like that to yourself, what else are you not honoring? What other commitments are you breaking? Where else are you living out of integrity? And so that's, that's really where the awareness comes in is really reflecting and,

and looking at these, what seems to be small, simple actions like our, our, our ego might say, yeah, but I just hit the snooze button once and only slept in for another 15 minutes. Yeah. But you are out of integrity. That was a choice and all choices have the potential

to become habits. And when you think about a future, the highest potential version of you that has created everything that you want is that version of you out of integrity with their commitments to themselves? Are they making choices to, you know, not fulfill their commitments and not do what they say they're going to do? I think not. I believe that person that you are meant to be the person that can achieve everything and create everything that you want in life is the person that's impeccable with their commitments. It's the version of you that chooses the best potential option, the best way to approach that opportunity in each moment. Yeah. It's interesting because the same way that I said that the way that you build confidence in yourself is by number one, either

getting the results that you want, or number two, even failing at what it is that you want to do, but at least stepping out of your comfort zone and going, you know what? Well, at least I stepped up for myself and at least I started down the path and tried something that I was afraid of. Do you don't want to do also on the opposite side of that? Do you want to know how to lose confidence in yourself to do exactly what you're saying? To not show up for yourself, to set your alarm for 6 a.m. and hit the snooze button and wake up at 6.09. Is there a huge difference between it in time? No.

In confidence and mentally in the future that you're trying to create? Absolutely. So people have to realize that they're either building their confidence or lowering their confidence with every single thing that they do as well. And so if we reflect back on what we've talked about so far and what we've gone over today, number one, what choices are you taking in the current moment and are they bringing you closer to or further from your goals? That's

something you should ask yourself at all points in time. And then the next one is what is one step in the direction that you need to take that would be a better choice for you? So an example of that would be, all right, you know what? I do want to create the body that I want, but at the same time, I am eating this tub of ice cream right now. What would be a better choice in this moment than that? Or would I actually go even better to get the ice cream out of the freezer and I'm starting to pick it up. Then I asked myself, Hey Rob, what would be a better choice than this? You know, what would be a better choice than getting this ice cream all right well i'm starting to get a sugar craving maybe i go and get an apple instead so i at least get some sugar but it's at least healthier for me i don't know what it is it's different for everybody but what's one step in the direction that you want to go to that is a better

choice than the choice that you're currently making yeah and what's really powerful about this this reflection you know the purpose of reflection is awareness. So the more awareness that you have, the more choices you have. So when it comes to this type of reflection and asking yourself this question, um, you know, what choices are bringing me farther away or closer to my goals? Look at the things that you, that, that maybe you've concocted a story in your head that the choices don't matter. Those are actually the choices that you want to look at, you know, whether it's, you know, showing up to, you know, showing up to meetings a minute or two late, right? Like that has a, you know, there's, there's something around integrity there, right? If, if you're meant to show up at a certain time,

you're probably also the type of person that'll sleep in for an extra five minutes and not think it's a big deal, right? Because it's just the story that we're telling ourselves to feel okay, not honestly not feel shitty about not being an integrity, right? But those are actually the choices that matter so much because it's those little tiny choices that just stack up that when we're making a bunch of little tiny choices, that's, you know, that's going to give us huge momentum in the wrong direction, right? It's kind of like, you know, think about Amazon, one of the largest companies in the world, they make a little tiny bit off of a lot of, you know, a lot of transactions, right? Well, the choices that you make a lot of different choices throughout the day. And in those choices, like, is there a little bit of lack of integrity or a little bit of

like, you know, not fully showing up, you know, if it's just that little bit and it's okay to feel, you know, it's okay to not feel shitty for you. Like if that's a story that that's like, ah, it's not that big of a deal. That's the choice that you want to look at and build the awareness of. And what is the consequence of not just doing that today? What's the consequence of doing that for another year, another five years, another 10 years, another 20 years, and just see where it takes you versus if you really just cleaned that up and

cleaned up your choices and intentionally made better choices, even if they're not drastically different choices, even if they're just slightly better choices. Again, it's not about perfection. It's about progression. So how can each choice move you in the direction of progress? Yeah, I love that. So essentially, what we're saying, everybody is have goals, but then after you've set them, don't worry about them as much. Just figure out what it is that you need to do in this present moment to make a better choice in this moment to get you closer towards that goal in every single thing that you do. And if you do that, the interesting thing is that you wake up one day and that goal that you had set for yourself has already been hit. So that's what we got for you for today's episode. If you

love this episode, please go ahead and share it on your Instagram and tag me in it. Rob Dial Jr. R-O-B-D-I-A-L-J-R. The only way that we grow is from you guys sharing it. And if you're out there and you want to either work with us either for mindset help, or if you're a coach and you want to learn how to grow your coaching business, you can go to bookwithdean.com right now. You can fill out some information. If you happen to be somebody that we feel like we could help, we'll reach out to you and set you up for a call to either learn about your mindset or to learn about your coaching business and how we can help you there. But I'm gonna leave you the same way

I leave you every single episode, make it your mission to make someone else's day better. I appreciate you and I hope that you have an amazing day.