Perusing a goal relentlessly to achieve an ultimate goal. It sounds like a nice concept. Setting an ultimate goal and working your way towards something amazing, something that will set us on improve our life significantly and immediately. And it's that end goal that we all work so hard to get to...But how does one stay working towards that goal? What does it mean to be driven? What does it mean to stay driven?
What being "driven" means to me
When I think of what it means to be "driven", I think of the rush of accomplishing a goal. The feeling I chase is the feeling of making it through the finish and being able to look back and say "I've made it. I did something awesome." Knowing that the feeling is coming is what moves me forward. But that feeling fades over time and if I'm not careful about making realistic goals, I can falter and fail at achieving those goals.
What staying "driven" means to me
Pulling myself up from the cliffhanger I left the last section on, I have lost motivation to do something more than enough times to know what I've done wrong and right. "Being driven" and "staying driven" are related concepts, but separate. Staying driven - staying motivated to work towards a goal(s) - means to be conscious of what I'm doing and how it affect how I make my goal a reality. Being mindful of that every moment and excited to work more. The way I do this is by visualizing what I want.
How do I stay "driven?"
I have a cork board in my room that I hang printed pictures of my current goal and my end goal on. "Seeing is believing" is the idea and keeping a constant reminder gives me a small boost in excitement to keep working. Now, it doesn't have to be a cork board and printed pictures. It can be a screen saver on a laptop or wallpaper on a phone screen. The idea here is to just keep a image (not words) of what you want in someplace you'll see it often. A sentence or phrase doesn't work for me because I don't take time to read it when I'm glancing around the room or looking through my phone apps. A picture is easily understood in under a second.
Why do I have two goals?
Previously, I mentioned that I had a current goal and an end goal. That's because often times my goals are lofty. "Buy a house", "get a tesla car", "graduate from school", "beat Resident Evil: Village on the hardest difficulty in under 3 hours." Lofty goal that will take lots of time to accomplish.
Time is the enemy here. The longer a task takes, the less it feels like I'm making progress. When something takes longer, it skews the perception of how obtainable the goal really is. I've often heard people say that what I should instead do is make a series of smaller, easier to obtain goals. I reject that reality and substitute my own!
Do. Both.
I have an end goal and a series of easier to obtain goals that lead up to the end goal. When you have a dream to make come true the last thing you want to hear is someone tell you "That's unrealistic. Set smaller goals for yourself." What an insult! How you feel is how you feel, no one can take that away from you except you. So own what you want, and make small achievements leading up to what you want. And DON'T forget to reward yourself for making it as far as you have.
For example, let's say I want to get through school. In my case, I have a certification program that I'm enrolled in. So my end goal is "Graduate." Perfect. Now, what are my steps up to that? Well, I have 5 phases in my program. I set a reward for each phase completion and lay out what needs to be done in each phase. I take each phase one step at a time and take time to be happy about the minor accomplishments. I have pictures of graduation caps on my cork board as well as the reward for when I accomplish that goal.
Summarizing my thoughts
When you want to be driven and stay driven, it all starts from the frame work of the goals. Create a goal, whatever you currently want, and visualize it in a way that you will see it constantly. Next, make small goals that lead up to it that wont take long to make come true. Remember, the longer it takes, the more impossible it'll feel. After every micro goal achieved take the time to be happy about what you have do so far and move on.
It's important to have something to congratulate often because it keeps the mind stimulated to want more. It changes the mind's view of work away from something you have to do into something you get to do. You'll have something to talk about and be excited for. And believe me when I tell you that your friends and family love to see you excited about something.
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