Ten month old Joe, had just learnt how to crawl. He used to crawl all day long, wandering from one end of the house to the other. He would see any ‘funny looking object’ lying on the floor and start crawling towards it. No matter how inaccessible that object was, he would make a genuine effort to reach it, banging his head against all that furniture, but somehow sneak into that tiny space and get that object. His face would light up with the joy of getting it and he would happily start playing with it.

Isn’t Joe adorable?

What Joe just did was, he set a goal to get hold of the ‘funny looking object’ and channelized all his energy towards getting it. Instead of crawling aimlessly like earlier, he now started crawling in the direction of that object.

What would have gone through Joe’s mind after seeing the object, would be something like this:

The ‘funny looking object’ is something that he thinks would be useful to him as can play with it. (Sees Value)

Since he can crawl towards the object, he thinks that he can possibly get it. (Stays close to reality)

He sets his eyes on the object and starts crawling towards it. (Focuses on one thing)

As Joe starts coming closer to the object, his confidence level rises and he becomes even more motivated to get it. (Positive reinforcement)

Meanwhile, Joe is still having a lot of fun with his new found toy, but suddenly, he sees another ‘funny looking object’ at a distance and starts crawling towards it with the same enthusiasm as a few minutes ago, leaving this toy behind.

He keeps doing this throughout the day, jumping from toy to toy, because he keeps on wondering if the other toy is going to be better than the one he has right now.

Every now and then, you will find something more attractive than what you have right now and will be drawn to that. You will see value in a LOT of things. But, if you start running towards everything you see value in, you will not be able to move at all. As soon as you start going in one direction, another object will start pulling you in the opposite direction. Both these forces will cancel out each other and you will end up staying where you started from.

So, what do you need to do in order to move towards your goals? It’s easy. Just reduce the number of objects in your life.

The more objects you remove, the better. If you want to learn coding, learn skateboarding, paint the the biggest painting in the world and run a marathon, all at the same time, you probably would end up just watching a sad movie on your laptop after a week, sobbing over how your life sucks.

Focus on 2–3 really really valuable things at one time. To prioritize your goals, this small exercise by Warren Buffet might help:

Write down 20 things that you really want to achieve in your life.

Circle 3 things that are really valuable to you and write them separately on a different piece of paper. This is your to-do list.

The rest is your never to-do list. (Never means not to concentrate on them until goals 1, 2, 3 are achieved). They will always prevent you from achieving the things that are most important to you and you won’t even realize it.

This might sound trivial, but this exercise would help you sort out your priorities well. Take out time to do this. I’ve tried it. It’s super useful. Helps you clear your head.

The color, the shape, the pattern etc. A factual picture is always easier to understand than an abstract one.

I want to be a good football player vs I want to score atleast 5 goals in this season.
I want to perform well in my job vs I want to get 5/5 rating in my next assessment.
I want to clear an entrance test vs I want to score a rank in the top 500.

Another important thing to always remember is to be cognizant of your strengths and weaknesses, and stay away from setting goals that are not sustainable.

Some other takeaways

Write down your goals
It will help you to think clearly about what you really want.

Write down why you chose this goal
It will constantly remind of the value of the things you are doing right now.

Stay away from everything else that is not contributing to your goal
Distractions will come and go. Think of this as putting your phone on silent mode when in a meeting, because the meeting is important to you. Same goes for your goals. Uninstall all junk applications that are taking up too much RAM in your brain.

Break your goal into smaller steps
Step 1, Step 2, Step 3, Step 4……… smaller goals are easier to handle than one big one. They give you motivation more frequently.

Be process oriented
As I talked in my previous article — positive thinking vs wishful thinking, be process oriented and not result oriented. Focus on skill development.

Visualize a roadmap
For example, if your goal is to get a job by the end of the year, you need to prepare your resume by August, wrap up the awesome project you are working on by October so that you can talk about it to people, do mock interviews in November…. and so on. Mark things on your wall calendar if that helps. This sets triggers in your environment.

Treat yourself every now and then
Treating yourself acts as a reinforcement and helps to keep up the motivation.