Tag / goals

by Nathan Coumbe

What can you control?

A new company wants to break into an existing market, open five new stores, generate $10 million in new revenue in the next year, and capture 2% of the market share.

Can they do it?

Well, yes. Possibly, but… Only one of those things is within their direct control.

They can open the five new stores – that’s an action over which they have direct control.

Everything else is an outcome – something that they want to happen but can only be controlled indirectly through specific and defined actions.

To get the outcome, they must focus on and develop actions.

Here’s a (possibly) more relatable example:

Someone wants to bench press 300 pounds. That’s an outcome goal, something that’s dependent on a lot of factors:

  • Genetics
  • Injuries
  • Past training history
  • Age
  • Nutrition and recovery
  • Consistent training

It’s possible to hit that goal, but not by focusing on the outcome. Instead, the lifter should focus on actions that will lead to the outcome she wants:

  • Consistently execute a targeted bench press program 3 days per week
  • Eat X grams of protein each day
  • Go to sleep at 9pm each night to recover appropriately

The thing is, she may still never reach that goal. But by focusing on the actions that lead to the outcome instead of the outcome itself, she has a much greater chance.

The same principle applies to our business example. Hitting $10 million in revenue or capturing 2% of the market share is great. But what actions, done consistently day after day, will lead to those outcomes?

That’s the question.

by Nathan Coumbe

The messy middle

Any worthwhile pursuit has a messy middle. In his book A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, Donald Miller talks about what it’s like to cross a stretch of water. We leave the shore and eventually arrive on the opposite side.

But in between those two points, we have “the hard work of the middle.” That’s where the journey becomes a slog, the motions seem repetitive, and the effort seems useless.

Pursuing a goal, starting a business, losing weight… All of these pursuits have that same hard work to be done in the middle.

In almost every case, we start strong and make decent, even quick, progress. But soon after we hit a point where we lose focus and motivation.

“Why am I at the gym for the third time this week? I just want to go home…”

“I really just want to pig out on pizza, beer, and ice cream. I don’t feel like cooking…”

We get frustrated, hit plateaus, and our motivation wanes.

It’s when we hit that point we have to rely on our “why”.

Our reason for pursuing whatever it is has to be strong enough to get us through the messy middle. Seth Godin calls this “the dip” in his book of the same name.

Without a strong why, without a reason to keep pushing through, we burn out and quit.

Not only does our motivation have to be strong, but we have to revisit it every day. Zig Ziglar had a saying about this rule:

“Motivation doesn’t last. Well, neither does bathing. That’s why we recommend it every day.”

First, identify a strong reason why you want to pursue something.

Then make time every day to review it. Keep your motivation front of mind.

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by Nathan Coumbe

Are you using “someday” to procrastinate?

Seth Godin wrote a very short blog post today you need to read. (Click here to read it)

I taught a class on this very subject yesterday afternoon. 

The students all had these grand plans to accomplish big goals for their budding businesses. But I told them: without a deadline to meet, they wouldn’t succeed.

By the end of it, all 71 of my students had a date certain for when they’d accomplish their goals. And we worked together to develop daily action steps to get there, too. 

“Someday” isn’t a day on the calendar. Declare your date and make it happen. 

(It never ceases to amaze me how Seth’s shortest posts seem to be the most insightful and relevant.)

Make sure you read his post here. And subscribe to his newsletter—it’s the most insightful email you’ll read each day.

by Nathan Coumbe

Why are you REALLY doing that?

Years ago, the Toyota Motor Company created a system called “The 5 Whys.” It is a problem-solving technique that helps drill down to the root cause of an issue–in their case, manufacturing problems.

It’s also an excellent personal technique to help you figure out why you are doing, or attempting to do, just about anything.

Why do you want to lost weight? This is now an almost universal goal. If your answer is to look good at the beach or to feel better, you’re probably going to start binging the first time you see a pack of Oreos at the supermarket.

Why? The motivation from those bland, generic reasons are extrinsic (outside of yourself and your reasons for being) and, well…bland and generic. They have no real meaning to you. So try the “5 Whys.”

Why do you want to lose weight?

“So I’ll be strong and fit.”

Why does that matter?

“When I am strong and fit, I’ll be able to accomplish more with my body.”

Okay, and?

“When I can do more, I won’t tire out and break down like I currently am on a regular basis.”

Okay, why does that matter?

“When I am more resilient, I’ll be able to serve others better and longer: I will be able to go up and down stairs without passing out, or help my friend declutter her garage without hurting myself.”

And why is that important?

“Because I feel like service to others is one of the main reasons I’m here…”

Wow! Just like that you now have a deep, intrinsic purpose for losing weight and getting strong. You don’t only want to look good at the beach: you want to serve others at a higher capacity because it’s one of your values.

Now, when you see those Oreos or feel like skipping your daily movement session, you’ll remember that you are striving to serve others.

Your motivation doesn’t have to be service to others, of course. This is highly personal to each of us.

Think of a goal you want to achieve in some area of your life: physical, financial, family, career, personal development, social, or spiritual. When you have a goal, start asking why it matters. Drill down until you either determine that the thing you want is hollow and meaningless or you find the real motivation to accomplish it.

Find the real reasons for what you want in life. You might surprise yourself.

*Note: I first learned about this while being coached by the folks over at Precision Nutrition. I want to thank them for giving me something I can now spread to others.

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by Nathan Coumbe

The instrument is a means to an end

Instrument – noun 

  1. A tool or instrument; 
  2. a thing used in pursuing an aim; 
  3. an object or device used to produce musical sounds.

The purpose of an instrument is to accomplish a goal. Play a song; perform surgery; type a book; draw a sketch.

Why, then, do we spend so much time focused on learning the tool, the means to the end, rather than pursuing the end itself?

How ridiculous would it be for a surgeon to spend four years of her education learning how to use a scalpel? His end goal is to perform surgery, and the scalpel is simply a tool to help her achieve that goal. So she focuses on what he is trying to accomplish, rather than on the scalpel, and learns to use the scalpel to achieve the goal – helping the patient lying in front of her.

A drum set, trumpet, guitar, or violin is a tool used to create music. And yet, in conversations I’ve had with other musicians and from my own personal experience, an inordinate amount of time in the education of a musician is spent on technical exercises or non-musical experiences. 

I am not diminishing the importance of mastering every facet of one’s tool – a surgeon must be a master with a scalpel; a musician must be in total control of her instrument. But to focus on technique, on the instrument only, while ignoring the purpose for which it was created, is to learn only half of a craft. 

How different would an artist’s life be if every exercise or technical study was drawn from a major work in her field? What if, in learning a song, one created one’s own technical exercises that enabled mastery of the music being played, rather than technique for technique’s sake? 

Learn medicine, not scalpel technique.

Learn to create art, not how to use a pencil.

Lean to play music, not an instrument.

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