Achieving Big by Thinking Small

What does it take to realize your dream?

It’s a big question, and one that most of us give up on before we begin.

So what should you do when the path to your goals feels overwhelming?

Make it simpler.

Magnifying glass zooming in on a growth arrow, showing it's made up of many tiny pieces.

Deconstructing Your Dreams

The first step is defining what matters to you.

A common misstep people make is to fixate on a single attribute of life. They want to get promoted so they build their dream life around that event.

While focus is important, you need to recognize that life isn’t one-dimensional. Would you still chase that promotion if it meant you couldn’t spend time with your family? Or that you’d have to quit that sport you love?

To realize your dream it needs to be real, and a real life is complex.

I break it down into 8 parts:

An octagon broken into 8 sections. Business and career, financial health, relationships, family and friends, health and wellness, fun and recreation, spirituality, personal development

Starting with the full picture helps you appreciate the trade-offs that may come with your ambitions.

Afterall, allocating the hours in your day is a zero-sum game, and investing in one part means divesting from another.

Setting Motivational Goals

The second step is defining success. You want to be ambitious – but realistic – in the targets you set.

Start with a 5-year time horizon and define what success is across each attribute. Remember you don’t need to re-invent yourself on every dimension; even keeping the status quo will take effort as your time is drawn into other priorities.

An image of the octagon showing some slices much bigger than others and a note saying growth isn't unlimited, prioritize what's important as you allocate your energy

Another common misstep is ending the goal-setting journey here. You’ve got ambitious goals and now it’s about the hustle to make it happen, right? Not exactly.

You need to break each goal down into its component parts.

A deep dive into one slice of the octagon, showing someone's business and career goals. In 5 years it is to become a sales manager, in one year it's to hit a sales target, and in 1 week it's to schedule 5 calls

Once you’ve created weekly goals, you’ve got a habit-forming feedback loop to keep you on track.

Trust the Process

Self-improvement is a journey and it requires some grit. You’ll have good weeks and bad weeks, but consistency and perseverance are what counts.

While every process is personal there are three keys to success that I’ve seen across the board:

Having a daily tracker to record your progress, and gamify your experience adds extra motivation while maintaining a history of how far you’ve come.

Having a mentor hold you accountable to achieving your goals significantly increases the likelihood that you’ll hit your targets.

Goals and ambitions change, and that’s just part of the process. Don’t break your system for self-improvement, just because your priorities in one aspect of your life have evolved.

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