If you've not achieving a goal, if there's a lack of progress towards your goal and you don't know what's going on one of these 15 reasons might just be the difference that will make the difference.
If you’ve got a goal (I used my YouTube channel growth) and think you’re missing a trick have a look at the 16 insights summarised below - here's the 2 reasons we reach realised would make a difference for myself, Judith my VA and Kirsty my hairdresser:
Do let me know which of the 16 reasons we don't achieve our goals strikes a chord for you.
Background
I laughed very loudly when I took a problem, I was grappling with, for a Landscaping Your Life (LYL) walk at the weekend and found myself saying “I could use my wellbeing prescription to document the insight!” – it felt like a bit of a doh moment!
My intention was to demonstrate the premise of the Landscaping Your Life (LYL) walk for my YouTube channel – and had decided to use ‘growing my YouTube channel’ as the problem to be explored. Although, I now realise, the 16 things stopping me from achieving that goal can apply to any goal – and most likely many problems too.
I’m now going to share the 16 reasons we don't achieve our goals in more depth. You can, however, find them summarised in my prescription for wellbeing template at the bottom of this post – along with the supporting YouTube video (15 mins summarising a 90 minute LYL walk) and couple of shorts.
16 insights from the walk about achieving your goal
Please note – the whole reason a LYL walk works is because you get the insight metaphorically rather than logically – it’s as if the insight bypasses current blocks to progress and speaks to your unconscious – so watching the video may help more than reading this logical explanation ie you may have heard the advice before and yet when you observe it in nature metaphorically it lands differently. Highly recommended therefore if it's a goal you've had for some time and are not achieving it!
1. Stick to the path
I did find the lack of options on the walk very constraining in places
But, with No. 6 in mind, I realise we need to keep to the well-worn path others who have achieved the goal have trodden. This is not a goal to start reinventing the wheel and throw all that great insight out with the baby and bathwater!
2. What will keep you motivated?
It’s a long enough journey that boredom is likely - having a prescription, therefore, to keep you motivated is a great idea.
3. Be flexible, work around hurdles
The path may be well trod but it’s not necessarily straight so don’t expect to keep to the plan 100% of the time – be flexible and adapt – so long as you’ve got No. 6 in mind.
4. Avoid diversions / 5. Avoid distractions
For 24 years these 2 points have been the most common insights on LYL coaching walks – it’s as if we forget No. 6 and start to worry we’re wrong, might be missing something better, and take our eye off the ball and are like a magpie seeing silver at the end of every tunnel!
My poem ‘half a path gets you nowhere’ talks to this point – you have to commit to a whole path - here's a video sharing that poem.
6. Keep your focus on your goal
Need I say more – if we know what we want why do we waver and allow our energy and attention to be depleted by distractions? There’s always time to evaluate progress when we get to our goal or interim goals along the way.
7. Pay attention to the warning signs
This links to No. 1 follow the path – it’s as if every path I came to had signs up saying there was a landslide, uneven ground, electricity etc. In this instance, a reminder to follow best practice others have used to succeed not reinvent the wheel.
8. Clear time to focus on it (undisturbed)
The path had been cleared of dead wood
which allowed for ease of walking. A great reminder to not try to shoehorn your goal into everything else you’re doing ie don’t be surprised if you do that and then get to the end of the week and haven’t done anything towards this particular goal.
9. Look after your wellbeing
A new goal can be draining as we learn new things and throw ourselves into it – so paying attention to your physical, mental, emotional and spiritual wellbeing is essential – with prescriptions written to remind us when we’re ignoring our inner wisdom’s nudges to look after ourselves and cut ourselves some slack.
10. Look for inspiration
Look up – because keeping our head down focused solely on the path, especially at the boring bits, can stop us finding inspiration around us.
11. What’s your why
The bench was positioned in front of some trees obscuring the view
and yet if it had been positioned 10 feet to the left would have had a great view!
(I suspect there’s multiple insight from this observation)
12. Don’t over do it – keep it simple
It can be easy (or is it just me?) to throw caution to the wind and jump in with both feet and just do what the ivy had
and cover the ground and not allow the goal some room to breathe.
13. Keep going – have faith
Don’t give up.
14. Have interim goals
For long journeys the end can feel quite a way away and so an interim goal such as brunch, or a swim, or shopping can act as great motivators (No. 2) to keep going.
15. What do you need to stop doing
The reminder about the prescription template reminded me of another key insight from 24 years of LYL walks – sometimes it’s about what you need to stop doing that’s more important ie stopping doing other activities that are negatively impacting this goal. (You’ll see in the prescription template below that 6 of these insights follow that format.)
16. Evolve – don’t stay static
The changing view of Edinburgh across the Firth of Forth as I walked from Burntisland to Aberdour reminded me not to stick to looking at the goal from one fixed perspective – ie a different perspective give us new data and new options and solutions too.
Do let me know which of these 16 insights struck a chord for you.
Summary of insights and other links
Here’s the YouTube video where you join me as a discover the 16 reasons you're not achieving your goal:
And here’s the completed prescription summarising these insights and more:
(you’ll find out more about the prescription here – and can buy the journal of prescription templates from amazon here)
As you know I do believe that a quick means of solving problems is to explore the idiom being used to describe the current situation (and is why it’s included in the prescription template).
In case they’re helpful for your current conundrum here’s videos I’ve previously done for the two idioms listed in the above prescription for achieving my goal:
There’s also a YouTube playlist with videos demonstrating other idioms as they might be more applicable.
And finally - a request for you
If you’ve any suggestions for problems you’d like me to take on a LYL walk, or idioms you’d like me to explore, do send me the details to alison@alisonsmith.co (yes just .co). Current plans include videos (and poems) for
