Why resolutions won’t help you reach your full potential (and what will)
Why don’t resolutions stick?
You know it in your gut, this year is going to be different (and it is).
You FEEL the shift and you're finally ready to embrace your full potential. So you sit down and create a list of goals or maybe declarations of how things will be completely different going forward.
You mean it with every fiber and you have every intention of making big changes in your life.
Except between Dec 31 and January 1st nothing fundamentally changes. And we follow all our old patterns because there's nothing programmed to replace them that will create the seemingly big behavioral changes we need.
Same behavioral patterns...same results. Rinse & repeat for next year.
This article isn’t about replacing old programming to create new results in our lives, it’s about taking a completely different approach to reaching our full potential as we look ahead to the new year...or whenever you’re reading this!
A resolution is far too often focused on what we THINK it will take to get us where we want to be. We think…successful people get up at 5am every day, so I resolve to get up at 5am too. I need to be fitter, so I promise myself I’ll go to the gym twice a week.
The challenge is that we tend to focus on changes connected to HOW other people have been successful reaching their potential and impact instead of WHO WE ARE and how to better align our actions to our natural potential.
Without a super clear understanding of who we are and how to align to our potential, we’re shooting darts into a void, hoping to hit on something.
Using Values to re-imagine resolutions
To become truly motivated and perfectly positioned to behave in a way that supports our optimal self we 1st need to embrace who we really are. That may have nothing to do with getting up a 5am every day, but you won’t know that until you get clarity on YOU first.
Our values are the lenses we use to view the world and to tell us (and others) what’s most important to us & who we are. They tell us who we like, trust, and respect. They inform our decisions and actions. They create feelings in us that tell us we’re on the right track…or we’re not.
They’re actually quite powerful tools that most of us haven’t fully tapped into.
When we know what our top guiding values are, we can consciously align to them instead of relying on feeling.
Our “gap” values are the best guides
Our guiding values live on a spectrum of lived values and aspired values. Our lived values are just that; present and fully lived in our lives. For example, if I value Personal Accountability AND I always take responsibility for my actions, arrive on time, always do what I say I’m going to do, and make it right when I don’t get it right…then I’m living that value.
On the other side of the spectrum, if I value Personal Accountability because I expect others around me to show up to it, but I struggle myself, then it’s more an aspired value than a lived one. We call that a “Gap Value”.
It’s in those gap values that we have the biggest opportunity to create goals that will help us reach our unique & beautiful potential.
So, creating goals and behavior changes around our aspired values provides built-in incentive to actually reach those goals.
How to create goals around your “Gap Values”
Here are the basic steps and then I’ll walk you through an example;
Identify your top 2-4 values
Identify the behaviors for each value
Identify the gaps
Create very specific goals to live the behaviors
Let’s say Vulnerability is a gap value for you and you identify the behaviors of “sharing personal experiences” and “public speaking” as behaviors you’d like to embrace to make Vulnerability much more of a lived value for you.
And then we create the specific goal of getting up in front of people and sharing personal experiences around a passion we have - equal access to global education. This could look like a lot of things, but let’s say we set the 1st small goal of speaking at a local charity event that you’re a volunteer with. They’ll certainly allow you to say a few words at the event, right?! You’ll share your personal experience with how education shaped your life and include personal details that may even be a little painful for you. Don’t worry, a short talk - even just 5 a minute one - wins you this goal.
How your lived values are your superpowers
So, you’ve created your very first aligned goal. Now what?
This is the fun part…
Taking advantage of your lived values is the secret weapon to achieving your goals. Your lived values are your superpowers and the fastest & easiest ways of achieving your aligned goals.
Let’s say your superpowers (aka, lived values) are Accountability & Humor.
Accountability: You know that when you commit to something, it ALWAYS gets done.
Humor: You always find respectful humor in every situation and others are drawn to you because of it. In fact, what you love most about others who you witness being “successfully vulnerable” is how they use humor to do it. Humor makes you feel comfortable around others and helps to connect you too.
Do you see where this is going?
For us, committing ASAP to giving a very short speech and using humor as your anchor will all but guarantee you’ll be successful in this mini goal and get you much further along towards reaching your full potential.
Next step is to scale your efforts. Identify the next level of this goal. Is it a larger format, a bigger crowd? Running a workshop? Teaching a class? It’s up to you, but the trick is to get that 1st win and reward your aligned values for a job well done - no matter how wonderful or messy the result - you did it, and you’ll do it again…BECAUSE it’s super important to you.
If you want to take this exercise to the big next level….attaching the positive beliefs you have about your aspired values will truly amplify your efforts.
A good belief prompt is: Why is it important that I fully embrace vulnerability in my life? What does it buy me?
For example: “I believe that when we fully embrace vulnerability, we’re open to the experiences in life that truly matter.”
If you want help uncovering your guiding superpower values or dig much deeper on these beliefs to create a personal mission, join me and a community of other changemakers in the Free Impact Clarity course.
To really big things,
Melissa