One of the many things we do as coaches is to support people in setting and achieving goals. We find that many people have been encouraged to do this but have often been set up to fall short or not given all the information they need to succeed and then they become discouraged. There are many elements of goal achievement that people may be unware of. The result is that they approach their goals in the same way over and over with similar results. If they don’t achieve the kind of results they are looking for, they become discouraged and either stop setting goals or dread the process.
Here is one element of goal achievement that can dramatically increase the odds of achieving your goals.
Let me start by suggesting that when a lot of us learned to set goals we put a lot of weight on the fact that we would have the willpower or discipline to stay focused to achieve our goals. We may even have personal evidence that willpower has worked for us in achieving some of the goals we have been successful with in our lives. We may also have some evidence of times when it didn’t. Willpower works when you are strong and when it is on. If you don’t want to eat any cookies and your willpower is fully engaged for 23 hours and 45 minutes, you can eat a lot of cookies in 15 minutes.
Willpower is important but here is an idea that you can employ to increase the odds of achieving the goals you set.
You may have heard the concept that we are a product of our environment. That makes sense. We are clearly impacted positively and negatively by the environments that we are in. The awareness that can make a difference is that although we are a product of our environments, our environments are a product of us.
In the Extraordinary Leader Program we show people nine environments that will have an effect on our lives and the attainment of our goals. Our environments can work for us or work against us and we help people to see the opportunity to set them up in a way to support the outcomes they are looking for.
The nine environments that we talk about are memetic, physical, relationships, network, spiritual, body, nature and self.
We start with the Memetic Environment because how we see the other eight environments is impacted by this environment. This environment is made of the beliefs, ideas, knowledge, cultural norms, and frameworks that we have been exposed to. It is possible to change our memetic environment by exposing ourselves to ideas and knowledge that is different than what we have held on to or known to this point in our lives. When we read, when we join classes, when we get a mentor or coach, when we expose ourselves to new ideas and new perspective we can see the world and the environments that we experience in a new way. The ideas and knowledge you expose yourself to can move you toward your goal.
Physical Environment: Your home, your car, your office, your furnishings, your artwork, or your technology are all parts of your physical environment. Whether you know it or not these things can all be enhancing you or working against you. They can either give you energy and focus or take them away. Does your home, your neighborhood, your city energize you. If not how could it? Is your home, your car and your office organized and working for you or against you? If things like your technology are not set up to support you or working properly, how much is that impacting you negatively? Set up your physical environment to work for you.
Relationship Environment: Your family, your friends, your colleagues, and the people you choose to put into your life are all part of an environment that can be working for you or against you. Some people will support you in moving toward your goals and some people will work against you. You may not always have control of who is in your life but you can decide how you will let them impact you and how you will choose people who will enhance it.
Network Environment: Beyond the close personal relationships we experience it is possible to create a network of people who can impact your life. They can come from all over the world, they can come from different interests, they can be part of your organization, your industry, your community, your church, your sports affiliations. Wherever they come from, be conscious of how they are impacting you. Are they moving you toward or away from your goals?
Spiritual Environment: Being connected to a higher power of your choice or an environment that gives you peace and calm and one that restores you is an important environment.
Financial Environment: Our financial environment is one that has a big impact on what we can do and the freedom of our time. When we earn and manage our money well, when we have safety nets like savings, insurance, or investments, we have more freedom to focus on the achievement of our goals.
Body Environment: We all have a physical body. We can’t control the genetics that gave us the body, but
we can control how we treat it. The health, the strength, the energy, and the endurance of our body has an impact on the goals that we set for ourselves.
Nature Environment: The time we spend in nature has a way of calming, restoring and teaching us. The beauty of nature, the cycles of nature, the movement of water, the warmth of the sun and the miracle of watching plants, and animals seemingly effortlessly doing what they were meant to do, can support us in doing and being what we are meant to do and be. How can you design your nature environment to support you?
Self Environment: Self environment is made up of your personality, your gifts, strengths, talents, and your emotions. Taking some time to be aware of how these things can move you toward your goals is a worthy endeavor.
What do you think it would be like if you set up your nine environments in a way that would support whatever goal you are working on? What would it be like if you delegated much of your effort in goal achievement to your environments?
.jpg?n=7956 "Kevin")
Kevin MacDonald and Shelley MacDougall are the coaches for CMAA. If you would like a copy of the poem “A Friend” that Hugh Alexander Campbell wrote, please e-mail kmacdonald@dccnet.com