Hey friends,
I recently had a conversation with
Ben Hardy, author of the book
Personality isn’t Permanent. He’s a psychologist who teaches and writes about self-improvement, willpower and other fun stuff.
During the conversation (you can see the live replay
here), we discussed the idea of
goals.
Honestly, I’m not sure how to feel about goals. In the past, I’ve been very anti-goal-setting. I felt that if we set firm goals, (a) we’re in a constant state of dissatisfaction until we hit them, and (b) once we hit them, we feel good for a few seconds, and then we move onto the next goal.
During the conversation however, Ben went some way towards helping me change the way I think about goals. One phrase in particular stood out to me -
Measure the Gain, not the Gap.
Ben argued that it’s totally fine to have a goal. If we consistently measure ourselves against that goal (the “gap” between where we are, and where we want to be) then sure, that’s generally a recipe for disappointment.
But if instead, we measure the “gain” (how far we’ve come relative to our past selves), we can feel good about our progress while continuing to make more of it.
It’s a simple shift in mindset that I’ve found myself thinking a lot about over these past few weeks.
I still don’t 100% buy the idea of goal-setting, but I’m working through Ben’s (100% free) 30-day
Future Self programme and I’m finding my mind slowly beginning to change. You can check it out on
his website if you’d like.
Have a great week!
Ali
PS: Final call to join the ‘Teach What You Know’ online summit (22-24th Sept) where I’ll be giving a talk about entrepreneurship, content creation and productivity, amongst 40 other workshops.
Check it out and get your tickets here.
