{"id":42501,"date":"2018-08-14T04:45:47","date_gmt":"2018-08-14T09:45:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/michaelhyatt.com\/?p=42501"},"modified":"2018-08-14T04:45:47","modified_gmt":"2018-08-14T09:45:47","slug":"when-goals-dont-cut-it-focus-on-obstacles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fullfocus.co\/when-goals-dont-cut-it-focus-on-obstacles\/","title":{"rendered":"When Goals Don\u2019t Cut It, Focus on Obstacles"},"content":{"rendered":"

Emily wanted to work in marketing. She was young and had no experience. She\u2019d skipped college and used a portfolio of work and a Praxis apprenticeship<\/a> to win a spot on the Customer Success team of a growing startup. But her goal was still marketing.<\/p>\n

She aimed right at it and started asking people in the marketing department questions how she might join their team. They were busy and it didn\u2019t seem to be working. So she stopped, stepped back, and asked \u201cWho?\u201d instead of \u201cHow?\u201d Who would she need to be to get hired in marketing?<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not how to get there, it\u2019s who is capable<\/h3>\n

She\u2019d need to be someone that didn\u2019t cost them time with questions and requests, but someone who saved them time. She\u2019d need to be someone who demonstrated ability in marketing. She\u2019d need to be someone easy to say yes to and hard to deny an opportunity. When she saw the marketing team looking at bringing on an intern, she volunteered to take on marketing intern tasks in addition to her CS role for no extra pay. She made their life easier. She learned some marketing skills. She became the kind of person they wanted. Not long after, she moved into marketing full-time.<\/p>\n

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Sometimes goals are a distraction. The big shiny end blinds us to the means necessary to get there. It doesn\u2019t just obscure the path, it obscures who we need to become in order to walk it. Emily didn\u2019t need to know how<\/strong> to work in marketing, but who<\/strong> can work in marketing.<\/p>\n

Could you handle your goal?<\/h3>\n

If you imagine a goal, say a certain net worth, it\u2019s not enough to plot a path to it. Such paths rarely work out the way you planned anyway. Instead, ask what kind of person you\u2019d have to be to be capable and worthy of the goal.<\/p>\n

A high net worth requires some qualities you probably don\u2019t currently have. If you struggle managing finances now, for example, it will only get worse with more money. Become the kind of person who can handle it. Faithful in little leads to faithful in much. If you have a hard time saying no to people now, imagine dealing with all the askers and hangers-on you\u2019ll have to deal with if you\u2019re wealthy?<\/p>\n

If you don\u2019t start working on growing into someone capable of handling the goal, you won\u2019t reach it.<\/p>\n

Even vague goals have specific requirements<\/h3>\n

I tend to keep my end goals vague. But when I have one, I work backward to tease out what obstacles stand between where I am now and that goal, and what kind of person would I have to be to overcome those obstacles.<\/p>\n

A few years into my career, I developed a vague goal of entrepreneurship. I knew I wanted to launch a vision, rally the best people around it, and build something that didn\u2019t exist before. That was about as concrete as the goal got. I didn\u2019t know what or how or when. I thought about creating something new and leading a team to execute and asked what would stand in the way of success. What obstacles existed between here and there?<\/p>\n\t\t