SUMMER REPLAY: 4 Tactics for Building Goal Momentum

Episode Transcript

[00:00:00] Marissa: If you found us recently, welcome. We’re so excited that you’re here, and we’ve got some good news. So summer is the perfect time to actually go backwards.

[00:00:15] Joel: Like hit rewind. We are playing, that is to say we are replaying some of our favorite episodes while we are on hiatus. So think of this maybe as like the starter kit for you.

[00:00:28] Marissa: Yeah. And the truth is that you don’t have to start at any specific point. We try to create all of our episodes as really standalone episodes. This next one that you’re about to hear is gonna be perfect no matter if this is your first Focus on This episode or maybe your 25th.

[00:00:45] Joel: We’re glad you’re here, and we hope you stay for the replay.

[00:00:48] We’ll see you soon

[00:00:54] Blake: Happy Monday, Verbs and Courtney

[00:00:57] Joel: Happy Monday to you, my

[00:00:58] Courtney: friend Yeah, happy Monday

[00:01:01] Blake: It’s a new year, guys. How’s it going so far?

[00:01:03] Courtney: It’s good over here. I have, um, the, at the end of 2021 did Best Year Ever. A shout out to any of our people that joined us live for that. It was so much fun. Every year, I love kinda the reset of getting all my goals in place, kinda dreaming what those are gonna be.

[00:01:25] I don’t

[00:01:26] Blake: know, do either of you- Oh, wait, time out, time out, time out, time out. Am I correct in understanding that Courtney Baker didn’t have all her goals in place until- … December 30th, 2021? Yes. I- The Courtney Baker I know, it’s like, it’s like the person that puts up their Christmas decorations in September with your 20- No.

[00:01:43] with your new year goal setting

[00:01:45] Verbs: Right after- No … Thanksgiving dinner, she’s,

[00:01:48] Blake: she’s in there- Right after Thanksgiving dinner … framing up those goals … like, “All right, guys, no naps. Let’s do this.”

[00:01:51] Courtney: No. The truth is, I actually have, kind of have to get in the mindset to even kinda think through what I want those to be.

[00:02:01] Sometimes I get stuck where I’m like, “What, what do I, what…” I have to s- get creative about, like, what is exciting to me for the next year.

[00:02:09] Blake: Hmm.

[00:02:09] Courtney: Actually, Blake, I don’t know if you knew this, but Verbs and I, well, actually, I’m sure you listened to the episode, did a podcast episode with Megan and Michael, um, about…

[00:02:20] Ho- honestly, we, we kinda talked about how important it was to kinda process the last year. Hmm. And Verbs and I both shared about it was a really rough year, and I feel like I have to kinda go through that proc- I know you’re probably shocked right now. Uh, Blake, I kind of feel like I have to go through that process before I can really put, like, pen to paper with my goals for the next year.

[00:02:45] Blake: Sometimes those Enneagram threes need help getting in their feelings. I understand.

[00:02:50] Courtney: And honestly, Best Year Ever really helps me do that.

[00:02:54] Blake: Yeah. The, that’s, it’s critical to not just rush, I think, into the year without really connecting to the why, the, the reasons, the, just where you’re at personally even- Right

[00:03:07] I think. If you try to rush into that- Um, it can not work out so well about, uh, about now-ish, you know? Yeah. Halfway through the first month of the year.

[00:03:17] Verbs: Yeah, I’ll say, um, and I think it’s okay because with everything, you know, 2022 kicking off, I mean, even for myself, like, I feel like I haven’t officially kicked off this year.

[00:03:27] Uh, you may hear a little bit of congestion in my voice. So, um, I was telling, uh, uh, Blake and Courtney when we first got on that, uh, just kinda getting over the flu, which led into a bout with dehydration and a concussion shortly after that. So I have thought very little about finishing up my goal framework, uh, for this year, even though I have some ideas in my head.

[00:03:49] I’ve just been trying to get my head together before, uh, before I really, really dig in. But yeah, and I think it’s okay again ’cause a lot of stuff has happened the last two years that we need to process to make sure that we’re going into 2022 with the right perspective, and not just zooming right in and not allowing things to settle emotionally or mentally or physically.

[00:04:07] Blake: We’re halfway through the first month, and maybe you set a resolution or you set a goal and you’ve already, you know, not batted 1,000. You’ve already felt like, “Oh my gosh, how am I gonna do this new habit for three months when I can’t even do it, uh, for two weeks?” Or- Mm-hmm … maybe you, like Vurbs or, or others, you may have noticed this, a, a few people have gotten sick recently.

[00:04:30] Uh- Mm … maybe the year health-wise just hasn’t been off to the races the way you wanted it to. This episode is for you because we’ve got four tactics that are gonna allow you to build the momentum at a good pace and allow you to build some confidence as you move through this first quarter with your exciting goals.

[00:04:55] Verbs: Welcome to another episode of Focus on This, the most productive podcast on the internet, so you can banish distractions, get the right stuff done, and finally start loving Mondays. I’m Verbs, here with Courtney Baker and Blake Stratton. Guys, I think we can get into it, um, as far as talking about these four tactics to gain momentum, and even really just how to come out of the gate, I think, for 2022.

[00:05:20] I’m sure these tactics will be applicable to that as well.

[00:05:23] Courtney: So the first tactic is to create visibility. You know, the number one reason people fail to achieve their goals is because they just lose sight of it. You know, it’s, it’s really a problem of visibility. So that’s the first thing that, you know, if you find yourself kinda lacking some momentum, is to find a way to get visibility.

[00:05:46] You know, this is really the cornerstone for goal achievement. In the same way that memorization happens through repetition, you know, goal visibility happens by returning to your goals over and over and over again. Um, and obviously with the Full Focus Planner, you know, that’s really built into the system.

[00:06:08] That’s one of the main reasons the system works so well. Um, I’m curious from you two, like, what are the number one ways that you work in goal visibility into your routine?

[00:06:22] Blake: So I’m guilty of underestimating this point.

[00:06:25] Verbs: Blake, I was just gonna say that I think- I

[00:06:28] Blake: was just gonna say I underestimate this one pretty good You were just gonna say, “I’m guilty of underestimating this point”?

[00:06:31] Verbs: Absolutely.

[00:06:31] Blake: Blake, why can’t you be better? I think if I, I take a lot of time to think through, you know, what I want. I’ll write it down. Like great, I wrote it down. But then I’m like, I know it. Like, looking at it, having it visible, it’s not like I don’t know what my goal is anymore, and so I don’t typically do that.

[00:06:49] Or sometimes, you know, it’ll be written down even just digitally somewhere or just in the front of the planner from the first quarter, you know?

[00:06:57] Joel: Mm-hmm.

[00:06:57] Blake: And last year, I actually had a really incredible year in 2021, and I had the fewest number of goals I’ve ever set, and there was one that was kinda paramount.

[00:07:10] And I went old school, and I took the person’s advice. I wrote it down on a three by five card, and I literally carried it with me in my pocket-

[00:07:21] Joel: Mm-hmm …

[00:07:22] Blake: everywhere. And it wasn’t even just the visibility, it was even the tangibility. Is that a word, tangibility? Yeah. And I would, you know, reach in, you know, for my keys or my phone, and like that card’s there.

[00:07:34] One time, my wife was doing laundry and she’s like, “What’s this?” And I was like, “No, I’m, no, I’m not a nerd.” You know, and, uh, it was a little embarrassing. But I actually achi- I actually achieved that goal, and I’d never thought that I would. I, I, I, I mean, I shouldn’t say I never thought I would, but it was like I didn’t…

[00:07:53] When I wrote it down, I was like, “I’ve got no idea how this is gonna happen.” And so, and now I’m all in. Visibility, I’m like, yes. Just like put it in your planner, put it on a sticky, put, write it on your forehead, uh- Yeah … put it in a card. But it does, th- sort of like this, your brain’s always working subconsciously, and I think that’s the part that we underestimate is that, like, just the visibility of something, it’s like you’re taking it in and your brain’s working on it.

[00:08:19] Verbs: And it’s funny ’cause this, this one is, lends to the most creativity to make sure… I mean, with everything that we have available to us technology-wise, I mean, you can make a desktop image of your goals. You can crochet your goals and hang them on the wall in your, in your hallway. I mean, there’s, there’s things you can do to actually, you know, really stick this tactic, you know, outside of what we work into the system with, uh, at least outlining those in either your morning or your workday shutdown or your startup ritual, whatever part of the day, just making that a normal, uh, a review process so you can keep those front of mind.

[00:08:52] But man, just with the amount of creativity that we have available to us now, it’s like, man, this could go so many different ways. You can have it on your phone, you know. You can, it can, it could be your alarm, you know, your wake-up alarm, just a rundown audibly of, of your goals or your top three that you may be working on for that quarter.

[00:09:08] So this is, this is a good one. Like I said, I underestimate it all the time, and so I’m looking forward in 2022 just using some of that creativity so I can keep in front of mind

[00:09:16] Courtney: I, I will say, just to hit these again, if you aren’t doing this, obviously it’s built into your weekly preview process, like you should be, um, reviewing your goals then.

[00:09:26] But again, you know, looking at your different rituals and determining where that could fall is, is a r- a really great automation in your day to, to look at your goals. Uh, the thing I’ve been doing lately, this is a really simple hack, but I, I, it’s new, so I, I can’t quite declare it successful. But with my planner, I usually leave it open to, uh, the day page throughout the day.

[00:09:51] Joel: Mm-hmm.

[00:09:51] Courtney: And so, um, right now I’m using a standard planner, so I have those two ribbons, but I’m actually trying to flip back and leave it open to the goal page, uh, throughout the day rather than just really that like subliminal, like, “Oh yeah, these are the things I’m committed to moving toward.” Um, it just, again, it’s just a little bit of extra visibility, um, that I’m testing out.

[00:10:14] So I think all this is a really good discussion. As you’re listening to this, you know, think through, you know, how have I created visibility for my goals? And then where are some ways that I can improve on making sure that they’re visible for me each and every day?

[00:10:36] Blake: All right, tactic number two, connect to your why. Your why, the reason that you’re setting this goal. Gail Hyatt, the legendary wife of Michael Hyatt, she says it this way: “People lose their way when they lose their why.” And this, I like this one because you gotta scuba dive sometimes to get there. You gotta go deep.

[00:11:02] It really exposes those goals that I call should goals, the things that sound nice, or this is what I think I ought to do, or this is an incremental increase on what I did last year. But really thinking about what’s driving this for me? Why am I motivated to do this? If this didn’t happen, is it really that big of a deal?

[00:11:23] The deeper you can go, the more colorful or, or multi-dimensional with this why that you get, the stronger your connection is to that goal. And that- Mm … that connection’s really important, right? Because as we all know, when you start going after a goal, you’re, it’s like hacking through a, a, you know, a, a forest or a, you know, a swampy area where it’s, there’s no path for you yet.

[00:11:50] You’ve never gone there before. And if you don’t have a strong why, it, it’s gonna be easy to just toss your hands up and go, “You know what? I’m just gonna go back to the old way that I used to do things.” So Courtney, tell us your deepest why.

[00:12:04] Courtney: I know that you’re joking around about this, but I actually, I think there is something to this because when you go through your goal detail page, you know, and it asks you to write and rank your key motivations, I think there is a tendency, or, and maybe this is just me, I’ll be curious to hear what you two think, but to kinda, like, list these at the surface level, and not to actually dig down, like, to ask w- why that’s a key motivation.

[00:12:34] I, I just, I find within myself sometimes what I list out of the gate is, like… I, and maybe I’m probably moving too fast to just check off the next thing. But usually there’s, like, a reason deeper and deeper, and sometimes, sometimes those whys are not always that comfortable. You know? Mm. Like, uh, let me give you an example.

[00:12:54] This quarter I have a goal to eat vegetarian, and I’m really excited about this goal because my key motivation is actually really to test how I feel at the end of 30 days, and it doesn’t have anything to do with actually, like, losing weight or, you know, those kinda things. But in the past I’ve had these, like, health goals when, when I really dig down into it, it’s like, oh, because I wanna look a certain way, or I wanna be perceived a certain way, which, you know, I, kinda then, like, starts to s- sit, sit with me in a weird way.

[00:13:28] Like, oh, is that, is that actually what I’m, I’m pursuing here? And is that actually a strong enough motivation? Like, should this even be the thing I’m focused on? And so I think, I think this is really, really important as we get throughout the year-

[00:13:44] Marissa: Mm-hmm …

[00:13:45] Courtney: that what’s at the core is, like… It, it’s really, like, who we are, who we want to be, and, and i- are we pursuing the right things?

[00:13:55] Like, do you like that? I went a little deep there, guys. I feel like I should get some credit. I’m proud

[00:13:58] Blake: of you. I’m proud

[00:13:59] Verbs: of you. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Let’s, let’s marinate in it for a moment

[00:14:04] I mean, ’cause I think it goes back to what we talked about at the beginning of just the importance of processing the year just so you can get in the right head space to even have what you just mentioned, Courtney, that conversation of- Mm-hmm … hey, some of these key motivations, if they’re real and genuine and authentic, then I may, they may be uncomfortable.

[00:14:22] And so- Mm-hmm … it’s either sit with those things or, like you said, kind of flippantly go through that, that part of the process of let me just attach this key motivation ’cause so I can frame the goal and it’s done and I can get on, get on my way. Um, but I think that is, I mean, that’s part of it. That’s, it’s, it’s, it’s part of the process is what is really my key motivation ’cause if it’s not really anchored down into something, then it’s gonna become that goal that you end up just scooting to the side because you lost, uh, you lost interest in it or it just- Mm-hmm

[00:14:52] you know, that initial kind of, um, shiny feeling that you had when you wrote it down has just dissipated.

[00:14:59] Blake: The other reason connecting to your why matters is it protects against this pass-fail, I’m doing good if I’m checking the boxes, I’m doing bad if I’m not checking the boxes mentality. Mm-hmm. Yep. People sometimes get to the end of the year, they feel sad that they missed their goal and I go, “Well, why did you want to hit that goal?”

[00:15:18] It’s like, well, because I wanted to… You know, like let’s say it’s a, um, yeah, I mean you mentioned like a health goal. Okay, so, oh, well, you know, I wanted to really, you know, eat this certain way or be at this certain weight or, or exercise, you know, f- five days a week and, and I totally, I never really did it 100%.

[00:15:37] And it’s like, well, why did you want to do that? Because I wanted to have more energy, sleep better and ha- you know, have the energy to play with my kids and, uh, just feel better. And it’s like, okay, do you feel better than you did last year? Oh yeah. Right? It’s like, it, it’s one of those things where connecting to your why allows you to retain your mastery, I think, over the goal pursuit rather than feeling like you’re f- you know, failing when times get tough.

[00:16:08] Joel: Right.

[00:16:08] Blake: And that I think is a huge thing for the long game of, of goal achievement. It’s not just, the longer I do this stuff the, the less I’m thinking quarter to quarter, year to year. I’m just thinking, all right- Right … what’s the long game here? And I can’t afford- That’s good … to sort of have this pass-fail mentality.

[00:16:24] The more I connect to my why, the more it connects back to what Courtney mentioned, stuff about my identity and is that developing? Yeah. Am I becoming who I want to become? Because the goal is just there to help me do that, you know? It’s, it’s more about that than it is, more about the why really than it is about the number or the, the checked off box at the end of the quarter.

[00:17:00] All right, so the first tactic was create visibility, right? Write it on, on your forehead, write it wherever you need to. Get, get, you know, put it on your wall- wallpaper. The second tactic is connect to your why. And what about tactic three? Phurbs, you wanna tackle that one?

[00:17:18] Verbs: Tactic number three is take smaller steps.

[00:17:21] Take smaller steps. One of the reasons we set goals really to begin with is to do something that we’re currently not doing, and I feel like I’ve heard Michael say this more, uh, during this last round of, of the Best Year Ever life teaching is, what am I not doing currently that I wanna f- shape and form into a goal versus just continue to extend things that I wanna do better at or in addition to, or just kinda add a layer of on top of something that I’m already, that I already got going?

[00:17:51] But sometimes when we do, the hard part is actually getting started out of the gate. I do have a sh- a short example that I wanna share. I don’t know if you guys remember last year, uh, I was about to go on sabbatical, and one of the things that I had as a goal was to, uh, start DJing. So I bought a whole setup.

[00:18:10] I was excited about it. I kinda knew the basics of, you know, how to get started, but the whole goal was just create like a DJ set that’s pretty much, you know, it’s a, it’s a vibe session What I failed to, uh, calculate was, you know, the last time I had, had did- done something like that, I mean, this is back in the CD era, so you can only play music that you actually physically had.

[00:18:32] Now the universe is filled with music and there’s so much stuff that you could comb through that was just… It came down to just finding songs that I’d actually wanna play into this, in this set that became overwhelming, ’cause literally everything is at your fingertips when- Mm-hmm … you know, selecting what song you would put into a mix somewhere.

[00:18:49] And so I had to kinda dial myself back ’cause I w- I went into it like, oh man, you know, I have records, I got CDs still, I have access to all these streaming pro- platforms, so it’s like you can pull from anywhere. But I had to dial it back to just, well, let me figure out how to actually just mix, the technique of mixing.

[00:19:08] Let me do that first and then work my way into it, and then start to kinda get into building the set song by song and, you know, figure out what goes well with what. But it was a little bit of a… It was… ‘Cause I knew I only had, like, 30 days to really dig into it, ’cause I had time to do it at that point, so it was a little bit of a setback, but I realized, okay, really I just gotta chunk this down a little bit, uh, to really get going on it, otherwise I’ll just get stuck of, stuck in scrolling through Spotify and Apple Music, you know, looking for stuff.

[00:19:36] Mm-hmm.

[00:19:36] Courtney: I think this is really important, and I think as you do your goal detail page, like figuring out those next steps and really figuring out, like, what’s the easiest one, I, I think sometimes our energy for our goals makes it, you know, w- where you get… You wanna do the big part of it. But, like, first it’s just that really easy next step.

[00:19:59] And as you go le- I’ll give you another example. I’ve got all my goals just, like, fresh for the taking right here, that I, I wanna work with a spiritual director, like, once a month throughout this year, and my next step is to text a friend to find out spiritual directors that she would recommend to me.

[00:20:18] That’s the next step. Uh, and, and each week, honestly, when I’m looking at my goal details, I’m just thinking, like, okay, what’s the next step now? Well, I need to text these people. These are really easy things, but, like- Mm-hmm … ultimately they get me to, you know, the outcome in a way that’s not overwhelming at all.

[00:20:36] You know, it’s very achievable to do.

[00:20:39] Blake: Yeah, this is another thing. It, it- when we create the goals, we get connect to the outcome emotionally. You know, just like we talked about your motivations. Oh, well, because when I’m there, when I’ve arrived, and so you want to get there. You’re ready right now to get there.

[00:20:53] But like that first tactic, don’t underestimate the power of the small step, the power of just building momentum. There’s really no step too small. Uh, you want to build confidence because as we’ll talk about next, achieving goals ultimately is gonna be outside of your comfort zone. So when you’re first getting going, especially if you need to build some momentum, stick to s- what’s the simplest, smallest thing that’s gonna be in the right direction?

[00:21:20] It may feel too easy. That’s actually a good thing, not a bad thing when you’re first getting going

[00:21:30] So as I alluded to, tactic four, we’re gonna go from those easy small steps, and now we’re gonna talk about leveraging risk. That’s the fourth tactic, leverage risk. So as I mentioned, goals ought to be outside of your comfort zone. That’s where all the good, exciting growth and exploration in life can happen.

[00:21:53] The best things in life are happening outside of that normal, mundane, predictable, you know, routine things that you’re doing. So if you want to build some momentum, you know, after you’ve gotten started, you figure out some simple next steps, you may wanna try asking yourself, what is that thing or, or an action I could take that would be outside my comfort zone?

[00:22:16] You know, what, what could I do that maybe… You know, I would phrase it like this If I were the kind of person that had already crushed this goal, what action would I take right now? ‘Cause that’s ultimately what you’re doing. You’re becoming the type of person that… Let’s just say I wanted to grow my sales by 100% this year.

[00:22:39] It’s like a really big goal. Well-

[00:22:42] Verbs: Right …

[00:22:42] Blake: how does that person carry themselves? How does that person think? Get into that head space of, of that person, you know, your future self, your future identity that’s already crushed the goal. And then ask yourself, “Okay, what types of actions does that person take?”

[00:22:57] And that may spark your imagination about, uh, a r- you know, seemingly, I use in quotes, “risky” step that you could take next. What are some things you guys have done, i- if you can remember, that maybe it was last year or in previous goals, or maybe even this year so far, but where you felt like, uh, I kinda have to swing big at this point, or this one’s gonna feel-

[00:23:22] this one feels a little uncomfortable. Or ha- or was it always just those small incremental comfort level steps?

[00:23:28] Courtney: I recently shared this, this story of I started… I have a Peloton, and, um, I started cycling with a group. And at the, the goal, the number of rides per week that we were doing and the expectation for the other riders was very much outside of my comfort zone.

[00:23:50] I literally every week dreaded sharing my results ’cause I just… These people were legit and I was not. I was a beginner. Um, but I think, I think that kinda gets to this point, which is like, it was outside of my comfort zone. But by doing it, like now a year later, you know, four or five challenges in the future, you know, I, with the same group, I’ve got the results because I was willing to go into, like, that uncomfortable place.

[00:24:23] Mm-hmm. You know? Yeah. Um, and I don’t think that would’ve… I don’t think the same outcome would’ve been true if I wouldn’t have.

[00:24:30] Verbs: Yeah.

[00:24:30] Blake: Mm-hmm. I feel well acquainted with one kind of risk, and it’s because every day I’m on phone calls with people that have these big goals for their businesses, and they’ve hit a point where they feel like, “I don’t, I don’t know what the next step is,” or, “I don’t even know if I can do the next step.”

[00:24:51] And that, you know, we sell coaching services for small business owners to, to help them grow and scale their business. And so I’m there going, “All right, like, this is what the investment is,” you know? And, and for them, a lot of them have never invested in themselves at all, much less, you know, invested in sort of premium level coaching.

[00:25:14] And so… A- and I know for me, that’s always been the scary thing is like, am I gonna try this, to do this by myself, or am I gonna take the risk and make a financial investment to try to get there faster? And I did that last year a coup- with a couple different, you know, coach/advisors, and that made a huge difference.

[00:25:33] But, like, I feel I’m in conversations all the time where people are like, they feel like it’s this, this big risk. And I, I guess my thought around risk is, um, it is where s- where the excitement is, where the juice is. Yeah. And usually a couple of thing- obviously you don’t wanna leverage, you know, things that you can’t, like, you truly just could not afford, you know, like putting yourself in or your family in danger.

[00:25:58] We’re not talking about that. But we’re just talking about outside the comfort zone. And the reality is either it’s gonna pay off or you’re gonna learn a lot, and either way, you get to grow. Either way, you get to take a pretty big step in the right direction of personal growth. So that’s my thought on that fourth tactic, leveraging risk.

[00:26:17] So let’s put it in some context of maybe an example of a goal. Let’s say you wanted to run a marathon this year. I wanna run a marathon by December 1st, 2022. Now, I think that’s insanity. Uh, I’m not a runner, but, uh no, but it’s a fine goal. It’s an exciting goal. You’re, you’re excited. You got a, you got your why and all that stuff.

[00:26:40] And maybe you’ve e- you’ve even went on Zappos and you got yourself some great running shoes. But you find yourself struggling to build some momentum with the actual steps to get there because you’ve never done this before. You’ve, you’ve… It’s just not a, a normal part of how you saw yourself in 2021, was a mar- you weren’t a marathoner.

[00:27:00] You don’t identify as a marathoner. One way you can leverage risk, you know, is to put yourself outside of your comfort zone. But I, I guess I would think of it less as, uh, what, what really scares me and more of like, if I knew that I w- I was totally gonna succeed at this, you know, how would I, uh, basically make this a, a done deal?

[00:27:21] And, and you think, “You know what? I, I would maybe join a running group.” But you feel pretty scared about that because what if everyone’s better than me? What if I can’t keep up with the group, and then I feel embarrassed- Mm-hmm … and then I wanna give up? And you might be s- wrestling with those types of emotional things.

[00:27:37] A, a lot of times the risk we feel is emotional. Uh, uh, is, is those are the stakes. So what I would recommend is to w- when you identify those things, go back to, you know, kind of imagining yourself at the f- at the finish line, literally in this case. Imagining yourself as, “Oh, no, I am a marathoner. I, I know, like, this is where I’m going.”

[00:28:00] And just kind of put yourself in the head space of, of the person that’s already achieved it, and it’s like, “Well, what would that person do? Oh, that person of course would join a running group. They wouldn’t be afraid.” Yeah. And so I’m, it may feel uncomfortable for me, ’cause I don’t feel like that person yet, but I’m going to take that action step despite it feeling risky.

[00:28:18] Verbs: Yeah, and I think it’s important to say, I mean, the risk is already baked into the goal itself, ’cause you’ve said it. If you use the framework, it’s risky for you. It’s just really getting it to the start of it to get that momentum that you need to, to get into those next steps.

[00:28:33] So the good news is you don’t have to lose momentum toward achieving your goals. You can gain and maintain the momentum you need by creating visibility, connecting with your why, taking smaller steps, and leveraging risk. Blake, Courtney, any, uh, final thoughts for our Focus On This listeners?

[00:28:51] Courtney: I, I know I hit on this at the very beginning of the episode, um, Verbs, when we were talking about you, but, um, I just, for everybody listening, like if you’re like, “You know what?

[00:29:00] I’m already behind. I didn’t even set goals. Things were crazy at the end of the year, you know, yada, yada,” like it is not too late. Like, I know culturally we say like, “You gotta have this done by January 1.” That’s not really true. Um, it’s not, not really true. It’s just not true. Um, and so I would really encourage you, if you haven’t taken the time, um, to, to, to document your goals for this year, to put them in your Full Focus Planner, I highly recommend that.

[00:29:28] Um, I even, I honestly, I’ve said this before, I really don’t understand how people use the, the Full Focus Planner without our course, uh, Your Best Year Ever. Uh, so there’s certainly the opportunity to go through that course and get your planner set up well for this coming year. And if I was a really good chief marketing officer, I would tell you the URL.

[00:29:51] Um, and that would be uh- courtneybaker.com/cashmoney

[00:30:00] uh, bestyearever.me, uh, if you want to take that course. I’m double-checking that right now.

[00:30:08] Verbs: Thanks for joining us on Focus on This. This is the most productive podcast on the internet, so please share it with your friends. Don’t forget to join our Full Focus Planner community right there on Facebook, and we’ll be here next week with another great episode.

[00:30:21] But until then, stay focused

[00:30:24] Courtney: Stay focused. Stay focused

[00:30:28] I almost forgot, guys.

[00:30:34] Three million episodes later

[00:30:38] Blake: All right, tactic two: connect to your why. So you may have heard us say this. There’s a phrase we pass around here that originally came from Gail Hyatt, legendary, uh, bride of Michael Hyatt. She says, “People lose their why when they lose their why.” That doesn’t make any sense, Gail, is what I tell her.

[00:31:01] And then she slaps me across the face and she says, “Say it again, son.” And I go, “Okay.” Um, no, I misquoted her. Um-

[00:31:11] Verbs: Say it again, son.

[00:31:14] Courtney: I, I think we should forever change this to be, it comes from Blake Stratton. People lose their why when they lose their why. And that is still true. It’s still- Spot

[00:31:24] Blake: the lie. Spot the lie.

[00:31:27] Okay?