The Key To Feeling ACCOMPLISHED When Setting Goals

Today's episode is all about focusing on PROCESS-driven results, rather than OUTCOME-driven results when setting goals.
Have you ever been working to a goal and then you get there and think "this is it?" That's because you were way too focused on a specific outcome, rather than the journey you took and person you became in order to get to that outcome. This is what today's episode is all about!
Also mentioned in this episode...
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Transcript

0:40

Hello. Hello. Welcome to another episode of the podcast. I hope you've been loving these episodes ever since we switched over to Rise and Energize Pod. I really hope that you've been enjoying the energy and the motivation mindset focus of these episodes. If you have, could you just shoot me a little DM on Instagram? It's rise dot and dot energize dot pod Rise and Energize Pod. Pretty easy to find. But please shoot me a little DM and let me know that you've been enjoying these episodes. I like to know if you're jiving with what I'm talking about or not. If it's putting a little boost, you know, a little pep in your step to get things done. I would love to hear from you if you're enjoying these episodes or if there's something that has been sparked recently in one of my episodes that you've been like, oh, I'd really like her to touch more on that. Or talk more about this thing that I'm going through or that I'm experiencing and kind of need some guidance on. I'd really love to hear that. Recently one of my friends was telling me of a podcast idea she had, and I'm really excited to think about how I can incorporate it in the future for these kind of 20 minute mindset sessions that we are having. So please shoot me a DM if you're enjoying these. Would super appreciate it. Today's episode I'm really excited about because I think that this is something that is on my heart pretty often, and I have to make this shift really often where I'm so focused on getting a specific outcome that I kind of ignore the journey or the process or the progress along the way. If that outcome does or doesn't happen, it can kind of. It can be a disservice to us to think about it this way and for many reasons. So I'm excited to get into that. Before I get into that, I do wanna remind you if you were listening to Fill Your Cups podcast before I rebranded into Rise and Energize, I do wanna remind you that. We used to have our Bonus Book Club episodes on that podcast, but we have kind of separated those now. So Shared Shelves Book Club is the podcast where you can now find our monthly book club podcast episodes and potentially some other bonus episodes in between there as well. And we just launched the first episode of that podcast. So if you're a person who is logging on or clicking on the links. To this podcast because you want a mindset shift, some kind of mental space, some time, kind of boost for your day, whatever it is that you're logging on or clicking on this title for. I'm really happy you're here, but if you also happen to read for fun or you know, good reads is one of your goals that you track something like that. That Book Club podcast is so fun. It's called Shared Shelves, and we just did an episode on the Academy by Ellen Hildebrand, who's a very popular author. So if you've read that book and wanna kind of hear about some of our thoughts on it and what. Our group, our in-person book club took from it. That is kind of a virtual book club opportunity for anybody to participate in, and we really love seeing when people drop YouTube comments and tell us what they thought of the book as well. So please go visit Shared Shelves book club podcast and subscribe there if that's of interest to you. Now moving on with today's episode of the show, so totally unrelated to books at all, but I had this. Thought. Like I said, this has been something that is constantly on my brain and on my heart, and something that I have to pay attention to in my own life. Super often, because sometimes as humans we can just be so outcome focused. We say like, oh, I wanna lose. 20 pounds and we're really focused on that outcome, or, oh, I really wanna stop drinking alcohol. We're really focused on that outcome. I really wanna get this promotion. I'm looking for a new job. I, you know, just, I wanna get 10,000 steps every day for the next month, or something like that. And those are all honestly, really aspirational goals. I think that they're really great things to have goals for, and I think that there are so many things in life that. I mean, I'm a goal person. I'm a trackable goal, shareable, measurable goal person. I'm really drawn to goals like that, but I feel like we do ourselves a disservice when we focus more on the outcome and actually attaining whatever that goal is that we've set, and less on the journey or the progress or process to get there more so. This came to mind this last week because if you have seen Wicked for Good, you, you don't have to have seen Wicked For Good to listen to this episode. By the way, I'm not gonna share any spoilers or anything like that, but at the very beginning of the movie, the second part of Wicked. Which my husband and I just love Glinda. She is Glinda at this point, not Galinda, but Glinda is singing the song. I think it's like happier than ever or No, couldn't be happier. That song. It's so. Cute, and I just, my husband and I were leaving Wicked, and we were like, it's actually so amazing how much music can do in a movie. I know not everybody's like musical people, but like musicals can cover so much ground and storylines just through a song because you see these exchanges of looks or just, I mean, you can kind of have a conversation through the lyrics or that sort of thing, and that is a song that. I believe it kind of opens up the movie, but they're celebrating and you know, there's, they're, they're celebrating. I'm not gonna get into the details'cause I said I wanna give spoilers, but they're celebrating and Glinda is kind of noticing that in the song midway through the song, I guess it might be the Bridge, I'm not sure, but she. She says something about dreams and how, you know, she couldn't be happier. This is what happens when dreams come true, right? And she's kind of underwhelmed of getting to her goal or getting to her dream. You know, everything that she's dreamed of is coming true right now. And she is a little, I won't say let down, but it just feels a little bit anti-climatic. Climactic. I'm actually gonna read real quick'cause I need to remind myself of what her words are, but she says, she says, no, I couldn't be happier, though it is. I admit the tiniest bit, unlike I anticipated is what she says. But she kind of goes on and she's like, well, not simply'cause getting your dreams. It's strange, but it's kind of complicated. There's like a cost that goes with this. So she's saying that, you know, she's gotten all her dreams in the musical. Of course it's a little bit different than in real life where we are not, there's not witchcraft and magic and all of these things, but I felt like it reminded me of this point that I. Love to think about of how sometimes we, like, sometimes the reason that it is so important to not focus on an a, a specific outcome that we're searching for is because have you ever gotten to that outcome and then been a little. Like, oh, well, I guess that wasn't exciting. Like you always, you know, you really, really were gunning for this promotion or gunning for this job, and you got it. And then. Not so much changed, you know, not so much in your personal life changed, you know, at work. Maybe they, maybe there's some accolades that go with that, but pretty shortly after you've gotten that promotion or that job, after a while, it just becomes rote again. It becomes mundane again. And that's not to say that that wasn't a really admirable. Inspirational goal and something that you shouldn't have gone, gone for or that isn't benefiting you more now, but it can kind of feel anti-climactic, especially if we're only focused on getting to that goal. It's the same thing. I think about it with weight loss too, where I used to have people who I was avidly coaching through body whenever I was a body health and wellness coach and promoting workout programs, which I still do, but. I had people that were reaching their like weight goals and then they were like, oh, well I guess I can, like what do, where do I go from here? What do I do from here? And it wasn't so much that they were super excited about the weight loss goals. I mean, they were, but at the same time they were like, oh well. I guess I got what I wanted, what now, and sometimes that can happen. Whenever you're focused on the outcome, you are focused so much on the actual. Tangible thing that you get at the quote unquote finish line or end of quote unquote end of the journey. But really there's not an end of the journey because all of these things are kind of like lifelong things. You're always going to be pursuing something. So, and another silly example of this, my husband and I were talking about this the other day on a walk, and he was giving me an example of this. He plays League of Legends on his pc. If any of you listen. To this, have husbands who are gamers, whether that's PC or Xbox or PlayStation or whatever it is. Let me know because I feel like it can take up a lot of his time. So sometimes it's not as relatable. But he was talking about this game League of Legends that he plays on his PC and saying how, you know what? Recently I've, it makes it sound like it's such a lofty goal, but recently I've shifted my focus on whether I win or lose or whether another teammate is playing well or whatever. Like mostly shifting the outcome or shifting the focus off of the outcome of whether he wins or lose. And more so reflecting on, okay, what went well? What did I do well, and what things could I improve? Focusing more on the journey. So how did we get to that outcome? How did we get to the win or the loss? Because honestly, it's a team-based game. There could be, I don't actually know how many people play in one game, but let's say it's a team of six, I don't know, but. There could be five other people on your team that really play poorly and you played great, but because you lost now you're no longer fo like you're focused too much on the outcome. You're no longer focusing on celebrating the things that you did well and you played perfectly well. So those are just a few examples And so I wanna talk about focusing on the process and the progress that you're making toward an outcome rather than what the actual outcome is. So when we are so focused on the outcome, it can. Really take us back. I feel like whenever we are really focused, like, let's use the weight loss example. If we're really focused on losing 20 pounds, then focusing on that 20 pound can defeat us really quickly. Even if you're losing two pounds a week, like say that you, you've increased your step intake, you've increased your water intake, you've started working out three days a week. You are really trying to focus on a Whole foods diet and. You're minimizing treats and drinks and things like that, and then you get to the end of a week and you've lost like 1.8 pounds. That's actually, that's actually a step in the right direction, guys. It's 1.8 pounds is. Much closer to 20 pounds than if you would've lost nothing or if you would've gained weight. So that's actually a really good thing. But sometimes we step on the scale at the end of the week and we're like, are you kidding me? 1.8 pounds for all that work I did. It can be defeating and it can lead to burnout. Another example of this would be like with the promotion that I was saying, if you have really been gunning for it, you know, you put in all the work you created. This really pretty one pager for why you should get the promotion. You have been putting in work leading up to this point and you have developed a lot of really good relationships with your coworkers. And and the people above you, the people on your leadership team. So you are gunning for that promotion and then you don't get it. And. Now you feel like, well, what was the point of all that work? And you're focused on the outcome rather than all the things that you did to get there. And all of those things are still great things that you can use moving forward in your career, whether that's in another job or going after the next promotion, or it's just like. I developed great relationships. Now I have a bigger playbook that I can use in the future, or I am building on my skillset of interviewing, or I created that one pager. And honestly, now I have something that I can go and take elsewhere and use elsewhere. So I don't know if this is making a whole bunch of sense, but. These are reasons that focusing on the outcome can lead to burnout or upset, and how focusing on the process instead is going to benefit you going forward. another reason that I bring this up is because I was talking with someone recently and she was talking about her side hustle or you know, kind of business that she's doing on the side, she was like, you know what just makes me really nervous too. Set that goal because if I don't meet it, I'll be really disappointed. And I was like, wow, that's so interesting because. I totally can relate to that. There have been times where I've set a goal and I didn't meet it, and I was like, oh, dang. And then it kind of set me back a bit. I started reversing the actions that I knew would help me get closer to that goal, and, and doing the things that were opposite because I was kind of self-sabotaging, or I had the all or nothing mindset where I'm like, oh, well I didn't get, I didn't get the goal, so that would be the all, so nevermind, I'm just gonna quit. And that would be the nothing, right? But the thing is, if you do set a goal, I, I think it's great to set goals. I think it should be trackable. I think it's great to be like. I wanna hit 5,000 podcast downloads by the end of 2025. Maybe that's a goal for me. I actually don't know how close I am to that, but I will look and let you know. But five th let's say that I set that goal, 5,000 podcast downloads, and at the end of 2025, I only get to 4,997. Okay? Am I really gonna just like quit the podcast after that? Don't you think? 4,997 downloads is better than. 4,500 or wherever you were before, right? I used to track. This is kind of cringey. I feel like, so bear with me, but just being totally honest with you, I used to track followers for quite a while. Honestly, I might start again with the podcast, but I used to track followers just to see how my network was growing, at least on social media. And I remember when I first started tracking these that I started at like. I think like 350 or 400 followers, quite honestly, and I was tracking it mostly for my network marketing business and seeing how my network was growing on social media. And so I was tracking it each week that I would do these like kind of networking. Opportunities or activities on Instagram specifically, and at the end of a year, I was like at over a thousand followers, but I wasn't really realizing that that progress was happening because I was tracking it really slowly and. At the time, I think I wanted to grow to like 500 followers or something, was my first goal. But if I had been so focused on the 500, I wouldn't have kept going because the 500 would've been like my finish line or my goalpost, and instead of continuing to do the things past that goal or that finish line. I would've stopped and then I probably would've regressed in my progress. You lose followers pretty quickly, so probably would've gone back down to like 4 97, 400, whatever. At the same time, if I had set the goal of 500 and at the end of the year I was at four 50, isn't that still better than the three 50 that I was at before? I still made progress. I still did the activities. That slowly but surely got me to a point that was closer than the point that I was before and got me closer to my goal now. The reason that I bring this up is because when that person was talking about that and they have like a specific deadline in their business, I was like, okay, that's true. But something that I've learned and that I wasn't always that good at before whenever I was also doing a business similar is that even if you don't get that goal. The the things that you're gonna do, the activities that you're gonna do, because you're driven to meet that goal, are naturally going to take you further than if you just never set a goal in the first place. Right. So that's why I don't wanna deflate you when it comes to goal setting'cause we're going into the new year. I know a lot of you are going to be setting health goals, career goals, education goals, maybe some parenting goals. I know a lot of people that are listening to this right now that are in my close network are new parents or young parents, and there are all sorts of aspirations that you may have. Maybe you're just setting a reading goal, like a book goal on Good, good reads or something like that. Totally. Great. Totally. Okay. I think that's awesome. But I do want to take the emphasis off of actually getting that number or specific achievement it is that you're wanting to do. Like if you're a parent and you're potty training and you're like, oh, I want my kid to be fully potty trained by half the, halfway through the year of 2026, I actually have no idea how long this takes, so I probably shouldn't speak to it. But halfway through the year of 2026, July one, I want my kid to be fully potty trained. If you are working on getting your kid comfortable with underwear and going pee and going poop, vocalizing that they need to go potty, whatever those things are that you're working on, when you get to July one, if your kid isn't fully potty trained, does that mean that you just quit? No, you gotta teach your kid how to go to the bathroom. So of course you wouldn't do that. It's so silly when you use an example like that that you would just quit on July 1st and just accept the fact that your kid is always gonna pee their pants for the rest of their lives. Like, no, that doesn't make any sense. So instead of looking at July one as, oh, I'm a failure if I don't get my kid potty trained by then, or I'm a success if I do get my kid fully potty trained by then instead of that. Focus on the journey up to July one. Maybe on July one you're like, wow, we have made so much progress. I cannot believe that my child is actually telling me that they want to go to the bathroom or like is actually excited about underwear or whatever those milestone things are in potty training. You tell me moms, but that is something that I feel like. I want to encourage you when you're making goals for 2026 to make the goal, but then really focus on the process of getting there and who you're becoming when you get there. Because the thing is, even if you like say that you do really want to get to like say that, I'm like, I really wanna get to a million podcast downloads. Okay. Great. If I woke up tomorrow and I had a million podcast downloads, would I be the person yet? Would I be the podcaster yet, or the person who makes content on social media yet that could actually handle keeping and sustaining those million downloads? Would I be the person that could handle hundreds of thousands of, or tens of thousands of downloads every week and really capture those people's attention? Probably not. It's probably gonna take me a while of getting used to podcasting and putting content out there and marketing and developing these skill sets that I wouldn't have if I just woke up tomorrow with a million downloads, right? So that's why it's important to make achievable goals, make sensible goals, but then also focus on who you're becoming in the process if you didn't get that promotion. Or you even did get that promotion. Let's focus on the process that you took to get there, because if you start a job at entry level and you are like, okay, my goal is to become director of this organization one day, first of all, we talked about how sometimes you can get, you can work your way there and then it can be like, oh, is this it? This is anticlimactic. So we don't wanna just focus on the outcome, but then also think about if you're at the entry level and you woke up tomorrow as the director. Would you be equipped? Would you know the things that you need to know to be able to be a director in your organization? Would you have the skills that you need to acquire? Would you have the relationships with the people that are directly reporting to you or reporting to your direct reports? No. So that's why it's so important to focus on the process and the progress that you're making and the person that you're becoming, skills that you're forming, and resilience that you are creating in yourself. On the way to get there. So what I really want you to take away from this is that when you are setting goals for 2026, or maybe you're setting goals for now, I mean, you don't have to start at the new year. It's not a new year, new me situation, but when you're setting goals for 2026, I really wanna encourage you. To set the goal, but then break it down into little actions, little skills, little things. Dream about the person that it is that you wanna become. If you're wanting to get the promotion, what does that actually look like? Does it look like somebody who shows up 10 minutes early to their meetings with. Whatever prepared, whatever presentations and whatnot prepared. Does it look like somebody who gets their reports done before the deadline? Does it look like somebody who has great relationships with their peers? Does it look like somebody who. Is really. Well organized I mean, I don't know what it takes for you to get your promotion and your job, but think about the person that you want to be before you get that thing. Because working toward that person and that dream of yourself is going to be more likely to get you there. And. Naturally. Even if you don't get there, quote unquote, there, wherever that is, You will be closer to that person that you're wanting to become. I hope this is making sense. Hope that you go into the new year feeling really strong and that you are able to use this episode. To focus less on the outcome and more on the process and who you're becoming as a person in the process for whatever goals you are setting. If you are setting those goals, one thing that is so important is accountability. So if there is someone that you are setting a goal with or you are working towards something with and you want them to hold you accountable, I really encourage you to send this episode to them. If you know that they're working on something on their own as well, send this to them. Share it with anybody who you are linking arms with for 2026. I'm happy to be one of those people that you link arms with as well. Just reach out, DM me. Let me know if you like this episode, and I hope this is helpful for you.