The #1 Reason You’re Not Reaching Your Goals

You know when you get super psyched about a new goal?

Like, you see a photo of the “old you” and right then and there you declare: “I’m getting in shape tomorrow!”

You pull out your old Weight Watchers brochure or download MyFitnessPal.

You study the gym schedule and pick your 5am class.

You throw out every chip, chocolate and cookie you can find.

Yet even with all this gusto and energy, your week might end up going something like this:

Day One: Awesome! You have your green juice and vitamins in the morning, enjoy 4 ounces of lean protein with your salad for lunch, catch the 6pm weight class and top of your night with your 8th glass of water.

Day Two: You’re annoyed you slept through your alarm and already fell off your fitness routine. But way to go on successfully drinking your water and eating all your veggies!

Day Three: You’re back to working out but have gone way over your calorie count and can’t remember if you took your vitamins in the morning. And who has time to make a green juice!

Day Four: You didn’t plan your lunch so you downed two slices of pepperoni pizza, you’re pained to drink another liter of water and your body is too sore to make it back to the gym.

Day Five: You’ve given up. You’re not doing anything well, nothing is working and you feel like a total failure…again.

What gives?

Truth Bomb: You’re Trying To Make Too Many Changes At The Same Time

Whether it’s getting healthier, launching a new project, creating systems or implementing new routines, we get so excited about our new goal that we try to change a lot of things at the same time.

Going all in may work for some superhumans, but not for the majority of us.

There are too many psychological, physical and mental changes going on simultaneously and your body and brain don’t have the capacity for them all.

The problem with trying to implement multiple habits at once is that the attempt to change is so overwhelming that you end up not changing any habits at all.

You’re back at square one feeling like a failure and sabotaging yourself into believing you’re unmotivated.

However, if you can succeed in changing ONE habit, you’ll start to believe you’re capable of change which will eventually snowball your other habits.

Mastering one habit at a time is what will make it easy for you to succeed.

Author Leo Babauta estimates that when people focus on changing a single behavior at a time, the likelihood that they’ll retain their new habit for a year or more is around 80%.

But for those who try to change two or more behaviors at once, success rates drop as low as 20%.

Whaaaatt??

Now you might be thinking that this one habit at a time approach feels painfully slow.

I’m not going to sugarcoat it. It can feel that way…at first.

Until you start seeing results instead of failure.
Until your success motivates you to start another habit.
Until you finally start getting closer to your goals.

Here are three proven ways to make sure you follow through with one habit at time:

• #1: Start small. Begin by choosing one small practice to follow. It could be drinking 8 glasses of water each day. Or exercising 30 minutes each day. Just be sure to choose only one and follow it for 2 weeks before adding any new habits.
• #2: Make it clear. “Drink more water” isn’t that helpful. “Drink 3 glasses of water before each meal” is much better. 
• #3: Track it. Use a simple checklist to track your practice everyday. You will gain confidence and motivation as you capture your small, but significant, daily wins. (This is where two week sprints come in really handy).

You might also wonder how a small practice or habit could ever produce any meaningful change.

Again, no sugarcoating. It might not, at least not today.

But build on the small change, and you’ll be amazed at what you can accomplish over a few weeks and a couple months. Even more, you’ll be surprised at how sustainable these new practices become.

That’s what you want, right? Lifelong changes that empower you with success. Not changes that last a week or two and make you feel like a failure.