This is What it Really Takes To Get Your Goals

0:00Welcome to the Get Your Goal Podcast, the place where ambitious, deep-thinking women chart their own course. Exploring the mindset, emotions, and daily practices that help you get your goal, your way, by being unapologetically you. I'm your host, Paula Bee, master certified life and goal coach and creator of the daily three journaling framework. On this podcast, you'll learn to navigate your unique path to success by using the most powerful tool in your kit. Your own internal compass. Ready for the adventure? Let's go! Hello, friend. Today we're talking about what it really takes to get your goal. And as the title of this podcast implies, I have a mindset shift for you that I have used in my own life to great effect. And I really wanted to share it with you today because I do think that this is a conversation that is... Well, first of all, I know it's a conversation that's appropriate for all goals. Like, really everything we ever talk about here on the podcast is about all goals.

1:03But I want you to know that there is something that I think we all think about our individual goals that is correct enough on the surface that I don't often tell you about this mindset shift or this nuance. And then when I do tell you about this mindset shift and this nuance, sometimes it gets... I'm going to say misappropriated, so let me tell you what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the fact that we all think that there are things that we have to do to get our goals. And what I often say to somebody who tells me, oh my gosh, you know, I have to do XY or Z to get my goals. You know, I have to get all my tasks done every day. I have to get consistent. I have to work hard. I have to make sacrifices. I have to do without. I have to restrict myself. I have to, you know, be on a diet. I have to get my button the chair. If I want to write a book, I have to learn how to be great at marketing. I have to do whatever.

2:04Like fill in the blank, whatever it is that you're telling yourself to do. And I often give the advice or the quick version of, okay, first of all, you don't have to do anything. And I know that you might already have some push back there. But let's just say that you've heard me talk about this before. You don't have to do anything. You're kind of on board with me there. And then the next thing that I often say is that you can reframe this with what do you want to do. And what I often see happening when that part of the mindset shift, like, okay, I get it. That makes sense. I'm making choices. It's what people often say to me. I choose to restrict myself and go on a diet. And very often, if you're reading the transcript, I'm speaking in a very sarcastic and beleaguered tone. Like you're saying the words that you're making choices, but also you don't really think they're choices.

3:05You don't really think or believe or feel that these are things that you would necessarily want to do if you really had your brothers about it. Sorry, I just got caught up in my own mind about that. How funny that word druthers is because I'm assuming I actually have never looked this up. But I'm assuming that's like a really old contraction because it means like I would rather, but it's like three words in one. I my druthers about what I would rather do. Anyways, don't mind me. Don't mind me. Just distracting myself. I'm having that sort of a day today. By the way, oh my gosh. Can I just talk about me for a quick second? I am very distractible today. I have spent a lot of time in this topic myself. Like honestly, I had it in my head today. I have made myself the promise that I was going to work on the podcast today. I've had many topics swirling around in my brain when I sat down to do my daily three this morning,

4:06which by the way is my journaling framework that I talk about with some frequency here on the podcast. But if this is the first time you're here, I have a journaling framework that I really offer you that helps you rewire your brain for success for you to get your goals. It helps you. Well, it helps you do what we're even talking about today with not making over promises to yourself and then getting frustrated and then not trusting yourself to follow through, but rather to see yourself where you are. Have a very clear vision of what you want and then asking yourself gently what you're really truly honestly going to do today in order to move yourself towards that. Also, there's a metacognitive journaling part where you untangle the stories that you're telling yourself about why this is hard for you or why this is difficult or why you can't have it. And then you also celebrate your successes of following through and becoming the person that you want to be the person who has your goal.

5:09If this is the first time you've heard about it, I lovingly invite you to go watch the free master class that explains all about the daily three much in much more detail than what I just did. Where I'm going with this story, though, is that today this morning I was doing my daily three I was doing the future self journaling where I picture myself with my goals and feel the feeling of being a person who is running a simple successful business. I've been thinking about this a lot. This is also me distracting both of us from this topic, but I've been thinking about this a lot about how one of the stories that I have told myself about having a successful business is that it has to be big in terms of like I have to have a staff. I have to have other people who are working for me. I have to have all this social media and an omnipresence and I have to have to do all these things that I don't really want to do. And so I've been really focusing on picturing having the kind of like financial success that I want while having the kind of emotional success that I want.

6:21There's a personal mastery that I deeply enjoy. There is a way that I love to bring out my best by learning new skills and getting so good at them that I actually don't want somebody else on my team doing those things because I know what the real mechanism is of success. And it's not omnipresence. It's not being everywhere and having a TikTok and an Instagram and everything all the time. It's about being, well, frankly, it's about being me. And it's about giving my brain body full alignment magical magnetic best when I offer you what I offer you. Anyway, I sat down. I was thinking about that. I was feeling into that simple, successful business. And I asked myself, what is it that I want to do today for that?

7:21What is it that I feel inside of me? And I definitely felt creative. I felt talkative. I felt very chatty this morning. So I was like, today must be a podcast day. And today was also a very distractable day where I had one of those days where I was so full of ideas that it was very hard to like grab onto one of them. I have. And this is it. This conversation about how we all tell ourselves we have to do things. The truth of it is I didn't have to record a podcast today. And I didn't just pat myself on the head and say, I want to record a podcast today. I actually spent the moment doing this thing that I'm going to tell you. Because I know you have an argument in your brain and possibly out loud depending on whether or not I have any access to speaking with you or reading your comments or whatever. You might have told me, but Paula, I really do have to work hard. I really do have to make sacrifices. I really do have to push myself.

8:25I really do have to do these very practical things in order to get my goal. And what I want for us to talk about today is how a couple of things. Number one, those words have to generate some version of the feeling of obligation. And I'm going to use the word powerlessness. And what I mean by that is that there's an obligation to a thing outside of you. And that when I offer you the advice of, you know, think about what you want to do, that that is the first step between letting the circumstances outside of you dictate what you do versus the circumstances inside of you, your own desire dictating what you want to do.

9:30And the truth of it is that oftentimes even when we are telling ourselves, oh, I really want to do this. I want to do these things. I want to, whatever it is, the tasks that you are trying to get done, even when you're telling yourself you want to do them. You are, I was, we all are very subtly thinking about the word take. That's why I titled the podcast what I did today. This is what it really takes to get your goal. This is a conversation that I've been having with myself a lot recently when I have been deconstructing goals that I have already gotten that I have gotten in a way that felt sustainable, that felt doable, that felt very much like me living my best life and giving my my version of my best energy to the goal.

10:33Sorry, I distracted myself again because I'm like, I know that word best implies some sort of like perfectionism or some sort of outside standard. And I really want to clarify to you that that's not what I'm talking about. Best for me is an internal feeling, not an external standard. So I want to clarify for you so that you can hear it that way. I'm not trying to be like the best. I'm thinking about that. I never tried to be the best. I'm not an Olympic athlete. I'm not, you know, one of the billionaires with the biggest business in the world. I don't even actually know which one of the eight families that run the world, who that would be. But like, I'm not trying to be the best. What I want is the feeling of my best. That is what I am aiming for in any event. Here's what we're talking about. All of us when we are thinking about this best and this have to we tend to focus on what the goal is taking from us.

11:38It's taking time. It's taking effort. It's taking creativity. It's taking energy. It's taking my, you know, my thoughts, my time, my energy, my, I don't even know how else to finish that sentence. We focus on what our goals, what our tasks are taking from us instead of and here's the real nuance that I want to offer you today is that your goal, your tasks on your way to your goal are all about an energy exchange that you are in charge of. I want to offer you a bit of a definition about what I'm talking about with energy because it's not just one thing in this conversation for the purposes of this conversation when we're talking about energy, we're talking about resources, meaning time or effort or actual legitimate, you know, calories if we're talking about a physical goal or your emotional energy.

12:50And I will tell you that this is where most of us are actually wasting our resources when you are currently telling yourself and I feel like that sentence is a big pointing finger when we let me include myself when we are telling ourselves we have to do a thing. The emotional cost of that sentence is the feeling of burdened or obligated or pressured that feeling. I mean, I want you to actually here let's workshop this together for a moment when you say you have to do something I want you to take a moment and actually feel what that feels like in your body. It feels heavy you are quite literally in a physics sense creating drag you are taking energy using energy just to overcome that inertia of that heavy feeling before you even get in motion on doing the task whatever the task is.

14:05When you think about getting your goal and doing your tasks as an exchange of energy and really thinking about an exchange of energy in a way that you are prioritizing your energy really thinking about which part of your tasks are an energy drain news energy or energy consumption and I'm thinking really specifically like if you have a running goal for example going for a run consume. Energy uses calories to go for a run and so thinking about going for a run in order to meet your running goal as an energy exchange. It can help you start to prioritize things like drinking your water to make sure that your blood pressure is already up so that you can sustain the pace that you want to sustain and you don't lose too much liquid via sweating that would knock you out in the middle of your run. It has you thinking about prioritizing fueling actual food that can depending on when you eat and what you eat and where you're eating and how long of a run you're going for all of those things there are factors to think about here but prioritizing something that's going to help with your blood sugar because that is the first resource that your body goes to make sure that your glygogen stores in your muscles are always nice and full before you go for a run.

15:31And also perhaps making sure that you have fuel on your run thinking about getting a good night sleep the night before making sure that you are resting and recovering afterwards thinking about your goal as an energy exchange and really taking agency over the fact that you are in charge of when you are spending and when you are replenishing. I know that's really easy maybe depending on whether or not your runner that to me because I am a runner sounds like a very easy example to think about it when you are literally burning calories and literally eating to replenish like that kind of energy exchange probably I assume makes a lot of sense to you. I offer you that in another kind of energy exchange where you might be thinking about it as exercise and eating if you have a goal of weight loss I offer you gently that you might be draining your own energy via the feelings that you have about the tasks of weight loss and or your ability to lose weight and or

16:53whether or not you really want to or if you want to focus on your health if you really you want to do this thing if you should restrict yourself or if you have to make yourself eat a certain way there is I have seen rather let me say it that way I have had access over my years as a personal trainer and then a weight loss coach and away goal coach I have access to lots of conversations with lots of women who have lots of leaking energy let's call it when it comes to the emotional load that we carry while we are working towards a weight loss goal. Thinking about your goal and your tasks as an exchange of energy that you have agency for agency over rather and that you have responsibility for that's why I combined those two things agency over and

17:53responsibility for dare I say that telling yourself you have to do things is an easy way to not take responsibility and don't hear that as blame or judgment. We get socialized that we have to do things I mean let's let's come back to that part of the conversation we get socialized that we have to do things and then it becomes very efficient to think that we have to do things when you take agency over your energy exchange when you take responsibility for your energy exchange it gives you the opportunity to actually hear yourself and I want to offer this to you as some of the biggest relief you might ever feel. When you shrug off the cloak of obligation of I have to and you take the time to ask yourself like really ask yourself and not in the sarcastic burdened way of I guess I want to do these things but actually ask yourself what you want to do I tell you it's very easy for me to come to the podcast without a half to feeling but with a feeling of deep desire I love talking.

19:13I love talking to you really specifically I love talking to you my audience for this podcast who in spite of my distractability really followed along on this deeply nuanced conversation that moves both of us forward. When you have the opportunity and you do to listen to yourself and to ask yourself from a beautiful place of this goal is mine to get when you ask yourself what you want and what your priorities are not just the ones you've been socialized to believe not just the ones that everybody and their mother and your dog is telling you that you have to prioritize other people you have to prioritize and I'm going to let you fill in the blank on that you've been told your whole life that you have to put other people first I can say that as a blanket statement you have been told that you are supposed to put other people first.

20:22Which means that this is going to feel difficult at first I really do like to gently be realistic about what this process feels like I know that it's my job as a marketer here on the podcast to be like here's the problem here's the solution it's my thing you're going to feel amazing paint you a beautiful picture and then have you open up your wallet and pay me money so that I can help you and I really want you to know that I don't love marketing like that and be the old cliche of anything worth having is you know worth working for is sort of true ish there's going to be a period of adjustment where you rearrange your brain to actually listen to yourself. And that my friend can be deeply uncomfortable if you have never done it before when you ask yourself what you want and what your priorities for it's going to feel awkward and weird and you will very likely

21:26if you are anything like me go ask 12 other people for their opinions about what you might want and what your priorities could be or should be before you even have access to your own thoughts and feelings my love this work will not come naturally to you and it's so worth it. Being inside of yourself giving yourself the gift of agency and responsibility understanding yourself paying attention to your energy really thinking about your energy as a renewable resource by you as a person who can see where you are giving energy and you can see where you are receiving energy and decide for yourself what you want that to look like my love.

22:28This is the path to not just getting your goal because around here I don't just talk I mean even though it is literally the name of my business I don't just talk about getting your goal this is the path to having your goal this is I'm going to give you a weight loss example this is that transition between white knuckling and restricting yourself and being on a diet to lose the weight to actually maintaining the weight. I promise you that you will not maintain your weight in a way that feels good until you understand for yourself this idea of energy exchange this idea of prioritizing energy in energy out and where your energy renews and I mean really specifically with weight loss the the supportive things that go along with that I'm thinking really specifically if we're talking about energy in energy out of course we're talking about eating and exercising even the exercising has nothing to do with weight loss exercises actually supportive activity that helps your metabolism also what helps your metabolism is sleeping well and drinking water and not the least of which is paying attention to your brain just like we were talking about

23:50where most of us are leaking energy where most of us feel like we are having energy taken from us is where we are feeling bad about what we are doing where we are feeling obligated where we are feeling like we have to my love you can at any point in time re program your brain away from have to and into want to in a way that actually feels like you want to do the things to get your goals. I'm going to leave it there thank you so much for listening I'll talk to you again soon. No matter where you are on your goal getting journey I'm here to help get started by watching the free daily three master class to learn the simple journaling framework that re wires your brain for success move forward with confidence at your pace with one of my goal specific guided journaling experiences

24:52and when you're ready for immersive exploration with fellow travelers just like you you belong in the get your goal membership find it all and join the adventure. Get your goal dot com.