Take a moment and seriously answer this question for me …
What is the thing that is MOST likely to derail your progress over the next few days?
Do you have plans this weekend that make it tough to stay consistent?
Maybe some alcohol that will lead to poor decisions?
A binge or overindulgence of some kind?
Stress or lack of sleep?
Emotional or boredom eating?
This is an honest, personal assessment of what you think is most likely to throw you off your game.
By answering this question, you’re already light years ahead of most people.
How we approach achieving most goals …
Typically, the way we operate when we’re trying to achieve a goal is this …
We find a plan we like (either from a coach, resource, or by creating our own).
We start to execute on the plan.
Then, we get thrown off the plan by common plan disruptors (self sabotage, stress, negative outlets for dealing with difficult emotions, instant gratification, etc).
We feel shitty about not following through but never actually address why it happened.
We vow to do better.
And we start the process all over again.
That summarizes most of my life.
But at a certain point, you have to recognize the pattern is on repeat.
I got tired of blowing myself up and starting over all the time. I got tired of feeling like a failure and I got tired of wondering why the hell I kept acting out of alignment with the things I said I wanted.
When your words and actions don’t align, it creates internal conflict.
So, let’s fix that.
If we don’t have a method for making decisions that remove our inherent biases, then we’ll always be subject to our default coping mechanisms and cognitive distortions.
Meaning, we’ll keep making the same mistakes over and over again.
This is an integral part of the goal achievement process.
I call it your iOS or internal operating system.
Think of it like this … you’re downloading all of these new apps on your phone. Fancy new apps that can make your life amazing.
Apps like a training plan, healthy eating, mindfulness practices, daily movement, a coach to support you. All the things that move you towards the goals you want to achieve.
But none of the apps will work if you’re still running an old software (aka decision-making process).
It’s like trying to tap into the healthy eating app but the old software tells you to say fuck it and eat whatever you want instead.
This is why the iOS pillar of goal achievement has decision-making commandments and decision-making frames.
That way, we can step outside of our biases and make better decisions that allow all of these fancy apps (lifestyle upgrades) to operate to the best of their ability.
Identify what will derail your progress and then try to prevent it.
One of the decision making frames is called the Parenting Frame.
As a parent, the thing you think about more than anything else in the world is what?
How can I keep my kids safe and prevent bad shit from happening?
We make fun of my mom all the time because she will think of elaborate worst-case scenarios that only a mom could come up with.
Hopefully you’re still following the thread here because it’s about to all make sense.
The Parenting Frame is preventative in nature.
What’s the worst that could happen and would I be ok with that or can I prevent it?
Imagine you have a kid who is 10 years old and you find out they’re looking at inappropriate videos on their iPad.
A detective starts to think about who to blame … do I blame my child, their friends, social media, their siblings?
Using the Parenting Frame, you think preventative vs. detective. How can I prevent bad shit from happening?
Well, I can set up parental controls on their device so they can’t look at inappropriate videos.
Now, let’s circle back to the question I originally asked.
What is the thing that is most likely to derail your progress over the next few days?
It’s time to insert the Parenting Frame.
Can we be preventative?
What’s the worst that can happen and would you be ok with that or can we prevent it?
Learn how to prevent binging, overindulgence, stress, emotional eating, and other things that throw you off your game.
Maybe you answered that a binge episode or overindulgence is the most likely thing to derail your progress.
Can we ensure that we’re eating enough throughout the day? Can we remove the foods that are most likely to be overindulged on? Can we insert some other methods of coping? Can we not allow things to build up so much by making sure we recharge our batteries each day?
The detective investigates after the event has already happened (which is also important).
The parent tries to prevent bad shit from happening (which is what most people don’t do for themselves).
To take it one step further, not only do we need to insert this decision-making frame into our everyday lives, but we also should start celebrating when bad shit doesn’t happen.
Many times our clients treat neutral days as negative days.
Well, I feel pretty good, did what I was supposed to do, but the scale didn’t move today.
Great, that’s a win. Bad shit didn’t happen. You won.
It’s nice to celebrate the person who loses 100 lbs. Amazing accomplishment.
But we never celebrate the person who doesn’t put themselves in a position where they have 100 lbs. to lose in the first place.
The preventative person who minimizes bad shit from happening is looked at as fortunate or lucky.
Celebrating neutral days is another way that we upgrade our iOS.
I won’t get into the full details of this pillar of goal achievement because I’d need several hours to do it justice.
But with one simple decision-making frame, the Parenting Frame, you can prevent the thing that is most likely to derail your progress over the next few days and make it a successful week.
And if we stack up enough consistent weeks, months, and years in a row then the goals you want to accomplish will be yours.
