Curious what’s the best indicator of long term success?
It’s not your actions.
It’s not persistence.
It’s not grit.
It’s not how your parents raised you.
It’s how you feel.
Yes, feel.
The best indicator of long term success is the feeling driving the action you’re taking to pursue your goal.
You Achieve A Goal By Taking Action
Here’s a quick refresher on how to set a goal in a nutshell:
- You decide with certainty on a new result you want.
- You take enough action (massive action) to achieve your goal, failing along the way.
Every action (or inaction) you take is fueled by a feeling.
Your feelings ALWAYS cause your actions or inactions.
Your feelings are caused by your thoughts.
To take the right action to get closer to achieving your goals, you need to feel the right feeling.
Two people can take the same action and be fueled by very different emotions.
The reason this matters for long term success is that if you continue to take action from negative, scarcity-based emotions, you’ll eventually crash and burn. Any success you create will always be fleeting.
Here are more goal setting resources:
- How To Set Goals (blog post)
- How To Set Goals (podcast)
- 11 Secrets To Getting Motivated To Achieve Your Goals (blog post)
- Free Life Coach Training To Up Level Your Life (webinar)
How To Avoid Goal Burnout
The reality of setting goals is that you’re going to fail a lot.
You’ll have obstacles. That’s for sure.
The way you avoid burnout and actually compound success from abundance is by being motivated to achieve your goal from positive emotion.
It’s the emotion behind the action driving the goal that matters.
When you’re motivated by positive emotion to take action, you want to keep going even when you fail. You fail forward.
Feelings Are The Secret Sauce
You are in charge of how you feel 100% if the time. (Seriously though. All the time!)
Your feelings are caused by your thoughts.
What you think determines how you feel.
And this is super fun… you can think anything you want all the time.
So, my question to you is… what are you thinking about your goal?
What are you thinking about your life? What emotion are you choosing to fuel the pursuit of your goals?
Resources on thoughts, feelings, actions and results:
- How To Coach Yourself (blog post)
- How To Coach Yourself (podcast)
- How To Improve Your Mindset (podcast)
- 13 Mindset Hacks That Helped Me Shift From Scarcity to Abundance (blog post)
- Personal Development Free Course (free training)
Two Types Of Discomfort
I’m not suggesting you should feel good all the time.
I’m suggesting you choose your emotions driving your actions intentionally and that those emotions should be abundant (not from scarcity).
You definitely will still experience negative emotions in the pursuit of your goals. That is not a problem at all until you give it meaning that makes it a problem.
So when you fail and make it mean you’re worthless and this is never going to happen, you sit in self pity, which is going to fuel inaction.
When you fail and make it mean just that you missed the mark, and you’re willing to feel rejection without making it mean something about you personally, you will allow the negative emotion and jump right back into positive emotion to fuel your goal.
Example: Hustling
People talk a lot about hustling and have very different sentences in their head about what it means.
For example, I’ve heard Amy Porterfield talk about hating hustling esp from her experience working with Tony Robbins.
However, hustling is just a label that we use to describe “going after something with extreme intensity.”
You can hustle from abundance or from scarcity.
When I was hustling getting up at 4am and doing my thing grinding it out on the weekends during the summer, I always did it from commitment, certainty, excitement, and expectation. I didn’t do it from lack, worry, or fear. Ever. Even when I was tired. I always did it from love. This is why I’m able to slow down now and not hustle and settle into success. The emotions fueling my goals are from abundance. It doesn’t mean I don’t experience negative emotion. I experience rejection, failure, humiliation all the time. I allow those emotions. I don’t let them rock my why. I’m 100% all in.
I have a friend and I see many students come from scarcity in their hustling. The emotion driving the hustle is worry, fear, and lack. And even if they take actions to move them forward, their success doesn’t compound and deep down they’re yearning for a break. They want to stop.
The difference is everything.
How To Know What Your Goal Fuel Is
We’re so used to taking action and focusing on action that we forget that the feelings are what drive actions. So, for you, I want you to pause. Take a breath. And genuinely ask yourself what emotion(s) are fueling the pursuit of your goals.
If you’re not used to identifying your emotions, this will be new for you and that’s okay. Do it anyway. It’s worth it.
A big hint is that if you want to stop and slow down or take a break, you’re likely not fueled from abundance.
Here are two lists of emotions to help you think about what’s fueling you…
Abundant Emotions
- Love
- Committed
- Determined
- Excited
- Certain
- Curios
- Passionate
Scarcity Emotions
- Fear
- Lack
- Worry
- Self pity
- Deprivation
- Stress
Remember that feeling negative emotions and allowing them is different than having them be the Goal Fuel.
I feel fear when I’m doing something new in my business, but it’s not my Goal Fuel. I’m nervous about the new Facebook ad or funnel, but I’m not in a constant state of fear about whether I’ll succeed.
Notice this difference. It’s everything.
You need to be willing to experience useful negative emotion that moves you forward through the pile of failures you’ll rack up in the pursuit of your goals. But you need to be fueled by abundant emotion stemming from your why.
Your “why” could be something really strong, too, and yet, you may have another thought that produces scarcity.
For example, you could really want to make money online to provide financial freedom for your family. This is a seemingly noble why. However, if your main thought is “I have to make this happen or else we’re not going to have enough money,” then your goal is fueled by lack. This is scarcity and it will compound. You’ll get burnt out and want to quit. It’s not sustainable.
How To Create The Right Feelings
To create the right Goal Fuel for you, answer the following questions:
- What is the current feeling (in one word) that’s fueling my actions?
- What is the feeling I want to experience to fuel my actions?
- What thoughts do I need to think to create the emotion I want?
For example, one emotion driving me in the pursuit of seven figures in my business is commitment. I’m 100% committed. I’m all in. For the good, the bad, and the ugly. I’m not rocked by much and when I am, I allow negative emotion and keep it moving.
The main thought for me that creates the feeling of commitment is, “I’m all in with my business no matter what.”
Another emotion driving me in my business is love. I love my business, my clients, and my money so much. It comes from having enough and wanting to create more. It doesn’t come from lack.
My main thought creating love is, “I love my business, students, and clients so much.”
Because of my “Goal Fuel” (as I call it!), I’m not on the road to burnout. I feel really great and excited every day. Don’t read that to mean that I don’t have negative emotion. I certainly do. But it’s not what’s fueling my goals.
Future Feelings
Once you have your feelings that you want to create, you need to practice them.
Practice being in the future feelings you think you’ll have in the role you want.
Go there in your imagination and be in that future feeling.
Create thoughts that help you feel the feeling.
You may have never felt love for your business before and it will be foreign and weird to you. That’s the point. Keep doing it so it becomes normal.
Decide every day what you want to think and feel based on the result you want for your goal success.
A Final Note!
The greatest indicator of long term success is the emotion fueling the action, not the action itself. This is what I call Goal Fuel.
If you create positive emotions to fuel your goals, you’ll be unstoppable. You won’t get burnt out. You’ll create long term success.
Give it a try. It’s worth it.
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