How do you achieve something you've never had?
What do you want in life? If you are like other logical thinkers I know, you want a lot in life. You are motivated, you are inspired, you are willing to work. But maybe you’ve had this goal for a while and haven’t felt like you were getting any closer. My guess is that if this is the case, your goals are big – so big that you haven’t achieved anything like them before. If that’s the case, there’s a fundamental thing you need to know.
Most of the world – probably 95 percent – approaches their goals with what they already know. They try to achieve another tier of success with the knowledge and information they have at their current tier. This 95 percent are held back, while the other 5% who know the secret I’m about to share sprint ahead.
This applies in all areas – maybe you want to become the next CEO of a company after climbing the ladder, or maybe you want to have a healthy romantic relationship after experiencing dysfunctional ones in the past. In both of these cases, you want to go somewhere that you have never been before. These are exponential increases, not minor ones.
When we approach these exponential goals with what you know from what you’ve already mastered, you’ll experience small steps forward but not the kind of leaps you need to get to that new goal. Often we think we just need to work harder, but I am here to tell you that this will not work. You will run out of energy or time before you get there with this method. Instead, you need to shift your approach by returning to a state of learning and exploration.
The one thing we logical thinkers can’t stand is feeling like we are being unproductive. The last thing we want to do when we are trying to run a record-breaking marathon is to slow down and look at our form. But that’s exactly what the elite runners do, as well as those reaching the highest states of achievement in any area.
If your goals are big and you’re currently feeling like you are inching toward them, you need to shift to a learning and exploration mode. The electron that wants to change orbits does not go inching toward that next orbit slowly over time. It stays in its current orbit as it absorbs energy. When the level of energy needed is reached, it immediately appears in the next orbit. We are like this too – we are part of the natural world, which science explains.
For you to move to the next orbit of your goals, shift to absorbing the energy you need to take you there. Seek out coaches, teachers, courses, books – all of it! The more you can absorb that is reflective of where you want to go, the sooner you will pop into that next orbit.