Identity-Focused Goals

Identity-Focused Goals
Written by Aush Chatman

Setting goals is important and there is a skill to knowing HOW to set goals.

If you would like some help with that here is a super handy Invictus Goal Setting Workbook.  This will be a great help to each of us as we set goals for the year (or for anytime).

The most common resolution every new year is *DRUMROLL* “I want to lose weight this year.  As a goal this is not specific enough, so we may refine it to say:

“I want to lose 20lbs by the end of May.”  Just in time for SUMMER!

This is a better goal, but how likely are you to reach this, have you ever set a goal like this before? Did you make it? How long did it take you to reach your goal from the time you FIRST had the idea?

Many of us have made goals like this before, maybe even this particular one, and most of the people that do, fail, and not just once, we tend to fail over and over, with varying degrees of commitment. The question is why?  Why do we set these goals, maybe even make them specific and then fail?

Outcome-Focused Goals

You have heard it before, some variation of, “iI isn’t about the destination it’s about the journey.” This is SO true. Joy, success, accomplishment is found in the process and not the outcome. Our goal of Losing 20lbs by the end of May is an OUTCOME-focused goal. It is a great jumping off place but we need to go deeper if we want to actually MEET our goal.

To make this a process-focused goal we need to turn our attention to the process. Let’s refine our goal of 20lbs to this.  

Between Jan 1st and May 31st, I will workout 4 days a week.

This is more process-focused, it isn’t about the outcome to lose 20 lbs, which we STILL want by the way. Please keep in mind that our original goal statement isn’t BAD, and in fact we can use it as a measure to check if our process is moving us along the right path.

Doesn’t this sound all the better?

Let me burst the bubble though. This still isn’t good enough, because we are closer to the core here many people will last a lot longer on their resolution journey if they can get their goal process focused, but still MOST people will fail here.

Identity-Focused Goals

The REAL secret to setting and eventually achieving a goal or resolution is to make it an Identity-focused goal.

This goal setting statement will sound nothing like the outcome or process-focused statements. Because it isn’t about the goal, it is about you.

“I am someone who NEVER misses workout.”

Ok, this really IS a goal but it is about ALREADY being what you want to be. That is why it sounds so different. Boiling a goal down to an identity level brings the goal from the future to the present instantaneously. You can see how, never missing a workout, will ensure you workout 4x per week, which will put us on the path to lose that 20lbs.

Dig REALLY Deep + A Warning

This is a powerful thing, but I want to add on one slice of perspective. Going through the Invictus Goal Setting Worksheet will actually lead you to this if you really spend some time on it. What I am leading to is, you really want to know your WHY? Why do you want to lose 20lbs?

A quick little side story:

There is research that says, when someone posts online, let’s say Instagram. They get really vulnerable and post a “before” picture on Jan 6th. And their post reads, “Hey, this is my body right now in my bathing suit. I am posting this publicly because I am committing to losing 20lbs this year!”

What generally happens is that very well meaning people will comment on their post.  Typically things like.

Fire emoji

Flexed Biceps emoji

You Got This!

Me too Boo

You look great but we are with you

Etc…

There is no problem here, UNLESS the person posting hasn’t done the work to figure out their “Why”.

It is entirely possible if they dug deep they would uncover that their “WHY” is “I want to be accepted”. They see themselves in the mirror and don’t accept themselves or they feel that others don’t accept them. So the 20lbs or weight loss is really a symptom. The cruel trick then is that when they post that first pic and get all that uber positive feedback, feedback ironically of overwhelming ACCEPTANCE, they have already achieved their goal, at least on a surface level. And while we may think we are smart enough to know that this one post is only going to give us a dopamine/serotonin hit for maybe a day or so, our brains eat it up. To our mind, we did it, we got acceptance and we are sort of correct.

So dig deep and find your real WHY(s), protect them, guard them. Don’t allow yourself to do things that will lead to cheap success like an IG post.