Goal Setting: Exposure, Desire & Confidence

There are many times in the coach client relationship that goals are going to change. And sometimes it’s not on a timeline or perfectly orchestrated through macrocycles and micro cycles…. OK who am I kidding? It almost never happens that way. And I think that’s because of a lot of different factors but some of the biggest ones have to do with our exposure to things.

And it’s not just our exposure, but it also has to do with something that we desire that is linked to something that we’re exposed to. And then when we see that and what we want… a good amount of time we turn around and say yeah I could do that.

Don’t worry. I’m gonna explain. LOL

And then also put it out there that this is actually not a bad thing even though I have a lot of clients that come to me and immediately try to their need for this change and they don’t have to. It’s natural. It’s part of who we are and the society that we live in. My usual response.. all right. Let’s see what we can do!

Exposure

Exposure is not a bad thing. It is simply a thing.

We don’t know what we don’t know until we know it. And how do we usually find out about things? Through exposure.

And truthfully, this does happen for the better and the worst, but let’s run through this.

The people around us.

The people we follow on social media.

The podcasts that we listen to.

The books that we read.

The email subscriptions that we have.

All of these grant us exposure. They let us see into different thoughts and different experiences that we may have never known existed. Or maybe they give us a new perception that we know a little bit about.

Think about it…

One of our good friends from high school made a post about how they were able to get really physically fit as they trained for a bodybuilding competition.

This is absolutely incredible. They look fantastic! They were able to become very physically fit through this process, and they looked overwhelmingly happy and joyous. They conquered this thing that they set out for.

Now, as you’re looking at them, you start to think about competing in a bodybuilding competition.

You’re looking at their pictures and saying, “I could do that”. and you’re feeling pretty confident about it. So you go out there and hire a coach and start the process.

Your exposure just led you to a goal that you never knew you would want to do until you saw it and decided you could do it.

THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH THIS.

Your ability to make choices is limited by your context and knowledge. When you expand that context, you expand your options.

Benjamin Hardy PhD, Personality isn’t Permanent

Desire

There are many times that I speak with people during consultations who are trying to work through what it is that they desire. They may have an inkling of what they might want, but maybe haven’t really focused enough for their own liking. They’re not quite sure what they need to do because they’re not quite sure where they wanna go.

And just like I said above… There’s nothing wrong with this.

Sometimes we don’t know exactly what it is that we want, but we simply know that where we are currently is not where we want to stay.

And truthfully, this is a conversation that I’ve had with my own coach. When I said out to initially lose the 135 pounds, I had no idea that that’s what I wanted to do. I had no idea that 5 pounds would’ve been possible. I had no idea of the future desire. The only desire that I knew in that given moment was that I no longer wanted to stay where I was.

That was when I leaned on what I mentioned above with the exposure and started to look at what piqued my interest. I had a friend at the time who was running. I also drove past a woman who was running while I was in my SUV at the time the kids were screaming, and this woman looked so peaceful… exposure to those two things led me to seek out a means of not staying where I was anymore.

Right now, you don’t truly want what your future self wants.  Your future self is an acquired taste.

Benjamin Hardy PhD, Personality isn’t Permanent

Confidence

Confidence… I think this word is overcomplicated and rejected quite often.

You may hear many people talk about how you won’t gain confidence until you act. But that’s a certain type of confidence. That’s a skill-specific confidence. It’s situational.

The type of confidence I’m talking about regarding goal setting is more about your confidence in your capability. In your ability to mess around and figure something out. In your curiosity to learn new things. In your openness to seek something new and give it a shot.

In one of my favorite books from last year, Adam Grant’s book Think Again, talks about having a confident humility.

This is about us believing in our capability. Having the confidence in that. Like we’re not there yet… we’ll figure it out. What could it hurt? Or in more recent terms how to mess around and find out (FAFO).

Confidence is the basis of imagination – which is required for seeing and choosing a future beyond your current capability and circumstances. Confidence reflects your personal belief in what you can do, learn, and accomplish.

Benjamin Hardy PhD, Personality isn’t Permanent

BUT what if you’re not feeling it?

Challenge things. If you are not feeling it, challenge it.

I am not saying that the road is not going to be hard. I am not saying that you’re going to enjoy it the entire step of the way. But I think we all have a moment where we can honestly say hey do you know what? I don’t know if this is what I really want. That is valid!

So challenge it.

Let’s go back to the above example.

Your friend from high school did a bodybuilding competition.

You are training for a bodybuilding competition and you are not feeling it.

Why are you doing this?

What about that original exposure piqued your desire?

Was it how they looked? Was it what they did? Was it the perception of their happiness from doing that?

Seriously, challenge it. Don’t run away from this because this year sometimes is the difference of adding another failure to the list of things that you do not complete.

This is the pivot moment. You either stay the course and maybe you do it… maybe you don’t… but it just brings about other things that you don’t love.

Or you challenge it and figure out what you really want. That could be to actually do a show and now your motivation is renewed with a deeper why. That could be that you were looking for a way to be more physically fit, and this looks like a great option.

I’m gonna focus on the second one here though because this is what I see more as a coach.

Are there other great ways to get physically fit? Yes!

Sometimes our exposure can help us figure out something that we want but not fully. We can see where we are now (which is our point A) and we can see that we desire to feel physically fit (which is our point B) but we cannot see more than the one in-between we were exposed to.

This is where an outside perspective can help immensely… or one of my favorite things… this is when you would corner a nerd. Pick their brain. Find a way through. Find all the ways through. The more you can be informed about the route you are talking about taking, the better.

Takeaway

Our society grants us the gift and the curse of exposure. It can lead us to things that we desire for our own lives and it can also lead us into a maddening chase for something that we could take a different route to get to.

But I wanna give one last thing with all of this because I find that it is never asked for or never needed but always necessary in a weird way…

I’m here to give you permission to change your mind.

Do you need me to? No.

Do my clients? No.

Do I give it to them anyway? Yes.

This is because strivers will sometimes strive through things that they don’t necessarily want to do… PS This is definitely a therapeutic rabbit hole people could go down and that is not my territory. But I can do one thing from one human to another. Say it’s okay to change your mind, and it’s not a failure unless you deem it one.

Practice: Challenging Yourself

If you’re trying to figure all of this out on your own, here are some challenge questions. It might help.

• What are you currently striving for?
• How would you explain this to your best friend?
• Is it something that you want to do at the moment?
• Have you dreamed and visualized about what it would be like to accomplish this goal?
• Is it something that you are just doing now to pass the time? 
• Are there other things that you wish you could be doing but this doesn’t seem like the opportune time or do you still feel as though you are not ready to take it on?

If something else comes about, we can let it go.

We can pursue it.

We get to choose.

Either way, we have dug deep to really find out if this is a choice that we want to make for our own lives.

It only costs us our time and energy.

And those are two of the most valuable resources we have.

If the ladder is not leaning against the right wall, every step we take just gets us to the wrong place faster.

Dr. Stephen Covey