If you’ve ever had goals and dreams that didn’t come true and you want to change your mindset, you’re not alone. The truth is that 92% of people say the goals they set for themselves each year are never achieved. With a figure that high, something is clearly holding many of us back.
Before we look at what might be holding that group back, let’s look at the 8% who do reach their goals—to understand what high achievers do differently. The people in that 8% come from every walk of life. They’re married, single or divorced, with higher or lower levels of education. They’re a mix of ages and backgrounds from around the world. But one thing they tend to have in common: a similar set of success-oriented mindsets that guide their thoughts and actions.
The fact is, no matter where you are in life or where you come from, you have the ability to set goals, change your mindset in a meaningful way and achieve them.
One clear way to see if you need a mindset refresh is to ask yourself: Do you regularly achieve your goals and live your dreams? If you answered “yes,” read on and you’ll probably recognise why. If you answered “no,” the seven steps below can help guide you toward reaching your goals.
7 ways to change your mindset today:
Accept that your thinking may need to shift – We’ve all had goals and dreams that didn’t turn out as we hoped or expected. When that keeps happening, we start to wonder what needs to change. We rarely look inward, at our own thinking, as the place to start.
We live in a society that emphasises ability and learning new skills or improving the ones we’re weaker at. That often reinforces the belief that we need more training to achieve our goals.
Some people go back to school, others take workshops and seminars or read books, always searching for that one skill they’re missing that will make everything fall into place.
Without underestimating the value of skills, it’s often our mindset that needs to shift. The good news is that changing your mindset is usually far less costly and much faster than learning a new skill. So the first step is simply to recognise that you may need to work on your mindsets.
Identify your “anti-mindsets” – Mindsets are shaped by past experiences and emotional milestones, and mindsets that don’t produce the results you want could be called anti-mindsets. Examples include self-doubt, limiting beliefs and any other negative thought patterns that get in the way of your fulfilment.
Around 65,000 thoughts pass through our minds every day. Unfortunately, for most people, many of them are negative. These automatic negative thoughts happen so often that we may not even notice them (most of us don’t).
You know that little inner voice that points out irresponsible spending when you look at your monthly budget? Or makes dismissive comments when you look in the mirror? We all know that voice. It makes you hesitate before approaching someone you’d like to meet. It makes you think twice before starting a business or considering a career change.
It’s hard to stay positive when that small voice keeps piping up with things like: “I can’t talk to her,” “I’m not smart enough,” “I’m not in shape,” “I don’t have the qualifications” … blah, blah, blah.
The way to start loosening the grip of those doubts is to start paying attention to them. Notice when you hear that critical voice and how often it happens. You’ll probably find that your limiting thoughts cluster around a few main themes. Writing this down is an important step—we can’t change what we haven’t recognised.
Flip the switch – Once you’ve spotted your main negative thoughts, you need a way to stop them from holding you back. A useful technique is sometimes called “flipping the switch”: shifting your thoughts from negative to positive.
One effective approach is an “if/then” plan. Once you know when your limiting thoughts usually show up, use a thought process that lets you literally think your way past them. Here’s an example: Say you plan to go for a walk after dinner to get more exercise, but when dinner’s over, the negative thoughts kick in. If you start hearing the voice in your head saying you’re too tired, too full or that you’ll never lose weight anyway, then go straight to the cupboard and put on your running shoes.
Often, one small step in the right direction is enough to quiet those self-limiting thoughts.
Understand your “why” – Changing your mindset takes work, because habits we’ve formed aren’t easy to break. That’s especially true when many of our most unhelpful habits and anti-mindsets were formed in childhood and we’ve been doing things the same way ever since. Understanding your “why” means going back to the beginning and choosing a goal or dream that, when you achieve it, would mean a real shift—losing weight, being happier at work, improving your relationship with your partner. Choose something that could have a meaningful impact on your life. After all, if it’s going to take effort, it may as well be for something that matters, right?
Once you’ve identified your “why,” write on paper or in a notebook why it really matters to you. Not on a computer … on paper, in your own handwriting. That’s an important part of building your motivation.
Recognise that motivation and willpower aren’t enough – Most people mistakenly believe that motivation and willpower are all they need to reach their goals. It’s no wonder, since that’s the kind of advice we often hear from friends and family to motivational gurus and life coaches.
I asked you to write down your big “why” in step four because that’s where motivation starts. But we all know that motivation can be hard to sustain, no matter how important the goal—and that’s when willpower is supposed to kick in.
Recent research on the brain suggests that willpower works like a reservoir. You start with a full tank, but you use up your supply a little every time you draw on it.
You try to eat more healthily, then you go to work and a colleague celebrating something offers you cake. What do you do? You draw on your willpower and resist. Good for you! Then you plan to go to the gym after work, but you end up staying late to deal with a client issue. Your willpower has already been used up, and the extra stress of not sticking to your plan doesn’t help. Do you make it to the gym? You know the answer—it’s happened to all of us.
It doesn’t take long to give up and abandon our goals when we rely on motivation and willpower alone. They’re not always enough. That’s why around 25% of people drop a goal after the first week and about 60% give up after the first month.
High achievers understand this. So step five is simply about recognition—recognising that reaching your goals doesn’t mean you’ll get there just by wanting it.
When you accept that, you can stop mentally punishing yourself for slipping or failing to stick to your plan. That can leave you freer emotionally to try again with optimism tomorrow! (We’ll say more about this in step 7.)
Start with tiny goals so you can reach the big ones – This is one of the best ways to change your mindset and make your dreams happen. Start by setting ridiculously small, totally achievable goals.
How small? How about this: one push-up.
If your big goal is to exercise every day, then your small, achievable goal is to do just one push-up each day. If you want to ease stress in your life, your tiny goal might be to meditate for one minute every evening.
Each of these examples requires almost no motivation or willpower to achieve. And yet each one is a step in the right direction. Here’s the trick: Decide that your tiny goal is the minimum, and that you can do more if you feel like it. Often you will do more and feel great about it. Some days you might only do the minimum—and you’ll still feel good because you met your goal.
How can such tiny goals really make a difference? Because lasting change often comes from small steps, repeated daily, that build momentum and add up to positive results over time. The top 8% of achievers get this, but most people never try this strategy because they think starting so small seems pointless. Wrong! Over time, consistently hitting your small goals will shape new mindset habits—and that’s real progress toward rewiring your thinking so you can achieve your bigger dreams.
Get comfortable with the possibility of failure – The steps above on how to change your mindset can help you move forward with more confidence toward your goals and dreams. But it’s important to understand that it will be hard work.
That’s why high achievers get comfortable with the idea of failure.
When most people hit a wall, they find an excuse or quit. High achievers realise that the only thing that will keep them from their goals is stopping trying … so they don’t stop. They know they’ll face obstacles and even fail along the way. What sets them apart from the other 92% is that they prepare for failure mentally. They know it’s coming and it doesn’t scare them or make them give up. When failure happens, they look for feedback and adjust so they can get back in the game.
You can do this by giving yourself permission to fail. That takes the pressure off achieving a perfect outcome and helps you stay ready to learn from mistakes and make adjustments that move you forward.
Changing your mindset doesn’t happen by chance—it happens by choice. A key part of the process is recognising the need for that change and then identifying the difference it could make in your life.
For more on breaking unhelpful patterns, see How to Spot Self-Sabotage and Overcome It and How to Recognize Negative Thought Patterns and Ease Rumination.
Happy Life Team
