Let’s say your goal is to gain 15 pounds of pure muscle in 15 weeks. But when the deadline comes, you only manage to gain 10 pounds. Clearly, that is a failure to reach your goal. However, the important question is: “After you have failed to reach your goal, what do think?”
Did you ask yourself whether you have tried your best? How would you even know if you have tried your best?
I think the best question you should ask yourself is: “Did I do whatever it takes to reach the goal?”
The problem is, most of the time, you don’t even know what exactly it takes to reach your goals. And that is totally fine. Things arise along the journey and make the experience unique to each individual. There is simply no way you can predict exactly how the journey will pan out even before taking the first step. Maybe you set your goal a bit too high because of a lack of understanding of your current capacities. Or maybe you hurt your wrist and could not work out properly for a few weeks. Whatever the reason maybe, it’s important that you can say to yourself at the end: “I have tried my best.”
When you fail to reach your goal of gaining 15 pounds of muscle, you don’t have to answer to anyone else but YOU. There is no excuse for being dishonest to yourself. Looking back on the whole journey, you must be able to pinpoint exactly what you did wrong or inadequately. But more importantly, if you had tried your best, what would you have been able to prevent from happening?
If you are to ever get big, you have to hold yourself accountable. There is no boss and no penalty to push you forward. You are your own boss. You assign your own penalty for failing to reach your goal. You have to be strict to yourself. You must feel guilty for not reaching your goal. Your conscience must scream if you don’t get big. Only by examining whether you have tried your best can you determine if you should feel guilty or not.
However, it is not enough to wait till the end to ask yourself that all-important question. What is even more important than the fact that you have tried your best is the fact that you have REACHED your goal. Don’t wait until you fail, ask yourself these questions every day to make sure you are heading in the right direction:
- Am I doing whatever it takes to reach my goal?
- Is this the best way to do this? Can I improve on it?
- Am I trying my best?
- If I keep doing everything as I am now and fail to reach the goal, will I be regretful? What specifically will I regret not doing?
RECAP: Are you doing whatever it takes to reach your goal? Ask yourself that question everyday. It is okay to fail to reach your goal only if you have done your best. Did you?
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November 27th, 2009 → 9:20 pm @ nguyentuanhoa
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