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The practice of goal-setting has been around for a long time. Every year people make New Years Resolutions where they want to accomplish something by the end of the year. More often than not, people get really motivated in January, start to fade in February, and have totally lost it by March.

Do you remember what a pre-COVID gym looks like in January? PACKED. Why do you think gyms run all of their promotions and ads during the holidays and around New Years? They want to capitalize on people’s resolutions.

But here’s the problem, let’s say someone actually follows through on their goal to run a marathon. They do all of the right things, start small and begin training early. Build up their miles per week until their race in late September. It’s finally race day and they complete their objective. They finish the race! Woohoo!

Now what? They stop running, right? Well yeah… They accomplished their goal. They ran a marathon. Now for October, November, and December they reward themselves with time off from their grueling workout schedule and strict diet.

After those three months, they start to notice that they’ve lost the muscle and their toned body that they worked so hard to develop. They have begun to revert back to their old selves. What did they actually do during this past year? They ran a marathon but did not become a runner.

I like to call this type of goal an objective and they can be way too binary. People can have objectives but what happens if when complete them? Or worse, what happens when they don’t? Are they a failure because they ran 24 miles instead of the 26.2 miles needed for a full marathon?

Objectives versus Processes

I believe people should frame their goal-setting around processes or habits rather than objectives. For example, my goal isn’t to run a marathon, it is to become a runner. I will do this by starting out by running 2 days a week or 5 miles a week. Then go up from there until it is no big deal to run 26.2 miles because I have a habit of doing it all the time.

The goal is not to do something, it is to become something.

James Clear, Atomic Habits

One goal I previously set for myself was to read 12 books in a year. I’m not a fast reader nor one that loved to read as a kid, so I thought one book a month would be good. What I should have done was make a goal to engrain a habit of reading X number of times or Y pages per week.

After a year of doing this, I would have a habit of reading and it wouldn’t matter how many books I got through, I would start to think of myself as a reader. I had to goal to create a self-improvement process by which my development would continue to compound on itself. The perception of my identity would change from one who didn’t like to read growing up to that of a devout reader who loves to gain knowledge from books.

Time Activates Momentum

Picture two people: one, Bob, who started working out 5 days a week for 2 hours each day for the past month. The other person, Joe, started working out 5 days a week for 30 min each day for the past month. Which one is going to reach their goal of having six-pack abs for the next 10 years (all other factors being the same)? After all, isn’t that what we are after? Continuous health over our lifetime?

You can probably guess where I’m going here but let me explain why my money is on Joe. It’s because his schedule is sustainable. Joe will be building a habit that lasts a lifetime, while Bob will most likely get burned out after a couple of months. Then Bob will relapse and have to build up his motivation all over again.

As Joe continues to work through his 30 min workout session, his body will start to expect them and crave them. After 12-24 months, he is on autopilot and not even thinking about working out anymore. His routine is set and his stead climb will start to show compounding results.

Over time, Joe’s habit of doing a little bit each day created momentum. And once that gets going, it’s almost harder to stop doing something than to keep going.

Do the work others won’t so you can have what others don’t.

Darren Hardy, Living Your Best Year Ever

At the end of the day, it is about hard work and effort consistently over long enough periods of time. That is where you will not only see a change in your fitness, but also in your relationships, career, net worth, mental and spiritual well-being, and all other parts of your life.

Just like the old fable of the tortoise and the hare, “Slow and steady wins the race.” So, let’s set goals around developing better habits in our lives. Let’s start small and make a consistent effort to do a little bit at a time to engrain this action into our daily lives. Then we can be that tortoise and build up to beating the hare in any marathon we want.