Now this might seem like an oxymoron. Is it realistic to reach for the stars? When you want to achieve your goals, how do you reach for the stars while maintaining realistic expectations?
1. Assessing whether you have unrealistic expectations
Unrealistic expectations stem from common misconceptions. For example, when talking about entrepreneurs and success in business, we often think that they’ve achieved overnight success. The successes, rather than the failures, are what draws attention and gets the most reactions on social media. People will rarely publicize the struggles that they’ve encountered during their entrepreneurship journey.
If all you consume is social media, this causes you to have unrealistic expectations of your own goals. Sure, setting the bar high helps you dream big and fuels your ambition. But when you have goals or ideals that you can’t reach, you easily become discouraged.
So if you think that entrepreneurs achieve success with very minimal effort, you will probably be shocked when you find that success requires toil and perseverance. Lots of it. Entrepreneurs have sleepless nights, worrying whether they have enough funds to pay the bills.
Sometimes you can get carried away by reaching for the stars, which causes you to have unrealistic expectations. That’s why a reality check is good to have every so often, and ask yourself if what you expect to achieve is realistic.
2. How to reach your goal without getting discouraged
When you reach for the stars, you expect things from yourself, and when you don’t meet your own expectations, you feel dissatisfied. But you need to walk before you can run. You can’t give up too easily, or be too hard on yourself.
Discouragement is the enemy of progress, or the perception of progress. You can have a lofty goal that seems miles away, but in reality, you have actually made it one step closer with your blood, sweat, and tears – you just can’t see the results yet. The incremental steps towards your goals appear invisible, until all of a sudden, that momentum picks up and you’re off to the stars.
This happens frequently if your personality type tends towards perfectionism.
It’s noble to strive for that perfect ideal, but it can easily discourage you if your results are less than perfect.
Think of major goals as subgoals, or smaller steps. Attaining that one small step will fuel your motivation to take another step. So if you find it hard to get started on achieving your goals, take the first step, then the next.
3. Stay realistic by evaluating your expectations
Are your expectations grounded in reality?
When you reach for the stars, it’s easy to forget about what’s realistic, and what’s not. To find out, first map out a timeline for your goals, and give yourself room for setbacks. No matter how closely you follow your plans, you will most likely experience setbacks on your journey. Then review this timeline. Is it realistic? Are you expecting to do too much in too little time? Some people will plan out an entire year thinking that they will do everything on their to-do list. But when they miss one of them, everything seems to fall apart, and their progress is stalled.
As mentioned previously, success rarely materializes overnight, and that includes having plans that run smoothly without encountering any barriers.
What can you do about unrealistic goals?
Rewrite the timeline you’ve set for achieving each goal, and give the timeline some flexibility. By having flexibility in your plan, you’re more likely to reach your goal. Decrease the number of goals that you plan on achieving for the year. Sometimes, you’re so ambitious that you plan on achieving too many goals. Be realistic, and pick the ones that have the most return on the time that you invest into the goal. By prioritizing your goals, you are much more focused and less distracted by the least important goals.
4. Be rewarded for that first step
Most people will have goals, but not the motivation to reach them. That’s why you must set up a reward system for your hard work. Rewards are what motivates you to do more of something and to keep on going. To incentivize yourself to reach your goals, be sure to reward yourself for that first step.
That first step is the most challenging, with the most barriers. There’s a lot of negative self-talk that may hinder you from even starting to achieve your goals. This is why it’s important to reward yourself for trying.
During our journey in reaching for the stars, it pays to stay realistic, and to reward yourself for sticking to an achievable goal. Instead of thinking of your goal in terms of the end result, think of it in terms of the path that got you to the first step. In changing how you think about reaching for the stars, you are more realistic, and more likely to arrive at the destination that you’ve been aiming for.