Achieving Personal Goals

Any professional coach, business leader or successful entrepreneur will likely tell you the same thing: Give me someone with heart, a/k/a drive, determination, passion and fierce commitment over a talented guy with a sense of entitlement any day.

So then, the question: How much ‘heart’, or commitment, do you have to reaching your goal? It’s a critical one, because if the goal is one of significance or difficulty, you’ll likely need to be committed to reach it. In study after study, goal commitment is cited as a key criteria correlated to goal achievement.

Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. – Calvin Coolidge

Harvey Mackay, New York Times best- selling author of Swim with the Sharks without Being Eaten Alive and the brand-new Use Your Head to Get Your Foot in the Door, says: “Heart matters in every human pursuit. In fact, I think it’s safe to say that heart trumps just about all the other senses when it comes to accomplishing the new and the unknown. Your goal may sound crazy, feel all wrong, look questionable, smell like failure and leave a funny taste in your mouth. But let your heart rule, and prepare to be amazed at the results.”

Consider this parable:
A zen master and his student were watching a
fox chase a rabbit.

The Zen Master said, “who will win?”

The student replied, “Master, of course the fox
will win, he is much faster than the rabbit and has
sharp teeth.”

“No” replied the master. “The rabbit will win. The
fox is running for a meal. The rabbit is running
for his life.”

When you’re running for your life, you’re just about impossible to stop. That’s ‘heart’.

There’s nothing wrong with not being committed to your goal – it may mean it’s something you’re not that passionate about. Better to understand that now though than to set the goal, work toward it for a while, fail then have to deal with explaining to yourself why you fell short. Failures get recorded in our psyche just like successes do, so don’t treat them lightly.

If any of this seems a little depressing, here’s reason for hope. Anyone can develop the habit of having heart or strong commitment to a task.