{"id":2715,"date":"2012-02-17T12:01:47","date_gmt":"2012-02-17T17:01:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/?p=2715"},"modified":"2012-01-16T14:49:41","modified_gmt":"2012-01-16T19:49:41","slug":"look-just-ahead-as-you-keep-walking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/2012\/02\/look-just-ahead-as-you-keep-walking.html","title":{"rendered":"Look Just Ahead as You Keep Walking"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Have you kept any of your resolutions yet? Or have they already gone out of your life with the holiday decorations? As I discussed in my post, Set New Year’s Intentions<\/strong><\/a>, it\u2019s so easy to make resolutions about things you\u2019re going to do down the road and so hard to keep them when you get down the road.<\/p>\n

One big reason people fail to keep their resolution or reach their goals is they look far ahead and focus on the ultimate outcome instead of the steps to getting what you want. Knowing your big goal is fine. But it\u2019s so much easier to accomplish if you break down the path to it, step by step. Action by action. Small achievement by small achievement. On a long driving trip, there are many cities between you and your final destination. If all I\u2019d thought about was getting to Seattle when I drove across the country on my own, I\u2019d have been miserable and discouraged all the way.<\/p>\n

Over 3,000 miles would have seemed like an endless journey. Instead, I had a map with all the cities I\u2019d pass through and looked forward to reaching each one, knowing I was a little closer. I had to reach Cleveland and Billings and Chicago and many other cities before I could reach Seattle\u00a0 and reaching each felt good\u2014another step to finishing my journey. It made the trip much more pleasant and I found things to enjoy along the way.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the same with goals. The most important part of getting the outcome you want is all the steps you need to take to reach it. Yet I continue to hear people with lofty goals complain that they feel frustrated because they haven\u2019t reached them yet. Many have made progress but they\u2019re too busy looking far ahead to recognize that. Big general goals with no actionable steps often go unfulfilled. For example:<\/p>\n

\u2022\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u201cI want to lose 25 pounds.\u201d<\/strong> That\u2019s a lot to take off and it can actually take years. But losing one pound is still an accomplishment. Then you can focus on losing another. You can\u2019t lose 25 pounds until after you lose one. Make a chart with 1-25 on it. Each time you lose a pound and keep it off for at least a week, cross out 1, then 2 and so on. Rejoice in crossing off each one! And keep in mind that the slower you take off pounds, the more likely you are to keep them off.<\/p>\n

\u2022\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u201cI want to double my income!\u201d<\/strong> Once again, making even a little bit more than you did before is a step to doubling your income.\u00a0 Appreciating it helps you attract the energy to earn even more. The more you focus on increasing your income a little at a time, the more each step up feels good. As I said in my Law of Attraction Post, Appreciating Life Right Now<\/strong><\/a>, the more you feel good about what you have right now, the more good you attract.<\/p>\n

\u2022\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u201cI don\u2019t want to be a DoorMat anymore!\u201d<\/strong> It took me years to leave DoorMatville and even more to get where I am today. Had I not appreciated every bit of progress along the way, I\u2019d have given up early on. But I made each time I said \u201cno\u201d to something I didn\u2019t want to do a victory. I appreciated each little bit of\u00a0 love I eked out for myself. Slowly my progress got faster as I relished what I\u2019d already accomplished. It\u2019s hard to get on the express train out of DoorMatville. The slow, steady route allows you time to get used to changes, and how people treat you when you change, so the progress sticks and you don\u2019t end up back where you began.<\/p>\n

A big key to change is patience. When you can just look ahead to the first thing you must do to reach your goals, it makes reaching them easier. And it feels better to appreciate each step instead of just looking at what you want as the end result and feeling like it will be a tough road to reach. When I run in the park, I focus on the path just ahead of me instead of looking ahead to how far I must go before I can stop. It helps me enjoy the run more and I don\u2019t let the long distance discourage me.<\/p>\n

Like feels much better when you appreciate every step you take to reach big goals. And that mentality make it much less likely you\u2019ll give up when things get tough. Love yourself enough to appreciate small victories so they can add up to bigger ones instead of beating yourself up for not making more progress! You get the best results that way and will enjoy the journey!<\/p>\n

Please leave comments under my posts so we can stay connected.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Have you kept any of your resolutions yet? Or have they already gone out of your life with the holiday decorations? As I discussed in my post, Set New Year’s Intentions, it\u2019s so easy to make resolutions about things you\u2019re going to do down the road and so hard to keep them when you get…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,15],"tags":[286,88],"class_list":["post-2715","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-self-empowerment-confidence","category-self-love-acceptance","tag-reaching-goals","tag-self-empowerment"],"yoast_head":"\nLook Just Ahead as You Keep Walking - Lessons from a Recovering Doormat<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/2012\/02\/look-just-ahead-as-you-keep-walking.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Look Just Ahead as You Keep Walking - Lessons from a Recovering Doormat\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Have you kept any of your resolutions yet? Or have they already gone out of your life with the holiday decorations? 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Let Me Count the Ways, a She's appeared on hundreds of TV and radio shows, including Oprah, Howard Stern, and Good Morning America and has been quoted in dozens of publications, including the New York Times, Chicago Sun-Times, Cosmopolitan, Redbook, Marie Claire, and Men\u00b9s Health. After being a consummate People Pleaser who felt unworthy of getting her own needs met for many years, Daylle found a path of self-love that enabled her to build her self-esteem and reinvent herself into a dual career. She learned to get taken seriously without being overtly assertive when she became one of the first women to start an independent record label (on a dare!) and learned to play ball nicely and successfully in an industry dominated by men. To help independent musicians empower themselves, Daylle writes music business books for Billboard\/Random House, including the very popular Start & Run Your Own Record Labe and I Don't Need a Record Deal! Daylle's books have been translated into over 10 languages and are popular around the world. She speaks for colleges, organizations and corporations. Through her company, Project Self-Empowerment, Daylle creates programs and materials to help people empower themselves. One goal is to raise the money to self-publish her book, How Do I Love Me? Let Me Count the Ways and give it away for free in colleges and through organizations, to give thanks for all her blessings. Daylle uses her writing and speaking to help others find the kind of contentment and empowerment that she has.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/author\/dschwartz"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2715","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2715"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2715\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2717,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2715\/revisions\/2717"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2715"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2715"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2715"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}