Most people will tell you that you need to share your goals with others. That it is a good idea to tell about your plans to as many people around you, because they can hold you responsible and motivate you. Off course this sounds pretty good. Your friends and family are the ones that want you to succeed right?
Well not really. Those are just another bunch of naysayers. They will start to talk your ideas out of your head. But luckily your own motivation and ambition will make sure you get where you wanted! Or not?
Great way to scare your friends
First of all lots of your friends and family have similar ideas and dreams to take real action and changing their lives. Although most of them are too afraid to start taking action and chase their dreams. Everybody is afraid of failure, but they’re even more afraid of seeing someone close achieving the things they were scared of.
On the other hand your family and friends have already known you for a long time. They know you the way you are at the moment.. They’ve seen you grow and get to the point where you are now. Your parents have been there from the beginning. And you chose your friends for the good times you had together throughout the years.
When you announce your plans to them they become afraid. Afraid of you changing as a person because you are planning on doing the things different than you’ve always done. They know how you are now, but they don’t know how you will become. Will you still have the time for them? Will you still have the time to be there for them if they need it?
Your friends want you to go to the bar with them, although you now have things more important to do. You have decided what you want with your life. Even better, you’ve planned the actions you need to take to get closer to your goals.
So it is not really that they don’t want you to succeed, they’re just too scared of you not being the person they got used to. And people naturally fear change in their lives.
Scientific proof for not-sharing
Besides all the external factors of why you should not be sharing your big plans with the world there are also internal factors. There have been tests since 1933 that show that people who share their plans and goals are more likely to fail.
Due to the fact that you will feel satisfied when you announce your plans to someone. This gives you a small boost in your self-identity which will make you less motivated to follow through on your goals.
It has been researched by W. Mahler that your brain will see your announced plans to the world as a reality for your satisfactory needs. By speaking about it your brain will see it as achieved, even if there has not yet been any action towards the solution.
“Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe it can achieve” – Napoleon Hill
Other tests have found that those who didn’t share their intentions were more likely to achieve them, compared to those who made them public. Telling your plans to anybody will give you a premature sense of completeness.
Your brain won’t support you either
Your brain uses symbols to create your self-image. Both your actions and your talking create these signals for your brain. Your actions contribute to your self-image, but also does your talking.
Apparently you’re talking already satisfies your brain enough to create a positive self-image. It is even so strong that it won’t search for further symbols, like your real actions towards your goals.
The same seems to be true for achieving sub goals on your way to your end goal. If your end goal is to lose weight. And you have set several sub goals to get you there.
You choose to be go on a healthy diet, and to spend more hours in the gym. What happens when you don’t really feel like going to the gym, after your already had your healthy dinner that night?
You start rationalizing your sub goal of going to the gym with your already achieved sub goal of eating healthier. They are both for the same end goal, so it wouldn’t be too bad not to go to the gym tonight since you already ate so healthy.
Change your procedure
So whether it is because you don’t want the people around you talking your plans out of your head. Or that you don’t want your brain to fool you out of following through. From now on never share your goals with others.
Start working on your plans and make sure you keep an eye on your goals. The people around you will notice that there might be something different about you. They’re going to see that you are making different choices lately. And they will be asking why that is.
Give them some information about your ideas, but never tell them all your dreams. Stay vague about what you are really working on. Off course you still do want to share your plans with others and you’ll do all you can to ignore all the negative feedback you’re going to receive. Then the most important thing to do is to be aware of the trap your own brain has for you.
Keep focused on your end goal and make sure you’re still going after the sub goals you’ve set. Even though you already had some small successes on the road. You didn’t plan for those small successes, you planned your path to massive success.
Small achievements are great to get your momentum going, but never confuse them for an end goal.