About Steven AitchisonA lot of us in life don’t achieve the things we want to achieve for a lot of different reasons. I believe one of the main reasons is that we are not confident about where we are going. We over analyse, over question, over prepare, over fret, over everything.
Think about it : When you go on holiday abroad and I was to ask you a few questions such as:
Where are you going?
France
Where about in France?
Paris
What hotel?
Hotel De Crillon
Who are you going with?
My wife and two children
What Airline are you using?
American Airlines
Where are you flying from?
JFK
What time is your flight?
2pm
etc etc etc
When you go on holiday you are totally confident about where you are going to. You don’t necessarily know what’s going to happen when you get there, or if there are going to be delays, but no matter what, you are booked on a trip and you know exactly where you are going.
Why don’t we do this in life?
Book a goal and just go there. It doesn’t matter how you get there, but just be confident that you will get there. Don’t worry about it being realistic, just book it and starting walking toward it.
This is not another motivational article saying ‘dream big, visualise, see it in your mind and it will manifest itself’. This is an article about being confident that you are going to reach your goal.
When I coached a client recently and asked them what they want to do in life, I got back the answer: I would love to be an artist. I asked them if they had painted anything and he advised he had, I then congratulated him on becoming an artist. Somewhat confused he said he hadn’t sold any of his work so he is not an artist. ‘Ah’ I said, so you don’t want to be an artist, you want to be someone who gets paid for their artwork? Isn’t that what all artists want? ‘Not necessarily’ I replied, artists paint because they love to paint, they don’t necessarily need the recognition for them to be confident about their artwork. He replied he wanted to be recognised as a great artist. I asked him, recognised by who? An art critic who has never painted in his life or by someone who doesn’t recognise the meticulous brush strokes he used when creating his artwork only for them to buy it because it would go well with their bedroom colour scheme.
If you want to be an artist, paint a picture and call yourself an artist and brush up on your skills whilst painting more pictures (pardon the pun 
)
If you want to be a writer, write a book and call yourself the author of (fill in the blank) and keep writing because you love to.
If you want to ride in the Tour De France, get of your arse, start peddling and make it happen
The need to over (everything), it
We have this need sometimes, to over analyse things and put barriers in our way. If you have a goal in life all you need to do is be confident about your goal, know, within yourself, why you are doing it, get passionate about it and keep your eye on the goal at all times.
Deal with the hurdles as they turn up, but don’t create the hurdles before they turn up,
Deal with the stress when it arises, but don’t create the stress before you get there,
Listen to others opinions about your goals, but don’t let the opinions put you off,
Deal with what you will do when you get there, when you get there, but don’t analyse what you will do before you get there, as you will never get there.
Don’t stop to think about it, go with the flow whilst your goal is hot and passionate and turn your ‘I’m going to……’ into ‘I am….’
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Steven
Thank you for a really enjoyable post.
At the end of the day we can work out what we want to achieve; we can plan our path forward – when the planning stage is over it is all down to action.
Lack of confidence is such a life spoiler.
Marion recently posted..How to Succed with Success
Hi Marion. You’re right it’s a shame that a lot of us are not confident about where we are going in life. If we can keep our eye on the goal and not the outcome we can certainly get there a lot quicker.
Hi Steve,
I am going to start paying a lot more attention to your blog. It seems to dovetail nicely with where I am in life, at middle-age looking to created a life built on dreams, yet make them real. Thanks for your comment!
Hi Tim, I sorted the mixup there
Thanks for your comments. I think middle age is a great place to be in life, we have the confidence to know that what others think of us doesn’t really matter and the strength to keep going with our plans in life.
Steven:
Great post and so true … sometimes it really is all about getting out of our own way. I have noticed how easy it is to encumber your mind with doubts and feelings that work against you. And, when we notice that our minds have been littered with non-productive thoughts, we have to do anything and everything we can to clean them up. It is often a step by step process and there has to be a continual commitment to clear your mind of negative thoughts and doubt. Thanks for the great insights and advice.
Hi Sibyl, thanks for your comments, always insightful. We can be our own worst enemy sometimes and it can be hard to get out of that loop, but it’s well worth the effort of keeping our eye on the goal and just getting our heads down and charging toward it.
Hi Steven:
I’m agree totally with you.
The most common obstacle for success is lack of self-confidence. The “cure” for it is goal planning it is excellent for confidence building in you and the process. And after that and as important is taking action. Also in the personal development literature you can read “act as if” (again take ACTION), as you say decide what you want to be and start doing it (acting as if you already are it), because you actually are it.
The problem you mention we can call it the syndrome of analysis paralysis, want to do perfect the first time, we have to do it the best we can and fine tuning in the process.
I suggest this formula for self Confidence – Success: passion + planning + action = success
Here are some of my post about self confidence: http://www.selfhelp360.com/category/self-confidence/
Regards…
Melvin Ramos recently posted..How to Improve Your Memory
Hi Melvin thanks for your comments and the link to your post.
Great post.
One way to gain confidence for your goals is to do some rational thinking, and a little background research, such as how many people have achieved what you want to accomplish, how long it took them, what their situations were when they got started compared to what you now have or are, how different are they than you are, what are the things that you think will prevent you achieving the same things hundreds of thousands of people have already achieved…
Once we go through this list, we often find that most life goals aren’t that difficult or impossible, it’s just a matter of keeping a postive attitude and moving one step at a time… I think that’s where you gain real confidence from.
Hi Harry. It’s great to do the research, but sometimes it can also get in the way and we say to ourselves ‘well they were born with money’ or ‘They had lots of contacts to help them’, we start finding excuses not to do it when we look at how other people achieved their goal. I think it would be best to look to others for inspiration but don’t analyse, too much, how they got there unless they are on the exact same path and were in the exact same situation as you.
Thanks for your insights Harry.
hello steve,
how are you?
thanks for bringing some home truths here.
from my experience, once i spend time over analyzing issues(i call it being extremely logical), i end up not pursuing that thought, goal or activity. In recent times i just dive in, although with my eyes open to see the obstacles in my way. it’s a learning curve and there’s experience gained.
There’s also something called constant practice. it builds self confidence and gives us that oomph!!! once we begin to feel at ease and realise we can accomplish what we’ve set out to do.
Take care of yourself and have a lovely week.
p.s. please look out for my email thanks
Hi Ayo, doing great buddy, still loving life and going for it
How about you?
Paralysis by analysis can be a major problem in achieving our goals in life. I love the idea of constant practice for building our confidence.
I’ll keep an eye out for your emails.
Steven,
Thanks for the insight; I am really bad at over-analyzing a situation. I’ve done it so much in my lifetime, I doubted my own common sense and intelligence that exists with me all the time. Middle age has been a great time for me to at last rid myself of the overthinking and really spread my wings to the possibilities. I’ve also listened to Mike Hernacki’s recording, “Absolutely Anything You Want” and he says that rather than thinking you have to do everything, just be willing to do what it takes FOR YOU to achieve your goals. And then do it. Thanks very much for the “kick in the arse”!!! Love and Light
Hi Lauren, it’s my pleasure giving you a swift ‘kick in the arse’
I’ve never heard of Mike Hernacki, will need to check him out.
Thanks for you comment and the recommendation Lauren.
I think the root problem here is thinking to much of ourselves and not others. If we focus on others more, we focus less on ourselves. “Other” focused goes a long way.
Colleen recently posted..Tagaris Winery to Conduct First Annual Vineyard Trip to Wahluke Slope
Hi Colleen. I think you have made a good point here.
Thank you Steve for simple wisdom! I have been tossing around the idea of going back to massage school for some time now and I have been doing exactly what you talked about! I am 55,am I too old,will I really like it when I finish,will I like the extra drive to school and back,can I work and go to school too and on and on and on…..!I think I’ll just DO IT!!!!Hey you might want to check out AccessConsciousness.com. I think you might like it! Love and Light,Cindy
Hi Cindy, go for it and let us know how you get on. thanks for the link.
Hello Steven, very interesting post. We have to descide every day what we want to achieve and what we don’t want to achieve – and this descision is not easy in a lot of situations. We should always try to be confident, that makes our life much better. You can be more confident, if you don’t thing about what the others think of you. That is a very important awareness. So just go on your path.
Hi, thanks for your comment, I really appreciate it.
It’s all about maintaining your composure with every adventure you take on. If you want to be the best with woman( for example). Just relax and confidently expect to succeed. Expect that everything is going according to plan and everything will happen when the time is ready. But just don’t sit on your ass. Get up and get out there. Talk to woman, meet different people. Don’t be socially awkward in bars or even club events. Get out and meet different people. The more action you take, the more success you will see within yourself. It’s about being consistent. If your consistent, your golden like Jill Scott.
Hi Jonathan, practice with anything certainly does make us more confident and like you say it’s all about getting off our arse and doing it.
Hi Steven,
That was exactly what I needed just now; thankyou so much for showing me back to my path … I thought I was done over-analysing, til I noticed this post and realised my whole day up til now has been spent talking myself out of any specific direction. It’s a bad habit of mine, and one I thought I’d got over. Each time it gets easier to turn-around tho, and now I’m excited about my next push of inspiration ;0)
Hi Kathryn, I am glad this post helped you in some way.
Nicely said, Steve. I’ve had similar conversations with clients, about being artists, writers, musicians, etc. About being all sorts of things, actually. Somehow we’ve gotten to this place where we think we need to have achieved a certain level of fame or success before we can name and claim ourselves. And we look outside of ourselves for validation, never getting it, of course, because we’ve never done the naming and claiming. And then we never do the work. And then, of course, the dream fades, leaving behind a bitter taste and an unmet yearning. I hope I’m not sounding too bleak, but I’ve seen the cycle so many times. Bottom line, though, is that who we are and what we do is an inside job, and we’re the ones responsible for shouting that to the world. Because the world won’t come to us, but rather we must go to it.
Patty – Why Not Start Now? recently posted..Meaning Mondays- Life As Collage
Hi Patty. Sometimes it can be frustrating when talking with clients as you know, sometimes, what the person is capable of and you have to find ways to make them believe it. I think we all look for validation in some way, I look for it everyday on my blog
but it’s about being confident in our own abilities. Thanks as always for your insightful comments.
Steven, your blog post is very pertinent to where I am at right now. I am just getting started in a new venture, and it is a rather big change from what I have been doing. Although I felt confident to start out, each step to building my own business seems to take a little longer than I anticipated, and with it the constant question wells up in the back of my mind – will it work.
This line was the most meaningful to me:
“Deal with the hurdles as they turn up, but don’t create the hurdles before they turn up,”
Vernon recently posted..Fun Wildlife
Hi Vernon. I know what you mean and have been where you are, it’s a matter of keeping the head down and staying excited about your goal and deal with things as they come up, you’ve made the hardest step and that is starting your venture. Good luck Vernon.
Hi Steven,
I agree with you completely….somehow it makes more sense to hit your goals when they are hot and pumping within us..with a life of their very own.
{hint- 2nd ebook on the way}
You have gotten me all pumped up after reading this post
I have had a few things going on at the back of my mind…and this awesome articles, just brought all those in the forefront
Much love,
Z~
Hi zeenat, I knew there’d be another book coming out soon
I am so glad this article helped in some way and I am looking forward to your next book.
My mind can be my best friend and worst enemy! I loved your comparison of a goal to a vaction. I will be “Booking goals” instead of stetting them
In regards to fears and anxiety, I have to be aware that I am the one creating them, thus I can be the one to destroy them.
Another great article!
Hi Katie, you said it perfectly: ‘I can be the one to destroy them’. Thanks for you comments, always appreciated.
This blog post couldn’t have come at a better time. Katie, I like your comment about “booking goals”…well said! I, too, over analyze and just need to get back to “ready, fire, aim”.
Hi Stacy, I am glad this post helped in some way.
Very nice post Steven. Whenever we set a goal, we should be confident that we are going to get it. We don’t have to know how or when just be confident that we will. Thanks for sharing
Dia recently posted..How to be happy
Hi Dia, it’s all about the confidence and that comes from the inside. Thanks for you comment Dia
Hey Steven
Another excellent post.
Why do we create all these little negative things that we put in our way of achieving success?
Maybe because what we want is out of our comfort zone
Peter Fuller MBA recently posted..Does Your Home Business Make You Feel Uncomfortable
Hi Peter thanks for your comment here. I think our comfort zones have a lot to answer for
Hi Steven,
I like your analogy. Many folks drift through their lives taking any road that comes along, simply because they have been told, “it really doesnt matter.” That kind of thinking feeds into a mood of hopelessness and lackluster living (like your artist client). Fresh energy stirs deep inside when we turn up the volume to “I make a difference, and really does matter what I do.” When we are convinced that our life and our decisions really matter, our powerful nature suddenly strikes through.
Hi Rob as always you add a bit more to the conversation. Convincing ourselves that what we are doing really matters in life is another feeling to cultivate in ourselves. It can sometimes simply be a matter of repeating ‘I am making a difference’.
Hi Steven. This is such a powerful, juicy analogy. Powerful because you present this article with the force of such simplicity.
I’m not sure, but I think the Hotel de Crillon is a rather nice hotel. Maybe a bit like the Savoy? Anyway, what is up for me right now is making a journey to abundance.
I believe I actually have the ticket in my pocket at last and I may even be on the plane. Hey. I believe the plane is actually taking off.
Now just to keep my confidence level high and strong. How can I not get to where I’m going? There’s a beautiful saying from the Bible: “In quietness and confidence shall be my strength.”
Good to share the way of life with you Steven and thank you for your many kindnesses to me.
Christopher Foster recently posted..How to make change a friend and not a foe
Hi Chris, I know your plane is booked and your destination has been set, it’s a matter of getting on the plane and relaxing and enjoying the ride. With you all the way Chris.
Very nice post Steven, thanks for boosting up my morale, i feel so good and charged after reading it, thanks !!!!
Hi Jatin, thanks for your comment, much appreciated.
Hi Steven,
It is so easy to say I’ll do that when……I would do it but…..etc etc. So I agree it is best to just get on with it.
Although when planning longer term goals I think it is important to realise there will be challenges and try and plan for these if possible. ……but never let them stop you getting started!
Kate recently posted..Lovely Lists!
Hi kate, You’re right, there is still an element of planning involved it’s about not getting struck in the planning stage.
Great and inspiring post! It can be really tough to shift our view of who we are to who we want to be. We give ourselves strict limits on what we can do or what we need to achieve to be “official.” This can be limiting and much less enjoyable. If we can learn to enjoy the process and really do what we love the pieces will eventually come together. Thanks!
Hi Joe, thanks for your comments on this. i think learning to enjoy ourselves in everything we do is great advice.
I enjoy reading it.Sometimes we just got confused when something bad happen and thing are not be as we plan but I believe all we need to do is get up and back to track…
eddyjason recently posted..Stop The Cramming
Hi Eddy, thanks for you comment, much appreciated.
Ha! I love the simplicity of this: “Book a goal and just go there.” You’re totally right Steven – we tend to get star struck by the perceived enormity of a goal.
I’ve learned in life that it’s a lot better to take small steps. Get from A to B, without knowing the rest of the road map. Once at B – you miraculously see how to get to C and so on. Life is a journey, so it implies traveling/movement not standing still.
Hi Anita, thanks for your comment. I think you’ve got a great attitude toward your goals, I guess it’s the same for fitness and health: take it one step at a time but just do it.
Very inspiring post, Steven! And very true words written here. Thanks a lot for sharing, I really enjoyed it.