scott stonehouse

As the New Year is about to begin and many are about to set New Year’s resolutions, I would like to encourage you to Focus on Process over Goals.

Goals are important. They provide a target and help set direction.

Process is more important because it is how you reach the goal.

People often get stuck or give up when they focus on the goal. When the goal is big or in a more distant future it can be hard to see progress and easy to get discouraged.

Focusing on the process, however, allows you to see your progress toward the goal. The steps are smaller and the encouragement more immediate.

You completed a workout. You practiced for 10 minutes. You saved $25.

Habit or Activity Tracker cards are a helpful tool to reinforce this. You get a small reward each time you check the box and you see your progress build over time.

The other reason to focus on process over goals is that goals are temporary. You achieve them. Great! Then what?

The real goal isn’t the goal but who you become in achieving the goal. It’s your character. Your identity. That gets expressed in your repeated actions. From that perspective, you succeed every time you act according to your identity, at each step of the process, not simply when you achieve the goal.

This year, Focus on Process over Goals.