How to Surpass High Expectations and Deliver Unimaginable Results Sometimes the solutions to most of our problems lie within ourselves and we seek for them all over
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"When you set your eyes on a goal and pursue it, the world conspires to make it work for you."
Life is all about setting expectations and making efforts to reach it. We have faced this all through our lives. It can be in our corporate life, as an entrepreneur, or even in your personal life from the people you love.
At work we face constant challenge from stakeholders expecting unimaginable outcomes with little support. Revenue, costs, sales targets, financial turnarounds and many more.
In our personal lives, we have many aspirations from wanting to learn a musical instrument to buying oneself that dream property or even winning an award which you have always only dreamt of.
Sometimes the solutions to most of our problems lie within ourselves and we seek for them all over.
How do we face large targets, challenges and expectations?
Everything Starts With the Mind
Conditioning our mind is an age-old discipline that has been practiced by great achievers all their lives. Our state of mind comes from our bodies. Hence the way we treat our body to positive energies would determine how our mind reacts to the conditioning.
After Roger Bannister ran that 4-minute mile, within just two years, 37 people also ran a 4-minute mile. And remember, no one in history had ever done that before. This is the power of imagery training. Thinking about the outcome and visualizing the same happening in your life.
- Visualization needs to happen within the environment that you operate in. This makes it real and connects to the actual incident.
- Imagery training is a ritual. One has to condition oneself over and over again so that you know without a shadow of a doubt that you will get the results you want.
Break Down Targets and Expectations
We all fret and fear when we get to hear about large, unimaginable targets and expectations from our stakeholders. The loss happens in the mind before we even begin the task. Considering you have conditioned your mind regarding the task the following could be done:
Break down the targets and expectations to small units per day/per hour and evaluate the same rationally. You will realize that when you break it down to the nearest time frame, the task seems more workable.
Breaking down these expectations to smaller units also needs to be done keeping in mind seasonality, external factors, environment, etc. Don't randomly break it down by the month-week-day equally. Be realistic.
Follow Up and Tracking Progress Daily
Make a rigorous tracking process. All the pains of conditioning your mind, living the dream, setting expectations won't yield results if progress is not being tracked like a hawk. Most organizations and individuals lose track of their vision due to sporadic review and not taking quick actions to fix issues on a daily basis. Hence, discipline like the army will need to be instilled in oneself and others to do this day in and day out. Only this rigour can bring positive outcomes.
Make Course Corrections if Needed
Don't change the goal. The strategy and route to achieve the goal can change.
Celebrate Small Successes
Celebration of small wins as well as large ones is a necessary part of achieving your dreams. If it's a self-achievement or the achievement of your team—celebrate it. Let your mind and body know that this is the reward for aligning with each other and achieving success.
"Victory belongs to the most preserving"—Napoleon.
Build your dreams, dream your progress and live the outcome. Go for it and don't look back.
