Okay, so you’ve set your intentions and decided that this is the year that you’re finally going to build your very own business. You’re going to create something that you love, that truly has an impact and brings in real revenue. Now what? The risk is that this year, like every other year, progresses without a lot of tangible results to show for it. Recognising all the things that stop your from achieving your goals will help you to anticipate and overcome those blocks.
Things that stop you from achieving your goals
So what might get in the way? Let’s group the most common blocks into three buckets:
- Your mindset
- Your planning
- Your implementation
There may well be unforeseen events and circumstances that throw a spanner in the works but the truth is that the biggest block is usually you (that’s the bad news) – which means that most things can be controlled and overcome (and that’s the good news!).
1. Your mindset
The first thing that can get in the way is your mindset. It starts with knowing what you want and why you want it – this is about defining success, something that I’m always going on about! If you’re not super clear on, and truly committed to, that bigger vision, then you’re never going to achieve it. What exactly are you trying to achieve? Why is it important to you? How will your life change for the better if you succeed?
Even when you are clear on the vision, you’ll often hold yourself back, consciously or unconsciously, and sabotage your efforts because of underlying beliefs and fears. For example, your fear of failure and all those ‘what ifs’ can keep you from properly going for what you want, as it can feel safer not to try at all. You may experience self-doubt – “I can’t do this”, “I’m not an entrepreneur”, “I’m not X enough” – and this becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you don’t believe in yourself, why should anyone else? How will you ever stay the course if you don’t have faith in yourself and your abilities?
Where do you think your beliefs and fears limiting what you think you can do and therefore limiting what you can do?
2. Your planning
After mindset comes the plan and, predictably, the complete lack of a plan can be a big obstacle to getting to where you want to be [see Why quitting without a plan is not such a good idea after all]. Especially when it comes to this kind of massive change, there are different stages and steps to work through, and if you have no idea of what those are then how can you ever hope to work through them all?
When it comes to your business idea specifically, if you don’t have a clear business model and a marketing and sales plan to support it, you’re not going to be able to reach your goals. Are you clear on who is your target client or customer? What’s your value proposition? What are your key revenue streams? How will you reach your potential customers and how will you convert them to make a sale? What are your specific targets and what actions do you need to take to reach them?
What are the action steps you need to take to make this transition from where you are today to where you want to get to? What are the milestones and deadlines? Do you have a clear plan for your business? Do you know how you’re going to make money? Do you even know how much money you’ll need to make in order for it to become a viable business? The planning stage is not very sexy but it’s pretty critical to making it happen!
3. Your implementation
Finally – and this is probably where you feel like you have the biggest problems, as it’s where the symptoms are most visible – you may come across obstacles in the execution of your vision and plan, the implementation. Again, it starts with goals: if you don’t have clear goals, or you have the wrong goals, then you’ll find that you won’t succeed at implementing them. The same goes for priorities: if you’re unclear on your priorities, you’re not going to be able to juggle them effectively. You may feel like you lack discipline in implementing your plan – assuming you have meaningful goals in place in the first place, it comes down to having the right structures and systems in place to support those goals.
Another barrier can be a lack of skills or experience that you need in order to implement your plan, meaning that you’ll waste time doing things the long way or even the wrong way. Finally, if you don’t have a support system – both in terms of emotional support (friends, peers, online and offline groups) and professional support (coaches, mentors, experts) – then you’re likely to struggle.
Now, it might seem a bit negative to focus on all the things that stop you from achieving your goals, but getting clear upfront on what’s going wrong, or all the things that can go wrong, will allow you to address those things, get the help you need, and overcome those obstacles.
So what’s getting in your way right now – and what can you do to leap over those obstacles and keep moving closer towards your goals?
If you’re not sure what’s getting in your way, or if you want to talk about how I can help you to overcome these blocks, then book a free consultation call with me here >>
