Episode 005 - Do the Damn Work

This is In Brief. Let's get to it. Hey there, this is the In Brief podcast where we take just a few minutes each week to dive into a topic that hopefully makes the post-military transition a bit easier and gives you a new perspective or a new thought to take into a new week. I'm Jordana, the CEO of the Recon Network, and this week we're talking about doing the damn work. A few weeks ago, we talked about setting goals and starting this year over with a clean slate. And for many of us, those big goals that we had at the beginning of the month are already fading out. We've forgotten what it was that we wanted to do or why we wanted to do it, or maybe they're stuck in the back of our heads, but it's lost among all the other stuff. Stuff in our life that has to be done, right? You know the drill. There's so much to do and so little time to do it in. But slowly you may be realizing that while goals are great, setting a goal doesn't actually get you anywhere. At some point you actually have to do the work to make the goal happen. And that's where a lot of people get stuck. If you've ever been through a goal setting workshop or walked through the process of setting goals, you may actually already know that there's one thing that stands between a goal Or a resolution failing, or it actually coming to fruition. And that's whether or not there is a plan in place. After all, setting a big idea in front of you is great. It may be really inspiring, but a plan is what actually turns that idea into an actionable process that leads to eventual success. So here's what I want you to do. What is the one big thing you wanted to accomplish in 2023? If you've already packed it away this year, yeah, we're only four weeks in, but it's happened. I promise you. Look at the statistics. If you've already packed it away, I want you to dust it off and bring it back into the light for a minute. Right? We're going to revisit this. We want to do a few simple things to help you establish a plan to actually get it done this year. It is not too late. You have not dropped the ball so much that it can't be retrieved. Right? So what we're going to do. The first thing that we're going to do is we're going to clarify the goal. And to do that, we're going to make sure it's a SMART goal. That isn't a knock on how logical it is. That's an acronym, and it stands for specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-based. Okay, so let's say that your goal is that you want to write a book this year. Oh, okay, that's, that's great. But just saying I want to write a book this year doesn't give you a lot to go on or really form a path forward, does it? So what we're going to do is we're going to use the SMART method to make it a really, really sticky goal and a really sticky idea for us. That looks a bit more like something: By September 30th, I will write a 50,000-word book that will be my first biographical novel. With that simple change, what we've done is we've made it specific. It'll be a biographical novel. It's measurable. We're shooting for about 50,000 words, so we know if we've hit that goal or not. It's attainable. It's not too big of a project that it can't actually physically be done. It's relevant. It's the big goal for the year, and it's time-based. It will be done by September 30th. Just that simple implementation of those items, those 5 items, can help you make a goal that actually sticks. And it's a goal that is actually shaped well enough for you to create a plan forward very, very easily. So now that we have that, we can start working backward from September 30th, right? That's our goal. So if we know that we need 50,000 words and we also need to spend some time editing, We probably need to spend some time generating the outline and the details and setting up the book. Then maybe we say, okay, I'm going to spend this month outlining the book. And then for the next 5 months, I will write 10,000 words a month. And then I'll have about 3 months to edit it and clean it up from there. And just like that, you have a plan, right? Between now and September 30th, you have some milestones in place that are actually going to help you get to that next step. But you're not done yet. Okay, you need to get this plan a little bit more refined, and that will come by pulling out your calendar and blocking off time to actually execute. Okay, this month you need to make time to organize your thoughts. Okay, well, do you also need to make a trip to the library? Do you need to interview someone for their story? Make a list of the things that need to be done in each milestone. Then make some sort of estimate of how long they're going to take. And then this is the part that people get really, really stuck on. Put it on your calendar. It's a whole lot easier to dedicate time to your goals when they're already blocked out and prioritized in your time, because that's what this is, right? What we are doing is prioritizing goals so that they are at the same level of all of the other stuff that your life demands of you. Why aren't your goals more important? This is the way you can prioritize them. Put them in your calendar. And from there, it's simple. You do the work when you have dedicated time in your calendar. You don't sleep in. You don't trade it for an extra meeting. You do the work. Yes, it takes discipline. Yes, it takes commitment. But that's how you get a goal to last and not only last, but to actually come true. There's a great quote by author Karen Lamb that says, a year from now, You'll wish you had started today. There is no reason for your goals to be gathering dust. There is no reason that you need to look back on this year and wish you had taken the moves to make that big thing a reality. So this week, take some time and revisit the thing that you want most this year and put together a plan to make it happen.