“I’m going to become a pro Kathak dancer. I just have to commit to it,” I told myself. I had recently accepted a job offer at a publishing company, and I was creating a list of my personal and professional goals for the year.
Kathak is one of the eight major forms of Indian classical dance, and it’s specific to the region I grew up in. As an amalgamation of three art forms — music, dance, and drama — Kathak performances are a delight to watch. I had learned it for a couple of years as a child, given up, and come back to it a few times, but it never stuck. It never became a thing I consistently wanted to practice. “Maybe I just like to watch it? I must not be that great,” I’d think to myself.
Eager to prove myself wrong as an adult, I started taking lessons. “You’re ambitious!” said my best friend. I thought she said it to motivate me. It was much later that I realized it was a warning.
Work was hectic and overwhelming. My days were packed with onboardings and trainings. I barely managed to make it to two dance classes in the first two weeks. I was always tired and exhausted. Instead of concentrating on the lessons, I would look at the time, wondering when it would get over and I could finally curl up on my couch and massage my sore ankles.
About four months later, I gave up. My personal goal felt entirely unachievable — and less important than my professional ones. In the end, I was afraid to fail. So, I stopped working at it. Had I approached the goal differently — picked it up at a less hectic time, been less competitive with myself, and viewed it as a joyful outlet — I may have actually reached it.
There are so many factors that determine whether we achieve our goals. In my case, it was clear that…
- I didn’t consider the obstacles (time management, burnout, work-life balance). As Kristi Depaul writes in “This Is Why You Keep Missing Deadlines,” we tend to experience what’s known as “planning fallacy” (coined by Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky) — our tendency to underestimate the time and obstacles involved in completing a task even when it directly contradicts our past experiences. Optimism bias leads us to think that the future will somehow be better than the past.
- I was too ambitious (I assumed my job wouldn’t drain my energy). If a goal is something outside what you have going on for your 9-to-5 job or study hours, remember that it’s going to take time, energy, and focus to accomplish. According to Allison Walsh in the article “5 Ways to Make Sure You Achieve Your Goals This Year,” we are far more likely to succeed at accomplishing a goal if we start small instead of jumping in at once. Had I told myself I would take a few classes, see how it goes, and then incrementally increase the frequency — instead of setting a goal to “learn Kathak” — I would have probably gotten somewhere.
- I was afraid (I set a too-high bar around my performance). In the article, “Why We Set Unattainable Goals,” the authors (all business school professors) explain how humans tend to be overconfident creatures, especially when a goal is linked to our self-esteem. In my case, I set a goal to prove myself wrong, and overestimated the energy, skills, or resources that would be required of me to bring it to fruition. Afraid I’d fail, I didn’t even attempt to work on it with sincerity.
What else can stop us from achieving our goals? Here’s more advice from our experts.
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