This Habit Will Stop You From Achieving Your Dreams

It all starts with...

I watched a video a few years ago from an ultra-rich businessman making some wild claims. He said the way you talk defines how successful you will be. But he didn’t stop there. In this particular video, he talked about how he refuses to say the word “tired” when talking about himself. He wouldn’t even say it in the video. After all, “I’m tired” is on a huge scale, you can say it whether you’re 10% tired or 100% tired. So he figured, never acknowledge where you are on that scale and you won’t accelerate it.

I think that’s ridiculous.

There are a lot of things that will stop you from achieving your dreams. But saying “I’m tired” isn’t one of them. That’d be too easy.

However, there are a few words that if you say them, will absolutely stop you from achieving your dreams. The words themselves don’t carry “death curses” for your dreams, they indicate there’s a problem going on below the surface.

Here are a few of them.

• Maybe

• Someday

• Sometime

Let me know if you’d add any.

When we discuss our goals and dreams, it’s already a bit nebulous. When you combine something in the future that has the potential to change with an uncertain timeline, the result is even worse.

• Maybe I’ll convert the garage into a gym next month.

• Someday I want to go skydiving.

• Let’s get coffee sometime!

You’ve used that last one I bet. We all have. It’s a nice way of saying we probably won’t follow through.

A deadline is the enemy of procrastination

We do ourselves a disservice by using words like these. It gives us a copout. A back door. It leaves us completely unaccountable. Granted, it makes us much more comfortable. We can throw around ideas, plans, and expeditions of granger without consequence, with utter freedom to go back on our word. Procrastination loves these words.

Avoid these for 7 days and watch what happens.

Something happens when we start cutting these words out of our vocabulary. We become accustomed to sticking an event or project to a date on the calendar. A date that doesn’t change. We begin to become comfortable with saying when we are going to do something and following through. We start getting really clear feedback on our behavior. If every time you say “sometime” you had to pin it to a date, you’d quickly realize how many things you have no intention of doing. It’s quite liberating to say what you mean and mean what you say.

As long as you keep dangling a task out in the future somewhere, it’s a weight on you. Someday you’ll do it, but every day that isn’t “someday” is a reminder that you’re procrastinating on it. Eventually, you completely forget about it or just decide to cut it loose. Why not do that from the very beginning? It’s indecisiveness.

Make a decision. Say “yes” and schedule it, or say “no” and cut it loose. You can always pick it up later. People will respect your decisions. At first, saying “no” will feel harsh to people, but they will respect it more than dragging them along only to say no later.

I used to do this with sponsorship emails all the time. I’d get an email from a brand I didn’t want to partner with, then go back and forth 6-7 times before finally saying it wasn’t a good fit. But not before wasting my time and theirs. Now I just say no. If they want to try to change my mind they can. But at least I’m not wasting their time.

Dragging out a decision is a form of mental laziness.

Someone in your life needs to read that too 👆

My friend Josh Winiarski recently posted a video where he talked about this. He said for him the big one was “sometime.” He said he’d bump into a friend and say “Hey let’s hang out sometime!” but then nothing would happen. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to, he simply didn’t peg it to an unmoving date. So he stopped saying it. “Sometime” turned into next Wednesday at 7am.

As his friend, I’ve benefitted directly from this. I noticed it right away. When scheduling a call he always came with a specific time when he could make it happen. He rarely misses.

Your dreams are important. We should be giving ourselves every opportunity to succeed. The problem is most people try harder to “not fail” than they try to succeed.

You will never succeed by trying not to fail.

7 Day Challange

Try to go 7 days completely cutting these words out of your vocabulary.

When you find yourself using them, stop and recognize your indecision to commit, and make a call. Say “yes” and make a plan or say “no” and cut it loose.

If you can get someone else to do this with you you’ll be 10x more likely to do it. Drag a friend into it 👇