The REAL Secret to Reaching Your Goals

Back when I had just started out in the consulting business, I was doing a consultation in North Carolina, with a martial arts instructor. I sat with the young man who had hired me and asked him what his goals were for his business. He said he had none, he just wanted his business to improve. I followed up by asking him how much money he wanted to make. He simply said that he wanted more than he had right now. With that, I got up, took my wallet out of my pocket, and handed him ten dollars.

“Is that enough?” I asked.

He frowned and said, “No.”

I took back the ten and exchanged it for a twenty, ”How about this much?” I asked.

“No,” he said again.

I swapped the twenty for a hundred dollar bill and asked if it was enough now.

“Of course not,” he said, somewhat frustrated by my antics.

“Then how much do you want?” I asked.

“Okay, about $30,000 a year,” he said. So, I pulled $30,000 out of my wallet (just kidding!). It took just a few minutes for us both to discover that this too was a ridiculous amount since he was already making almost that much.

It is kind of hard to do better if you have no idea how you are doing now, or if you have no clear idea of what better would be like…