Stop Setting Goals. Start Celebrating Milestones.
Most goal setting starts with what's missing. What you haven't achieved. What you still need to fix. What isn't happening fast enough. No wonder so many of us feel overwhelmed, procrastinate or burn out. This…
Most goal setting starts with what’s missing.
What you haven’t achieved. What you still need to fix. What isn’t happening fast enough.
No wonder so many of us feel overwhelmed, procrastinate or burn out.
This week on The Dr Sam Collins Podcast, I’m sharing one of the most powerful yet simple coaching exercises I’ve encountered in years.
A coaching client introduced me to it this week and I couldn’t stop thinking about it.
Instead of asking what you want to achieve, ask yourself:
What do you want to be celebrating in the future?
Whether it’s your career, your health, your relationships, your finances, your purpose or the difference you aspire to make in the world, this simple shift changes how the future feels and your chances of achieving it.
In this episode, I’ll guide you through the exercise in real time so by the end you’ll have a clearer picture of the future milestones you’re creating and perhaps a renewed sense of hope, energy and possibility.
Because change doesn’t begin when you reach the milestone.
It begins when you can see it now.
Listen & watch
Transcript
Transcript
Select a chapter to read along. Use “Play this clip” to jump to that moment.
Hello and welcome to the Dr. Sam Collins podcast. Thank you so much for being here today. And if you ever woken up in the morning and you feel really excited about something, it's often anticipation, but you… don't really know why. Well, that happened to me this morning. And let's be honest, it doesn't happen every day or even very many days at all. But I'm really glad that it happened this morning today that I'm recording this podcast for you.
And I'm just really excited that you're here. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Especially after being away for a year and coming back to this podcast. This is a podcast for women who want more. who have the aspirations to want to make a difference in life, health, work, workplace, career, and ultimately, and most importantly, I think after looking at the news this morning, the world. And it's okay.
We can say that we want to make a difference in the world, however small we might feel or however hopeless or helpless we might feel in all that's going on. I strongly believe that women are the key to making a positive difference in the world. So again, thank you for being here. Today I want to share a
a tool, an idea, a concept, if you like, that one of my clients came up with last week and I thought it was absolutely brilliant. It was in her first coaching session and we were starting to think through the goals that she wanted to achieve from coaching. So, you know, pretty usual stuff. And she said that she had this idea that she would like to be able to think through what she called her future celebrations.
And I was like, well, what your, your, what your future celebrations. And she said, yeah, I've got these longer term goals of things that I want to achieve. And I'm starting to get clearer on what they are, but Hey, why don't we think through some of the milestones and the things that I want to be celebrating in the future. Now I thought this was absolutely brilliant because when it comes to goals, quite often we can feel a bit bored or tired or, okay, I have to achieve this goal and I have to do this and I should do that.
And some days and many days, it's hard to get inspired and you might set a goal, but then the actual achievement of it can be quite a grind and can be very difficult. And of course there's tons and tons of stuff out there, isn't there, about the obstacles and the challenges and particularly for women, all the things that are in the way. Now, I'm not saying none of that is true because you're going to get mad at me and send me a message and tell me all those obstacles are there and they absolutely are both within our heads, within our societies, within our countries, within the political, economic, organisational, family, religious systems that we operate in.
I get it. And…
Here's something that I think will help with some of that and maybe a little bit of a different way to look at it today. So what I want you to do is to maybe even stop setting goals and start setting some celebratory milestones. Why are we doing this? What does this mean? Well, when we engage ourselves in something more compelling for the future, you know what it's like when you're looking forward to your holiday, or you're looking forward to your break, or you're looking forward to going out or something like that.
When you've got that in your mind, and you can almost see it, can't you? You know, you're going through your day and you think, okay, this is really tedious, or this is difficult, but I'm going out on Friday night, or I've got my holiday coming in two weeks and all is going to be well, and then sort of this delayed gratification. until that time when we know we're going to be happy.
How about rather than waiting to that time to be happy and celebrating, we could do it right now. So what does this look like? I want to invoke your imagination today, your ability to be a future thinker and your ability to celebrate things ahead of time so that you can feel more motivated. Don't we all want to feel more motivated? motivation is it's not easy. And I'm going to be talking I think next week about the urgency of motivation.
And you know, sometimes we have to think about all of the things that are not going to be so great if we don't do things which also can get us out of bed and get us going. But today we're going to do this in a more positive future focus way because we need to be pulled towards visions of the future, even goals of the future that are compelling for us, for us to be able to actually do the things that we need to do.
Now.
Also, when we think about goals, it's like that typical interview question, isn't it like, where do you want to be in five years time? I don't know. Where do you want to be in three years time? I can't even sometimes think about where I want to be in three minutes time. So goals are tricky and goals have been out there for a long time. You may have heard of smart goals, specific.
I can never say that right. Specific, specific. Yes. Not saying that quite right, but you know what I'm talking about, the measurable, acceptable, realistic time bound goals. Like who wants a goal like that? I mean, it makes it so small and sort of manageable that we might be able to get it. And it sounds so utterly, completely boring. Celebratory milestones is something very different. So I want you to try with me wherever you are right now, maybe you're on a train going into work or coming away from work.
Maybe you're on a bus, maybe you're on a plane going somewhere. Maybe you're at home, you're at work. Maybe you're in a really terrifically boring meeting right now, but you're actually listening to this podcast, which would be quite cool actually. I want you to do this.
I want you to imagine that it's some point in the future. So, you know, not too far ahead. I would say, you know, like a few weeks or a few months ahead and you, so at some point in the future, if you can try and imagine it and you know, I'm not asking you to visualize or meditate or even close your eyes. Just think about it for a little bit. At some point in the future, maybe you want to even write it down and put down a date, put down a date, any date, maybe it's some kind of relevant date to you.
New Year's Eve, birthday, a significant other day that you can think about or think of or any just pick a date. All right. So pick that date. And I want you to imagine that it's that date. And I want you to imagine that you are on your way to achieving your ultimate goals that you visions and dreams of life that you would really love to achieve now. Feel free to be as idealistic and optimistic as you like at this point.
We don't have to get into that realistic moment now. We're looking at this and saying, okay, why not? Why not you? Why not now? All the things that you've wanted. There's plenty of people out there in the world who have achieved the things that you want to or aspire to the things that you want to do and be. Why not you? Why not?
All right, come on. So I want you to imagine at some point in the future, you've got your date and you're well on your way. So in fact, you're celebrating what you've achieved so far. Maybe you're talking to a friend about it. Maybe you're writing about it and journaling. Maybe you're talking to a coach, a mentor, a family member. Maybe you're sitting having lunch. with someone you really like and they're saying how's it going and you're saying well actually I'm really delighted I'm really pleased I'm celebrating that I've achieved this and this because a lot of the times you know we're at those kind of meetings or lunches oh how's it going it's not going that well it's very difficult oh me too I'm busy you're busy but instead of that conversation you're having a conversation and And maybe the person in front of you sort of looks at you like, whoa, what's going on?
The eyebrow raises are looking a little bit surprised because perhaps they're expecting you to give them the doom and gloom of how you haven't been able to achieve the things that you're achieving and all the very plausible reasons for why not. So imagine that you're at this, this lunch or meeting, or you're on the phone with a friend or someone that you, you know, you want to be with and they're saying, how's it going?
And you are celebrating this moment. Can you do that? Give it a try. Imagine that you're there and you're celebrating this moment and you're well on your way. So something's happening. where you're on the train, you're on the journey and you've taken off and you're already down the road and you're celebrating it. I want you to try and imagine that for a moment and sort of feel yourself, if you can, getting a bit more excited about it, a bit more…
Maybe this is possible. Maybe I could just try not to go into that whole logical analytical part of your brain, which is like, how are you going to do it? And is it going to be possible? And your inner critic coming out saying, well, it's all going to be really hard. And is it going to be, do you really have the time? And are you really good enough? And are people really going to want to listen to what you have to say, blah, blah, blah.
But then, you know, you've got that inner champion part of you. That's like, why the hell not? Let's do this. Let's do this. Even if it doesn't work out exactly how you would like to, and even if you don't have, you know, worldwide recognition of the planet, at least, at least you've given it a go and you're celebrating your successes. And even if you've made no progress at all, the fact to be. getting going on things I think is so significant because so many people out there, they're like, they're full of their dreams, aren't they?
They're full of their dreams. They're full of their visions. They're full of their ideas. And then they have all of these wonderful reasons. And I say wonderful reasons, meaning plausible excuses is what I call them. Very plausible excuses. Lots of people would agree with you on all of your excuses, but really isn't it time, isn't it time that you
got going on the things that are really important to you now. So you're imagining this date in the future where you've got going and you're celebrating. So this is what we call a celebratory milestone. Now, wouldn't this be a good use of your day? If you spent a couple of minutes each day, imagining you celebrating yourself in the future, you imagine that you are, you're there. You're actually there. You've taken yourself there in some kind of, I don't know, dreamlike, but also pretty realistic way.
I'm not asking you to go 10 years into the future, 20 years in the future and you, you know, the world has completely changed. I'm asking you just to go a few weeks or maybe a couple of months into the future and you're celebrating it. You're celebrating your success. And this is the milestone that you are working towards. It's not been miserable. It's… It's may have been challenging. It may have been difficult.
You may have had to come out of your comfort zone and do a couple of things that you didn't really want to do. Maybe you had to get up a bit earlier. Maybe you, you stayed up a bit later. Maybe you, you felt nervous about picking up the phone. Did we still pick up the phone? You know what I'm talking about. Maybe you felt nervous about sending an email to someone or making a call, making a call that we'd forgotten how to make calls these days, but we've actually done something.
You have done a couple of things, not a massive amount. I'm not talking about asking you to radically change everything. I'm asking you to get on the road, get on the road, come on the road, on the road. There's all sorts of wonderful people, a bit mad looking maybe, but some wonderful people who are alongside with you going, come on, you can do it. If I could do it, you could do it.
I'll help you. You help me. Because on the sides of the roads is a whole lot of people who are like, oh,
there's lots of reasons why we can't do it. I know, I know, I know. Maybe they talk like that. Maybe they don't. All right. But celebratory milestones is what we're talking about today. So what's the tool. The tool is that you take a couple of minutes and you imagine yourself and you fight the fight. If your brain's like, I'm not going to do this right now, or we can't do this, or this is too hard, but you fight the fight in your head.
And you imagine that it's a date in the future. If you need to write the date down, it's December 31st and I am and complete the sentence, complete the sentence and write it all down. I'm doing this. I'm doing that. I've achieved this. And this is something that in fact, if you write it down and quite like this idea, if you write it down or type it down or whatever you want to do, then this is something that you could Couldn't you, you could look at every day.
And when you look at it, I don't want you just to read it like, okay, blah, blah, blah. I've done what Sam's done and I've, I says, and I've written it down and I've said it to myself. I encourage you to say out loud. In fact, this is something I'm going to start doing because I've written down a few of my future milestones and I have them actually in my email. And then I look at it every day and I sort of read it in my head, but I don't read it out loud.
So let's start doing that. Shall we let's read it out loud. and try and feel the feels. So feel the feelings of how it might feel at that day. So it's 31st of December, for example, and I am, and you're, well, that's a great day for celebration, isn't it? And you complete that sentence and you're like, okay, I'm starting to feel these feelings a bit more of excitement, anticipation, possibility, hope.
I mean, hope is one of those amazing, very compelling, future-focused feelings. And when I did my doctorate degree, and part of my doctorate degree was future studies, the study of the future, to be able to use tools and techniques to create potential possibilities for the future. Those possibilities can be more idealistic, more plausible. more possible. Of course, we do this all the time. We create disaster scenarios in our head. We create, Oh my God, what if this happens?
And what if that happens? So we can do it, but we don't often apply it to the possible. positive futures that we can create. So doing this for yourself. I mean, companies and organizations do this all the time, don't they? They're creating strategic plans of all the things that they want to achieve and these, you know, big idealistic ideas of their visions for the future. And, you know, this is how many organizations operate, successful organizations operate.
But do we do it for ourselves?
Not often. We don't really think about applying these tools to ourselves. Now, if you have a mind like mine, which is very analytical, quite often anxious and is looking at the risks of things. And maybe that is a skill set that served you very well. Maybe it's helped you to be successful in your job and your role. Maybe it's helped you to avoid risks. Maybe it's helped you to overcome worries about what might happen.
And so you're ready for those things. But this part of your brain, isn't that helpful for this technique? All right. And so when I said earlier, fight the fight, we do have to fight the fight a little bit where that part of our brain might come in and say, that's not very realistic. How would you actually do that? So what happens is when that part comes in to our future celebrations, it dumbs down the future celebration.
It starts dumbing it down into those smart goals, you know, where it's measurable and actionable and realistic and all that stuff. So those smart goals.
Yes, they can be helpful later on when we're three days in or 10 days in. I'm like, okay, this is something my celebration's coming up in three months. Just like, I'm just thinking about this right now. If you're planning for a holiday. and your your holiday is three months away and you know you're having your daydreams about your holiday and oh my god i'm so looking forward to this adventure holiday i'm so looking forward to seeing my friends i'm so looking forward to taking a rest and actually reading a book if you know your holiday is three months away aren't you in your mind starting to imagine it don't you see yourself on the beach or going into that city or whatever it is and you're starting to imagine it don't you and especially if you're having a bit of a bad day and also don't you start planning don't you start thinking okay what am i going to wear what what am i going to do oh i keep the time off work i need to make sure that everything's up to date before I go need to all the things and we start a bit of a to do list, don't we?
So that we're ready for the holiday. Really, this isn't any different to that. Well, it's different because you're not actually going on a tangible holiday. But it is the same in the fact that in order to achieve the things we want to achieve, we're putting these milestones in place. I mean, you could actually schedule a meeting with a friend or a dinner or a party or something like that. So that milestone, the celebratory milestone is a real thing too, if you want to.
So I invite you to stop setting goals and start setting celebratory milestones today.
And I invite you over the next few days to spend five minutes, five minutes a day setting your celebratory milestones, remembering what they are, reminding yourself of these celebratory milestones as a way of keeping you on track. All right, of keeping you on track.
And I also invite you to remember something really, really important is that even though you might be thinking that, you know, this is a personal development podcast and it's all about you achieving the things you want to achieve and you've heard all these things before or whatever it is. My vision here is that we as women become or enhance or evolve as leaders of the future. And I'm not anti-men. I'm not saying let's get rid of men or anything like that.
I'm saying that it's time for us as women to be able to step up into the leaders that this planet really needs. And I know that might sound a bit big and grandiose to some of you, but you know what? This is what keeps me ticking on a day to day basis. So every time you step up. When I say step up, what do I mean? I mean that you're doing something that is scary to you or involves you being braver or something that you've been putting off or something that is ultimately countercultural.
What do I mean by countercultural is maybe everyone in your company does something a certain way, but you are, you know what? It's time for us to lead in a different way. It's time to speak up. It's time to do something different. It's time to start. a program for women, it's time to mentor, it's time to be a role model. And I'm also not talking about this only for the most senior people, although I do think that we all have a lot of work to do as senior people, as junior people, as all people.
So whatever age or stage you are, whether you are starting out in your career, whether you are a young person listening to this podcast, whether you are mid career and trying to juggle it all, or you are in, let's say the more mature elder stages of your life and career, which is one of the stages I am most interested in for women. Let me tell you, we are here to make a difference.
And
If your celebratory milestone is you getting regular good sleep and you have finally managed to find a way to look after yourself from a physical health, sleep and exercise perspective, then that in my view is world changing. isn't it? Because there are so many of us, we're in and out and I am in and out with our consistency on looking after ourselves. And if more women got more sleep and looked after themselves better, I can't even imagine the complex world issues that we would solve together.
So whether your aspiration is to end world poverty, to revolutionize climate change, to change the economic potential of the people in your community, to transform a corporate culture, to lead a team, to get that promotion, to find the relationship of your dreams, to be healthy, to have kids that are thriving, to not have kids and be perfectly okay with that, or to get a good night's sleep, please celebrate it. There is equality of action here.
So thank you for being part, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you for listening and you know, just keeping with this and celebrate those milestones. Do this.
Do this every day for a few minutes. Make yourself do it. Put it in your schedule. Put it on your to-do list. If you don't have a to-do list, start a to-do list and have this at your top of your to-do list. Five minutes celebratory milestone exercise. Check it off, tick it off when it's done and move it to the next day. So it becomes a daily habit. When things become a daily habit, you know, like brushing your teeth or going for a walk. or whatever else it is when things are daily habits and we don't have to think about them very much anymore because it's just something that we do and when we don't do it we feel a bit odd and weird oh my goodness what's happened i haven't brushed my teeth this morning let me make sure i do that this we need to get to the point where this is exactly the same that a celebratory milestone what a great way to start the day i mean how do we often start the day okay, I wake up and get some, well, my son woke me up this morning and breakfast and look at the to-do list and the meetings for the day and the rest of it.
Start your day with this. I'm going to be starting my day with this. And I invite you to celebrate your future before it's even happened. And what a wonderful way to start the day. Thank you so much for being part of the Dr. Sam Collins podcast and… I look forward to seeing you next week.
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