Do You Have Lofty Goals For The New Year? Commit First

A recent Wall Street Journal article told the inspiring story of Mike Massimino.

Don’t feel bad if that name doesn’t ring a bell with you.

As a NASA astronaut, Massimino space-walked four times to repair the Hubble Space Telescope. He retired from the space program in 2014, and today teaches engineering at Columbia University. He shares many of his experiences in his book Moonshot: A NASA Astronaut’s Guide to Achieving the Impossible.

Massimino’s story is worthy of a Hollywood script. He was rejected by NASA multiple times. But he applied over and over while working to qualify. When he was finally accepted, he summed up his philosophy: “The only way to fail completely is to stop trying.”

That approach to life is echoed by Erik Sorenson, author of Commit First: The Key to Unlock Potential, Break Through Obstacles, and Achieve Your Impossible.

Sorenson, an accomplished entrepreneur, marketer, human performance coach and captivating speaker, offers you-can-do-it advice on how to break out of the world of average and use the gifts you likely didn’t even know you have.

To demonstrate his own allegiance to this approach, he opened pre-orders for his book before writing a single word. “With pre-orders for the book and telling the world about it, I was applying leverage on myself,” he says. “This left me with a choice: either write the book and have it published by the date I committed to or not write the book and face public scrutiny and loss of credibility.”

Sorenson says grit and hustle can be helpful when beginning the journey of achievement, but they can get you only so far. “Hustle leads to burnout,” he says. “It takes time away from precious relationships and pushes you toward short-term tactics rather than long-term strategies. There’s a better way: it’s by committing first. Commit First is a principle that allows you to gain clarity on what you want and then Commit First to achieving it.”

While we often hear the phrase, “failure is not an option,” Sorenson believes a more helpful phrase is “quitting is not an option.”

“Nothing great ever came about without a significant amount of failure preceding the achievement,” he says. “While we often hear that failure is not an option, it’s actually the only option because it’s the only way to be truly successful. In fact, the goal should be to fail as often and as quickly as possible so you can learn the lessons from the failures that will ultimately lead you to discover what it takes to be successful. Failure is an option, but quitting is not. Quitting is the only true ultimate failure because quitting means you’re abandoning everything you set out to accomplish.”

Sorenson says resourcefulness plays a critical role in a person’s ability to achieve lofty goals.

“People think that to be successful you need resources like money, connections, or technology,” he says. “In reality, the most important asset you can have is not resources, but resourcefulness. Resourcefulness means you look inside and you find a way and you figure it out. Many incredible things have been created by people who had nothing but a resourceful mind and a hunger that fed the resourcefulness.”

Many performance experts tout the importance of a person’s “why” when seeking goals. Sorenson offers advice on that quest.

“When they really think about it, most people know their why from a high-level standpoint,” he says. “Most want to be happy, make a difference in the world, provide for their families, etc. I suggest that it’s more powerful, especially when focusing on a specific outcome that you desire, to align with your purpose rather than your why.”

He explains the difference: “A why is something that drives you; a purpose is something that pulls you. Being pulled toward your dream outcome is far more powerful than being pushed toward it. It starts by understanding what your purposes are. Look at the talents and abilities you have, look at the things you love to do, and align your desired dream outcome with those things, and you’ll find that over time your purpose will be uncovered.”

Sorenson subscribes to the idea that 100% commitment is easier than 99% or less.

“When you are 99% or less committed to something, you must make a decision every day whether you’re going to keep your commitment. For example, if you want to quit consuming sugar, you’ll face temptation when going to the store, dining out, socializing with friends, and more. When the urge to break the commitment arises—and it will—if you’re less than 100% committed, you will eventually succumb. In contrast, when you are 100% committed, you need to decide only once.”

At a time of year when many people are making resolutions, Sorenson says accomplishing goals is not about doing, it’s about becoming.

“Studies show that as many as 93% of people who set goals don’t accomplish them,” he says. “Setting goals in the traditional way has a very high failure rate because we often focus on short-term tactics and try to push ourselves, leading to abandonment when the novelty wears off and the tasks become mundane and challenging. A much more powerful and effective way to achieve goals is to focus on the person you must become to accomplish that goal. When a goal is intertwined with your identity, every action becomes about building the person who will achieve that goal, rather than a mere tactic that will likely fail.”

Sorenson says creating a “commitment statement” is a critical step to bringing clarity and purpose to a person’s performance journey. He explains the process.

“A commitment statement is an ultimate declaration to yourself and a constant reminder of your commitment and the importance of keeping it,” he says. “When aligned with your clarity and purpose, a commitment statement allows you to remember it and inspires you daily as you recite the reasons behind your commitment and the importance of keeping it. To set a commitment statement, first, get clear on what you want, commit first to that thing, craft a statement that embodies your commitment that is concise, powerful, and meaningful to you. Then display your declaration so you can see it every day. Memorize it and recite it daily.”

Busyness is a common trap that can create a false sense of accomplishment and get in the way of a person’s attempts to reach important goals. Sorenson has a view on that, too.

“Busyness is laziness,” he says. “Most of my adult life, I thought being busy was a measure of progress. But have you ever been busy doing things all day, only to discover at the end of the day that you got nothing done? The challenge with busyness is that it’s usually reactive to what is happening around you. You show up to work and simply react to your emails, phone calls, meetings, conversations, and you spend your day ‘doing.’ I call this empty activity. Empty activity is very sneaky because it creates a false sense of progress. Look at your day and ask yourself if the things that are keeping you busy all day are actually progressing you toward what you want in life. Then begin focusing only on the things that are completely aligned with what you want. Eliminate the rest.”