Page 168 - Hard Goals

Difficult 159

people will think I’m weak and couldn’t hack it.” Again, search
your history, or someone else’s history, for counterarguments.
I’ve got plenty of examples personally, but let’s take somebody
with more dramatic goals: Lance Armstrong. Lance is a guy

with difficult goals—he’s a 38-year-old guy with kids trying to
make a comeback in cycling. As I write this book, one of his
specifi c diffi cult goals is to win the Tour of California (like the
Tour de France, but less famous). But he crashed and is out of
the race, so let’s call that a failed diffi cult goal. But does any-
body really think Lance is weak? Have we abandoned him? Do
we think he’ll never be able to do anything again? Do you think
he believes that?
I would argue that Lance is a pretty good counterargument

to the idea that failing at a difficult goal means people will think
you’re weak. Heck, if anything, the guy’s probably got more
supporters because he’s showed his humanity and his struggles,
and who doesn’t love to root for that?
We literally need to take those “what happens to us if we
fail” statements and debunk them, one by one. Use your ana-
lytical brain and your life history. I’m confident that if you take

every one of them apart you’ll fi nd they hold no real power.
Once you’ve fi nished that exercise, the fi nal step is to rewrite
those statements. You’ve debunked them, so now turn them
around into something a lot more encouraging. For example,
here are some revised statements:

• If I fail at this goal, people won’t think I’m weak. In
fact, they may even rally to my defense.
• If I fail at this goal, people will still believe in me.
• If I can’t do this specifi c goal, it has no bearing on my
ability to tackle other diffi cult goals.