Finish: Give Yourself the Gift of Done

by Jon Acuff

the exercises that caused people to increase their progress dramatically were those that took the pressure off, those that did away with the crippling perfectionism that caused people to quit their goals.

Moving forward imperfectly. Reject the idea that the day

That’s how powerfully destructive a wrong-sized goal is.

My theory was that people, especially chronic starters like you and me, overestimate what they can accomplish in a set period of time. When they fail to hit the massive goal, it leads to discouragement, which results in people quitting and never finishing.

Goals are a marathon, not a sprint. I know that if I can get you to do a little one month and win, you’re more likely to do a little more the next month and win even more. In the course of a year or maybe even a lifetime that approach will always beat the kill-yourself-for-a-month approach. That tends to end one of two ways: you miss your goal and give up, or you hit your goal and are so spent that you give up.

Just say no. No long explanation. No apology. No justification. No. And remember, if someone gets mad at you for saying no, they just confirmed you were supposed to say that in the first place.

The crazy thing is that the aggressively nonfun approach doesn’t work. It might make you look good on Instagram as you impress your friends with your miserable grind, but scientifically speaking, joyless goals fail. When you study goal setting you look at a variety of statistical factors, but the two most interesting are: (1) satisfaction, and (2) performance success. One speaks to how you felt about the process and the second focuses on what you actually got done.

I live by my own rules.

You can get stuck drawing a perfect plan and never actually get work done if you’re not careful.

Difficult work requires discipline.

The hour you spent watching TV is gone forever.

You have a limited amount of time, energy, and money. We all do.

I didn’t want things to get easier, which is unfortunate, because that is exactly what finishers focus on.

Jason is a finisher, and as such, he was striving for one thing: to make things easier for himself.

Perfectionism always makes things harder and more complicated.

“For something to count, it has to be difficult.” A lot of high performers carry that sort of secret

“If I’m not miserable, I’m not doing something productive.”

Whether you hit potholes or whatever is the positive, opposite version of a pothole (The Dukes of Hazzard jumpable dirt pile?), don’t let your true north get away from you.

winning more than you lose.

getting rid of a secret rule is to write a new rule to replace it.

I can control my eating

where our perfectionism keeps us from blessing people we love.

Only he doesn’t have any data to back that up, only memories and feelings and the chirping of perfectionism.

Our memories are constantly editing themselves and therefore are unreliable.

Pants size Shirt size BMI Number of times he jogged Number of miles he ran Number of times he worked with the trainer Food diary

It’s way more enjoyable to ignore it and feign surprise at where our lives take us than it is to be deliberate about listening to the data and responding appropriately.

A lot of our problems in life are self-inflicted and not mysteries.

told. But there’s a danger in overfocusing on the finish line. When you do, you lose the power of seeing how far you’ve come.

Miles run

savings account? That’s a form of measurement.

The thinness of your credit card statement is a form of measurement. If it’s being mailed to you with

Maybe you’re working on gratefulness. How many thank-you cards did you send out this month?

How many people did you meet this month?

Bad food avoided I think it can be equally interesting to track what you didn’t do.

dial. He could increase his actions.

increase in action doesn’t come with an increase in perfection.

If you’re already in the middle of a

goal, decide if you need to adjust your goal, timeline, or actions.