This is more important than your action plan
Aug 27, 2021
When I talk about planning, most people immediately think of action plans or the steps that’ll take them from A to Z. It makes sense – we do actually need to know how we’re going to get to where we want to go.
However, there’s a plan that’s even more important: a plan for the potential pitfalls.
No matter what you’re dreaming up or how confident you are, I guarantee something will get in your way. (Note the extra formatting – I’m not joking around here!)
That something could be external, like other people not being reliable or available. It could be procedural, like not giving yourself enough time.
Very likely, it’ll be an inside job, like your limiting beliefs tripping you up. Maybe you lose momentum & confidence once you get started. Or you don’t believe you have what it takes in the first place. Nothing like that gremlin voice to completely derail you. Or perhaps you’re distracted by bright shiny objects.
The problem with your action plan is you’re not taking any of this into account. Nowhere in your Steps A -> B ——> Z have you identified what you’ll do when (not if) the roadblocks pop up. You’ll have to stop to figure out what to do. Maybe you’ll stop altogether because it feels like too much. That’s why you need to plan ahead of time for the pitfalls.
It’s super-simple:
- Write out all of the things that might go wrong. Tap into what you know about yourself and the situation. You probably have a very good idea of what can throw you off-track.
- For each potential problem, write down 2 – 3 action steps you can take. The format I love is:
If THAT happens, then I will do THIS.
If you have this mapped out as best as you can before you get started, you won’t lose a lot of time figuring out what to do when something goes sideways. You’ve already got your possible fixes, so simply try those. It’s like having a huge bag of tools that are really going to help move you forward when things go wrong.
