Goals and intentions that matter, and finding your potential

What will lead you to success?

What’s your potential? 

Is it different from someone else’s?

How far have you come given where you have come from?

These are some interesting questions to consider, and might just be answered as you read this week’s recommended book. 

And if you’re looking for some different ways to think about setting goals and making changes (yes, we’re well into 2025 - how are your resolutions going?), we’ve got something for you today too.

So jump in, take action, and grow!

In today’s newsletter:

• A success that comes from meaningful goals and intentions

• Is your potential hidden?

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CAREER TIPS

How You Can Create Meaningful Goals And Intentions That Will Propel You To Success

"Success is steady progress toward one's personal goals." — Jim Rohn

In your career, the art of setting goals and intentions shapes the path toward success. These goals, when thoughtfully crafted, become more than just markers of achievement—they become catalysts for growth and transformation. Let’s dive into the concept of creating positively framed goals that propel you toward success while emphasizing the power of intention and the importance of embracing an approach-oriented mindset.

Approach Orientation vs. Avoidance Orientation

The dichotomy between approach and avoidance orientations is pivotal in shaping our career trajectory. An approach orientation signifies a growth-centric mindset, characterized by a willingness to take calculated risks and seize opportunities that lead to a better future. On the other hand, an avoidance orientation is driven by fear—fear of risks, fear of failure, and the desire to maintain the status quo. By focusing on approach orientation, we channel our energy toward forward movement, enabling us to embrace new challenges that drive personal and professional development.

Where Focus Goes, Energy Flows

The principles around energy and attention underscores the profound connection between focus and outcomes. Tony Robbins succinctly captures this idea when he says, “Where focus goes, energy flows,” highlighting that our energy is directed by our attention. This principle is particularly pertinent to career development conversations, where you often express what you wish to avoid rather than what you aspire to achieve. Shifting your attention from avoidance to approach-oriented goals directs your energy toward growth, inviting transformative change.

Shifting from Avoidance to Approach

Common career dialogues often revolve around what we wish to escape, the pitfalls we want to evade, and the negative experiences we seek to avoid. However, true success is borne out of an approach-oriented perspective—one that envisions the future we strive to create. Crafting positively framed goals transforms the narrative from one of avoidance to one of intention. The shift is exemplified when you exchange phrases like "I don't want to be pigeonholed" for "I want to unleash my creativity and innovative ideas."

Embracing Approach-Oriented Goals

Approach-oriented goals wield transformative power. They not only direct your focus but also inspire action. By visualizing the desired outcome, you are driven to take proactive steps that align with your aspirations. These goals encompass professional growth, financial gain, collaborative work environments, and personal development. The beauty lies in their ability to inspire us to invest in actions that actualize their vision of success.

Self-Reflection and Transformation

Engaging in self-reflection is a vital step toward harnessing the potential of approach-oriented goals. I encourage you to introspect and identify your natural orientation—whether you lean toward avoidance or approach. For those who find themselves veering toward avoidance, the path to transformation involves reframing your goals to encapsulate what you seek to achieve rather than what you wish to avoid.

The creation of meaningful goals and intentions is an art that propels us toward the pinnacle of success. Approach-oriented goals, rooted in intention and the desire for growth, serve as the guiding light through a career journey. The transition from avoidance to approach marks a transformational shift—a shift from a mindset of limitations to one of possibilities. This intentional focus on growth and opportunities can propel you to step beyond your comfort zone and seize the successes you envision.

📚 BOOK RECOMMENDATION

Hidden Potential: The Science of Achieving Greater Things by Adam Grant

I love Adam Grant’s stuff, and you’re always going to have your mind expanded by reading his books.

We live in a world that’s obsessed with talent. We celebrate gifted students in school, natural athletes in sports, and child prodigies in music. But admiring people who start out with innate advantages leads us to overlook the distance we ourselves can travel. We underestimate the range of skills that we can learn and how good we can become. We can all improve at improving. And when opportunity doesn’t knock, there are ways to build a door.

Hidden Potential offers a new framework for raising aspirations and exceeding expectations. Adam Grant weaves together groundbreaking evidence, surprising insights, and vivid storytelling that takes us from the classroom to the boardroom, the playground to the Olympics, and underground to outer space. He shows that progress depends less on how hard you work than how well you learn. Growth is not about the genius you possess—it’s about the character you develop. Grant explores how to build character skills and motivational structures to realize our own potential and how to design systems that create opportunities for those who have been underrated and overlooked.

Many writers have chronicled the habits of superstars who accomplish great things. This book reveals how anyone can rise to achieve greater things. The true measure of your potential is not the height of the peak you’ve reached, but how far you’ve climbed to get there.