E: Expectant
What’s one thing you hope to achieve in the next 90-days?
We’re pretty familiar, I think, with the idea of ‘starting with the end in mind’ as a concept, but how often do these theories make the cut when it comes to our reality?
How much of our days are spent in reaction mode? ‘Make lunch as I’m hungry now, send the email because someone needs my response now’, as opposed to small steps towards a goal we’ve already mapped out? Even more than this - have we spent so much time in reaction mode, that we’ve not even thought about the goals we want to achieve.
Of course, we will at some point need to make lunch and reply to emails - it’s just the way that things work. But if the majority of your time is spent reacting to ‘emergencies’ (either yours or other people’s), then those end goals you’ve had in mind for what you want to do with your life will be a lot harder to reach. And they’ll be even harder to reach if you’ve never even given them any thought because of how busy you are with everything else.
I love the word ‘expectation’. I mean, literally defined it is - ‘a strong belief that something will happen or be the case.’
From my experience, belief in something happening is quite often enhanced when I know that I’ve personally done all I’m able to do in order to help the process along. The rest isn’t up to me. I wonder if you have a similar viewpoint? This confidence which crops up when you know that you’ve done the best you can with something?
This is why the fourth and final pillar of our TIME framework is expectation. Because I know that once you’ve set your mind on something, you find a way to make it happen - by hook or by crook. It’s not always perfect, but that’s not the point. It’s done.
I’m interested in us coming back to our expectations a whole lot more, and I’m even more interested in the steps we take towards making them happen being a lot more of our ‘normal’ day to day, in the same way that the reactionary tasks we find ourselves wrapped up in are.
What’s one thing you hope to achieve in the next 90 days?
Your answer to this question might be something work related, health related, family related, or any/all of the things inbetween. The point is, it’s something you know that you want.
And now think about the things on your to-do list for today, or for the next week in fact. Do your daily actions correlate with your ‘wider why’? If not, why not?
This is, of course, quite an ambiguous question. The reasons for today’s actions not looking like your overall expectations could be manifold. So, let’s tune into the belief part of the definition of expectation, shall we?
It’s been said that “Most people overestimate what they can do in a day, and underestimate what they can do in a month. We overestimate what we can do in a year, and underestimate what we can accomplish in a decade.” (Matthew Kelly, The Long View). With that in mind, when I asked you what you wanted to achieve in the next 90 days, did you roll your eyes at how little time that sounded? Did you internally ask ‘how do I know? We’re still not out of this pandemic and so I can’t make any plans.’ All of these are things I’ve certainly thought in recent months.
Here’s the thing, though - Every mountain is climbed through a series of small steps. And so, yes, if you left your 90 day goal until the last week, then I could understand why you’d feel a little stretched for time and left believing it’s impossible. If, however, day one of 90 started today with something small, you could well be on track for hitting a big milestone in 89 days time - even in the uncertainty, and even with 100 other things to do. Our tendency to put tasks like this off goes back to what I said at the start regarding our default mode being reactionary. It takes far more discipline to do the non-urgent, but important things today when you have countless other demands seemingly screaming at you.
That’s where I think that the belief part of expectation can be really helpful to harness. And with that, another few journal prompts:
Is there anything practically stopping you from reaching this goal in 90 days besides a real or perceived lack of time?
Is there anything mentally/emotionally stopping you from reaching this goal in 90 days?
If experience serves me correctly, the answer to the second question is usually more of the reason you’re procrastinating than the answer to the first - even if you think your reasons are more practical. There’s typically not much which is practically standing in your way aside from time, and if we’re doing this daily chunk thing, we should have that part covered, right? But to mentally get your head there in truly believing it’s possible for you - that can be a different story, can’t it? Don't worry, we're going to cover that.
Later this week, I’m going to be sharing details about a free training I’m hosting soon which is all about how our belief and mindset has a LOT more to do with our goals than we might think. Keep your eyes on your inbox for those details & stay tuned next week. I can’t wait to share it with you.
If you’ve enjoyed today’s message, or indeed any of the 4 which have been shared so far introducing our TIME framework, please spread the love. It MASSIVELY helps as we prepare to launch to the world. Just take a screenshot of your favourite part and add it to your IG stories tagging @officialtimeandpace. Oh, and if you're new to this party, thanks SO MUCH for joining and please let me know if you'd like any of the other Nurture Notes you might have missed. Here's a quick recap:
T - Thankful: Maintaining the small things we've been grateful for during the pandemic & taking that attitude into post-pandemic life.
I - Intentions: Making intentions about being present over being productive.
M - Me: Carving out time for you without guilt or multi-tasking.
E - Expectation: (today's edition!) Linking your daily action to your wider why.
Keep going. Keep growing.
Get weekly wisdom like this in your inbox by subscribing to our newsletter. Fill in the form below to stay in the loop ⤵️
Ready for more from Time & Pace®?
Check out the options below: