All In!
Have you ever felt like your goals are mountains that impossible to summit? If you have, you’re not alone. I’ve been feeling this way too lately.
As I’ve been working towards accomplishing some big goals, I’ve set for myself, doubt, fatigue, and confusion has crept it.
As I’ve been thinking about and wrestling with this issue, I realized that the reason I’m struggling and the reason you’re struggling has to do with not being all in.
Tune into this episode to learn the missing ingredient: Being All In! Because those who decide to go “All In” are the ones who succeed.
FEATURED ON THE SHOW
- Henry B Eyring Quote
- Brian Johnson
- Elder Sabin’s Talk
- If you’re ready to go all in and work with me, learn more here
- Follow me on Instagram
Transcript:
Have you ever felt like your goals are mountains that impossible to summit? If you have, you’re not alone. I’ve been feeling this way too lately.
As I’ve been working towards accomplishing some big goals, I’ve set for myself, doubt, fatigue, and confusion has crept it.
Maybe I don’t really want this. Maybe this isn’t for me. How do I even accomplish this thing? I’m so confused. Everyone else can do but not me. There must be something wrong with me.
There were days I didn’t even try, days I completely threw in the towel and decided that doing nothing felt better than attempting.
As I’ve been thinking about and wrestling with this issue, I realized that the reason I’m struggling and the reason you’re struggling has to do with not being all in.
Here’s what happens: We get excited about a goal. And we start taking steps to accomplish it, but then the nuance wears off, and it gets hard and what do we do? We check out. We go the other way and give up. We let fear and doubt and confusion cloud our desire. We think that since it’s hard, it must not be right. Either the goal is wrong for us, or the way we’re going about achieving it is wrong for us.
I recently heard a quote from President Henry B. Eyring who said that his mom used to tell him, “If you’re on the right path, it will always be uphill.”
Working towards a goal is hard work. It takes us changing old habits and creating new ones. Change is hard work! So, if it’s hard and you find it difficult, good news! You’re on the right path.
I think a lot of us know this. I don’t think this is news to anyone. So what’s the missing ingredient that will help us continue to climb our figurative goal mountains until we reach the summit and not turn the other way when things get hard and our brains go crazy?
3 words:
BE ALL IN!
What does it mean to “be all in”? According to Idioms dot the free dictionary dot com, it means to be fully committed to a task or endeavor, to give or be prepared to give all of one’s energy or resources toward something.
I have lots of conversations with my clients and myself about the importance of “being all in”.
Not sort of, not hallway, not maybe I’ll try, but ALL IN!
The example I like to use for this is going to the mall. Let’s say you’re wanting to go to the mall to buy yourself a new outfit and you’re really excited about this. So, you get in your car, you back out of your driveway and you start your drive to the mall. You’re cruising along on your way to the mall and the next thing you know you get stuck in traffic. You have to stop. Do you let this deter you from your goal of making it to the mall to buy an outfit? Do you think thoughts like: “Man! I’m never going to make it to the mall. Guess I should just give up and turn around and go back home to what I was doing before.” Or “I knew I wasn’t capable of making it to the mall. Everyone else can drive to the mall just fine. What’s wrong with me?” “I’ve never been able to drive to the mall. I don’t know why I even bother.” “This isn’t going fast enough. I knew I should have never tried.” “I don’t understand why I have to stop for traffic. It’s always smooth sailing for everybody else. Maybe I don’t know the best way to get to the mall after all.”
This is exactly what we do when we hit road blocks along our goal path. Road blocks are normal just like traffic on the way to the mall is normal.
If you are “all in” on going to the mall, you are fully 100% committed to getting there no matter how much traffic you hit, how many red lights you get, even if you hit construction and have to take a detour, you do it because you’re “all in”.
People who go all in are the ones who succeed. If you turn around and go back home, you are 100% not going to reach your goal. But if you go “all in” and you stick with it and you are patient, and you keep figuring things out, you’re 100% going to reach your goal.
Being all in means you believe you deserve it and you do the work to accomplish it. You’re not holding back to see what the minimum is you can get away with.
Are you all in?
It is so much easier to be “All In” than to be “partially in”.
Coach Brian Johnson from Optimize.me said the following about being “All In”:
“There is something about just going absolutely ALL IN on a commitment that saves a tone of energy and makes it way more likey to stick.
Fact is, anything less than a total 100% commitment we’ve left room for that little whiny voice to come in and start negotiating with ourselves right when we can least afford it and most need to ignore it.
When I used to eat fast food and had a less than 100% commitment to not doing it, literally every time I’d drive by Micky D’s I had a conversation with myself about whether I should go or not.
Not wise.
And, of course, I lost the negotiation on the days I felt the worst. 100%!!
The [100%] commitment is, oddly, way easier than anything less.” End quote
Are you all in? or are you only 99%, or 90% in?
When we’re only part way in, we leave room for that whiny voice, as Brian calls it, to try to negotiate with us. That whiny voice is a very good salesman. It has every excuse, justification, and good reason why just this once is a good idea. But when we’re all in, we’re all in 100%.
There is a huge difference in being all in versus being partially in. It also matters to whom and to what you are committed to. What are you going all in on? Are you all in on your story that you’re not good enough and that you can’t do it? Are you all in on social media or news feeds that add to your doubt and confusion? Are you all in on that Netflix series? Be careful what you go all in on.
In his talk Stand Up Inside and Be All In, Elder Sabin says, “when we are all in, we have the all-encompassing assurance that all things work together for good.”
When we’re “all in”, we can hit traffic and not make it mean anything. We can drive past the fast-food place or go to the party full of delicious looking desserts and not be affected by them because we’re all in.
We can take a hit, get back up, and keep going. We don’t have to let a fall or a stumble while climbing our mountain make it mean that we need to turn around and go back the other way. Just like a GPS when we take a wrong turn, it just quickly redirects us back on the correct path to our destination.
This is what being all in will do for us.
Oddly enough there is a second definition for “All in” and it is to be completely exhausted, fatigued, or worn out. This second definition is interesting because some of us confuse being all in with hustling or grinding. We’re in a hurry to reach our goal, we want it like yesterday, so we overdo ourselves, we put in strenuous effort followed by burn out. This is not the ‘All In” I’m suggesting.
There is no need to run faster than you have speed.
So let me end by asking you, are you all in? Are you all in on taking exceptional care of your body? Are you all in on saving up for your 40th birthday trip? Are you all in on building your business? Are you all in on whatever your goal is?
If you want to have the life and the experiences you crave, you know what you’ve got to do. BE ALL IN!
