The Missing Element of Guaranteed Progress

Have you ever broken a promise to yourself? If so, don’t feel bad, because you’re in good company. 

Only around 9% of Americans keep their New Year’s resolutions, with around 43% quitting before January ends and a staggering 23% giving up during the first week of the year. While it might feel good to make a personal commitment to yourself, it’s an entirely different endeavor to follow through on the goal, plan, or aspiration. 

Thankfully, there are some things you can do to help. Somebody who writes down their goals increases their chances of achievement by 42%. Furthermore, somebody who shares their goal with someone else ups the odds of completion by 65%, and the probability rises to 95% if you also share a deadline for completion. 

Truth be told, many of us approach a personal commitment as if we were writing down a goal in pencil. The level of dedication is fairly weak, and it’s easy to change plans or pick a new course later on if things get challenging or if a distraction comes up. This is especially true when the goal only exists in your head and not in any sort of tangible form. Writing down goals makes them less abstract and more concrete.

The tangibility further increases when you tell someone else about what you plan to do. This creates a level of social pressure that increases the likelihood of follow-through. Even if the friend would be quick to offer grace and understanding, we still don’t like the idea of not doing what we said we would do. Finally, creating a deadline for action bounds the goal to a particular time and helps us understand, in a more practical sense, what we must do to make progress.

At Proven Results, we believe deeply in the power of writing goals down, sharing them with someone you trust, and setting deadlines to ensure you take action. With these things in mind, we’ve created two powerful tools to help you pursue - and experience - the kind of life you want to live, and the life that only becomes possible by making sacrifices and doing hard things. Some of you are already familiar with our mentor program, which pairs aspiring leaders with experienced guides who will help you embody Biblical principles through periodic one-on-one sessions. If you’re not currently meeting with a mentor but would like more information, use this link to schedule a free discovery call. 

However, we’ve also got another exciting project in the works. Soon, you will be able to work through valuable content on your own time through our thought-provoking workbook. Rooted in Biblical principles and written in a way that evokes powerful one-on-one reflection and practical action, this workbook will help you take meaningful steps forward toward the life God has called you to live by getting your thoughts and ideas out of your head and down onto paper into written form. If research is any indication, this will significantly increase the odds of you taking meaningful steps forward and experiencing more of the abundant life God has designed for you. 

We hope this workbook will be ready for release in the next few months. In the meantime, we’ll be sharing some sneak peeks on this blog in the coming weeks to give you a better picture of the type of content you can expect in the full workbook. We hope that this enhances the value of our mentoring relationships while also providing value to people who aren’t yet meeting with a mentor.