Ah goals. They usually only come about around New Year’s or when something has caused us enough pain. But even though we set the goal why does it feel like we lack the willpower and discipline to do anything about it?

So what’s up with this lack of discipline thing anyway? Why does it seem that sometimes no matter how hard you or I try, the lazier part of our nature wins out? I think there are two primary roots: you set a goal that you don’t actually care to achieve and you didn’t remove enough friction.

Problem 1: Uninspiring Goals

People don’t go and set uninspiring goals intentionally but they do set goals unintentionally sometimes.

And what is your ‘why’ for this goal? Your friend might have an inspirational reason but yours right now is because they asked you to join them. When the going gets tough, you won’t last. Your brain will find every reason under the sun to avoid the workout and sleep in.

Hopefully, when the pain is great enough to bring you to the decision of ‘are you in or out?’ you’ll take a moment to reflect. Are there some good reasons to keep working out? Are bad reasons sufficient?

Bad reasons took time to think up but you’re probably no better off for the time you spent doing so.

The best reasons are attached to other people. Let them be your motivational anchors. There’s a different level of personal responsibility that comes with goals attached to others.

If failing only hurts you, it feels like that’s a call you’re allowed to make. It’s your prerogative. If failing hurts others, it suddenly no longer feels like choosing to fail is your call to make. Let me show you.

I have a good buddy who was in extreme pain on a backpacking competition. His legs screamed for him to quit or at the very least go slower. However, with each footstep he took he was saying his wife’s name or the one of his kid’s names. Rachel, Jake, Sarah…Rachel, Jake, Sarah…Rachel…

He couldn’t exactly quit on Jake’s footstep, you know? The pain he endured was dedicated to someone he cared about. He made the pain something noble to endure and endure he did.

Tether your goals to the people you care about and I promise you’ll find a new well of motivation to draw from.

With whatever goals you are pursuing right now, assess your reasons why you care to achieve them. Is achieving them actually valuable to you? Is achieving them something that you can use to bring joy to others you love?

Pick and set your goals consciously. Make sure your “whys” are ironclad. Tether them to names, to people, to a future you that you care to become.

Now the second beast.

Problem 2: Too Much Friction

Friction is anything that makes it harder to achieve your goal or habit. Now, there is friction that you can’t do anything about and friction that you can. The latter is what matters. Control the controllables.

Let’s say you had a cookie-eating problem. You’ve ballooned up to 350 lbs and despite how much you hate that. Despite how much you despise yourself when you eat another cookie, you keep looking down and both lefty and righty have a fist full.

Now let’s also say that you’ve been keeping this cookie jar on your kitchen table so you see it every time you come home from work. Every time you walk through the door you have to decide whether or not you’ll eat a cookie and an opportunity for you to slip, for your willpower to lapse. How about we change the environment where you don’t even have to make that decision? Remove the opportunity to be tempted.

Level 1 friction removal: take the cookie jar and put it somewhere you can’t see it. Level 2: put it somewhere that takes a significant amount of effort to reach. That family safe can finally get some good use. Level 3: Don’t have any cookies in the house.

Obviously, level 3 is the goal. Make the desired behavior as easy as possible to choose and the undesired behavior as difficult as possible to choose. When possible, completely remove that stimulus or option from your environment.

Decide what your desired behavior is and make that the easiest choice. Put a bowl of apples or grapes on the kitchen table instead.

Whatever your goal is–the thing which you want to become disciplined in–break it down into actions and behaviors, then prepare the environment around you accordingly.

Bonus Idea:

This is such a deep topic but please let me offer you one final thought on how to become more disciplined.

Make it fun.

They say that the best workout plan is the one you’ll keep doing. Doesn’t matter if it’s jump rope, Zumba, or water aerobics. What matters is that you enjoy it because that means you’ll keep coming back.

Make it fun is a simple idea but it takes a bit of cleverness to implement. Making it fun often doesn’t have an obvious solution. Run some of your own experiments.

Here’s a good way to brainstorm: take your goal and ask yourself, “What would this look like if it were fun?” and then do that! (*hat tip to Tim Ferris)

Bonus Part Dos:

Go google “Revenge Bedtime Procrastination.” Perhaps this is a source of your pain too…

Experiments

1. Get your goal sheet in front of you. For every single one of the goals I want you to ask yourself, “Why do I care to achieve this goal?” If your reasons seem pretty weak, tether it to names and people that you care about. How does achieving this goal affect them and your ability to love them?

Note: It is also perfectly fine to tether it to a larger mission or purpose that you care about (e.g., in college, I was able to study relentlessly because I believed the harder I worked, the more people I could help once I had my degree. I wasn’t going to let them down)

• Perform an Environmental Audit. What triggers in the environment cause you to be more likely to make the wrong decision? Remove those. What triggers do you need in the environment to make it easier to make the right decision? Add those!

• Make it Fun. “what would this look like if it were fun?”