Why Your Goals Keep Falling Apart

[00:00:00] Dr. Christiane Schroeter: It was never your discipline. That’s why your goals keep falling apart. Picture a bus stop. The bus pulls up, and that first step is too high, so you wait. The doors close, and you stay on the sidewalk. That’s most of your goals. Not because you are lazy, the step was just too high. I’m Dr. Christiane, and this is the Happy Healthy Hustle podcast.

[00:00:31] Today, I will show you how to lower the bus so the first step meets you right where you stand. Let’s tune in and subscribe so you never miss an episode. Let me tell you why your goals keep falling apart. It’s not your discipline. I mean that. Picture a bus stop, and you know exactly where you want to go.

[00:00:54] The destination is clear. The bus is your goal. Now, this is really important because when the bus arrives and the doors open, just imagine, you look up, and all of a sudden you’re like, “Oh my gosh, there’s the first step to get into that bus.” But the step is so high. And you just stand there, and you have these ordinary shoes on, you’re holding ordinary bags, and all of a sudden, ordinary energy comes, and it’s just a real day.

[00:01:27] And there’s no way you can actually climb that very high first step into that bus. So you wait. And the doors close, and you just kind of see the bus pulling away with your goal, and you just stay on that sidewalk. I talk about that story in my book, Petite Practice, and this is actually what most of your goals feels like.

[00:01:51] Dr. Christiane Schroeter: It’s not even you’re lazy, and it’s not that something is broken in you. It’s just that the step to get onto the bus to reach that goal was just so high. This is important. We need to slow down. And this is the turn. Let’s imagine something different. The bus pulls up. The driver sees you, sees you hesitate, sees you looking up at that impossible high step, and then the driver does something really, really cool.

[00:02:26] I call it quiet and beautiful. The driver pushes this button, and all of a sudden the whole bus just kind of lowers down. It might even make that sound, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, this soft hydraulic sound. And all of a sudden, that first step, it meets you on the sidewalk right where you are. So you don’t have to leap.

[00:02:48] You don’t even have to stretch out your leg. All that you have to do is you just take an even step, a very small one, just a small step forward, and that very small step from exactly where you are already. That is Petite Practice. It’s meeting you where you are, and that’s the point. Here’s what I actually want that you notice.

[00:03:15] Dr. Christiane Schroeter: The goal didn’t change. The bus still pulled up, and the destination was the same. What changed was the size of the very first step, and in this case, it was that step to get onto that bus, right? That big step. So think about your goal you keep, and you just don’t start. The book you want, but you just don’t write it.

[00:03:40] The workout, you keep, but you just push it off. The conversation, you just don’t have. Now, let’s shrink that goal down. Shrink it until it feels almost too small to matter. Maybe just two sentences, or five minutes, or one honest text. That is when that bus arrives, and it lowers down to the level where you are.

[00:04:08] Dr. Christiane Schroeter: So I have spent 20 years studying this, first as a behavioral economist, then as a human trying to build a life without running myself into the ground. And the science, it just keeps saying the same thing. That lasting change is built from steps that are so small they almost feel embarrassing. Now, that’s really important though, because here’s the truth.

[00:04:34] Dr. Christiane Schroeter: You were never the problem. You always had goals. It was just the design. The step was too big. The bus pulled up, step too big. So the reward was too far away, and when it all fell apart, you turned around and you blamed yourself for not being able to reach your goals. Most of us do that. We set the resolution in January.

[00:04:57] We drop it by February. And then we whisper, “Ah, what’s wrong with me?” Nothing is wrong with you. Your step was just too high. And so there’s no one that ever taught you how to lower the bus. Because keep in mind, the bus arrives. That’s really important. That’s the part that everyone really skips.

[00:05:23] Dr. Christiane Schroeter: And this is one thing about the bus. The journey is built like a route. There are stops along the way, and you can pause. You can even step off the bus again, and then you can step on whenever you’re ready. So you can even sit on a bench. You can look around, and you can say, “Huh, yeah, is this really the direction that I want to take?”

[00:05:47] And, “Is that actually me?” And that is so important, because you can always climb back on your route, on the bus, and you can continue your journey. Doesn’t mean that once you’re on the bus, you’re going to be on there until you reach your destination. Most productivity advice skips that part. They say, “Oh, you need to keep the streak.”

[00:06:11] “You need to keep going. You need to keep riding because once you fall off, you’re going to fall off, and, you know, it means you’re skipping, and don’t break the chain.” But Petite Practice is different. It asks you for something much, much gentler. You can ride, you can take that first step, get on the bus, and guess what?

[00:06:34] You can also pause because I would like that you notice how it feels. You can check, is that road really mine? Yeah, I give you permission, in fact, to ask yourself these questions and get off the bus if you feel the road is not mine. The pause is the practice. The stops are just part of the journey. So Petite Practice, if you’re curious about the story, we’ll continue this beautiful story.

[00:07:05] Dr. Christiane Schroeter: Now, if you’re already doubting, and I know what doubt sounds like. You’re thinking, “Ah, I’ve tried this so many times. I’ve tried it before, it just didn’t work,” right? “I quit. It was like week three last time I tried. And why would all of a sudden a smaller step be any different?” It’s not a magic formula, right?

[00:07:28] It’s not even like a new system that I’m sharing here with you. In fact, here is why it works. A big step needs a lot of motivation. And a small step honestly really doesn’t. A small step you can take on a very busy day, on a day when you’re so tired, so exhausted, you don’t even have energy, and no motivation at all.

[00:07:54] It’s this, one of those really hard days. The day when it seems like nothing is going right. Sounds familiar, right? We have all been there. And all of a sudden, that small step, you can still take that on that exact day because that’s maybe the one step on that day that actually adds up to something. That is really the point.

[00:08:19] Dr. Christiane Schroeter: So what is the small step you can take right now? You could grab the book. You have been standing on the sidelines, on the sidewalk, watching the bus arrive, leaving, and just not knowing how to get started. You kind of watch your goals just pulling away without you. And you’re like, “Ah, one day I will be on that bus.”

[00:08:42] “One day,” right? I wrote this book for you. Yeah. Because I know you have those goals, and I know you’ve been dreaming about getting started with them. So the book is called Petite Practice: Small, Steady Steps to a Life of Momentum and Real Change. It’s the system that actually lowers itself to where you are right now.

[00:09:06] It meets you where you are and gets you started. Available August 16th on Amazon. And of course, you don’t even need a bigger leap to get started. You just need that system that comes to you. So grab your book on Amazon. Find it and get started where you are already, where you already stand. And of course, I can’t wait to hear your biggest takeaway with it.

[00:09:33] So grab your copy. You can even put it in a purse. It’s nice and small, petite. The link is right below this video. And then go and do one small thing today. Don’t climb the whole staircase. Just take that very small step, and maybe it’s even that first lowered step that meets you where you are today, and go on your journey.

[00:09:57] And let’s take it together. Can’t wait to hear from you. My name is Dr. Christiane, leadership strategist, TEDx speaker, and of course, author of the Petite Practice book. Talk to you soon.