I have a friend named Sam, and she is working herself to the bone. She works for an Acme Corp in the financial sector, and through a cascading series of managerial failures, she is now saddled with a crushing workload meant for four people, on a project for which she’s had no training. She’s smart and resourceful, so she’s making her shlub bosses look great, but she’s working 16 days, 6 or 7 days a week, and has been for months. She’ll be working Christmas Eve the same way.

The punchline is that because of the turmoil in the industry, she will not receive a raise or a bonus this year, and because she’s been working non-stop, she is going to lose a considerable amount of paid vacation time when the new year comes.

I’ve pleaded with her: Sam, this is not your fault. You have the right to require adequate resources and training to do your job. This situation exists because people who were supposed to be responsible let the ball drop. You’re the fall girl. When you’ve completed this assignment, someone several layers up the chain will get a pat on the back and probably a promotion. Just say no!

Invitation

Still, she persists. She says she wants more freedom. She says she wants more money. But what is she actually inviting? She’s inviting long hours and unacceptable compensation by the way she acts.

And she’s not alone.

How many people do you know who bellyache about their lives? The long hours? The shit pay?

How many people do you know who do something about it?

Do something!

Here’s how to get what you want. It’s not easy, but it is simple.

1. Stop making Excuses. Sam has a lot of excuses. She’s concerned about job security. She likes that she has more vacation time than usual. Like many excuses that we carry around with us, Sam’s excuses are obviously unfounded: job security in the financial sector? Seriously? Vacation time? Looks good on paper, but when’s the last time you actually took a break?

   There is always a litany of reasons you “can’t” do whatever it is you want to do. Forget all of those excuses, and just do it.

2. Define your Goals. Maybe part of Sam’s problem is that she doesn’t have a clear idea of exactly what she wants. Most people want more money, but how much exactly will allow her the breathing room to pay for her son’s private school, fix things around her house, and give her the freedom to take long vacations?

   Successful people know how to measure success. You want more money? Figure out how much you want, and make it your goal to get that. Want more time? Figure out how much time, and make it your goal to get that much.

3. Create a Plan. Make a plan to get from where you are, to where you want to be. Make the plan explicit and detailed. Be prepared to modify the plan as you go along.

   Goal mapping is a great way to create a detailed plan, and it has a side effect that brings me to my next point:

4. Stick to it. This should go without saying, but I know it doesn’t. People with the best intentions do all the ground work to achieve their goals, but they falter at the most important part: actually following through on the plan!

   The trick to following through is to create milestones for yourself, which will be automatically built in if you use a goal map. Each node in your map is a milestone.

   

   Mountainous goals loom overhead like an ominous cloud, blotting out the sun. They are intimidating. It may be impossible to change careers, but it’s not so bad to just spend a couple hours updating your resume, is it? Once that’s done, it’s not so terrible to just spend some time on the internet collecting information about an industry or company, is it? Why, you have this information, you might as well submit your resume! Oh an interview? I suppose you could make time during lunch sometime this week. And so it goes.

   It’s worth mentioning that you may stall on a milestone. It happens, don’t sweat it:

   1. You have a milestone on your list that you keep looking at and ignoring. You see it there, but you can’t bring yourself to do it. You want to do it, but as soon as you put the slightest effort into thinking about it, you are instantly demotivated. This is a case where the milestone is too broad or vague. You simply need to break that milestone into smaller steps.

      “Write Resume” may be daunting. “Write Employment Dates in a list” is not daunting. Neither is “write a list of duties for last employer.” “Write a list of technical skills.” Once you have the raw material, “Edit the list into a document” isn’t so bad. Once the information is there, looking for a nice resume template isn’t so hard. When all that is over, it’s no big deal to polish and send it to friends to help edit.

      That’s it, just break down the milestone into mini-milestones.

   2. On the other hand, you have a milestone that you are working on. You throw yourself at it every day, but the goal for that milestone isn’t happening. You’re an artist, and your goal is to get your art into a gallery. “Get Art into Gallery” seems like a nice milestone, but try as you might, no gallery will take you. In this situation, simply back up.

      

      You expected the previous step in your plan to lead to this step, but you’ve simply overlooked a step or two in between. To figure out the steps in between you can try to work backwards. You’re in the gallery. How did you get here? Who did you talk to? What was luck and what did you control? Based on their counter-factual narrative, create the steps you need to achieve your goal.

      Alternatively, you might try overwhelming force. In some situations milestones will seem unreachable, but if you imagine an absurd scenario in which you can literally anything to achieve the goal, then you will probably think of a (silly) solution.

      Your goal is to lose weight, but you can’t seem to get the last 5 pounds off. You’ve tried “everything.” Then you imagine sitting on an exercise bike for 5 hours a day for a week, and consuming nothing but extremely healthy juice blends of veggies and fruit. A person who does that will lose 5 pounds. Then you just ask yourself: why not? Sometimes doing outlandish things is the right way to break through the slump.

One step at a time. That’s the real secret to getting what you want. We have this idea from entertainment media that lives change instantly and with little effort. One day a normal person is “discovered” and thrust into fame and fortune. Average Joe works hard until the day he wins the lotto and lives happily ever after. This is wrong. The way it really works is that people make a choice to plod, one step at a time, toward a goal, and then they are diligent about taking the steps.

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