Please, everyone, think about your biggest goal. Imagine that we are making a decision right now that we have to accomplish. Imagine telling someone you met today about it.
Imagine their congratulations and their high opinion of you. Doesn’t it feel good to say it out loud? Doesn’t it make you feel one step closer to your goal, as if it is already becoming a part of you?
Well, the bad news: you should keep your mouth shut, because that good feeling will make it less likely that you will achieve your goal. Long-tested psychological tests confirm that telling someone else about your goal will reduce the likelihood of it being achieved.
Whenever you set a goal, there are certain steps that must be taken to achieve that goal. Ideally, you won’t be satisfied until the work is done, but when you tell others about your goal and they know about it, you get satisfaction. Psychologists call this social reality. In this situation, your mind is misled: it’s already been done. Then, because you have that sense of satisfaction, you’re less motivated to do the hard work required. This goes against the common perception that we all have: that we should tell our friends about our goals so they can support us.
Let’s look at the evidence.
In 1926, Kurt Lewin, the founder of social psychology, called this phenomenon “substitution.”
In 1933, Vera Mahler discovered that when someone else tells you about something, your brain perceives it as real.
In 1982, Peter Gollwitzer wrote a whole book about it, and in 2009, he published the results of new experiments.
Whenever you set a goal, there are certain steps that must be taken to achieve that goal. Ideally, you won’t be satisfied until the work is done, but when you tell others about your goal and they know about it, you get satisfaction. Psychologists call this social reality. In this situation, your mind is misled: it’s already been done. Then, because you have that sense of satisfaction, you’re less motivated to do the hard work required. This goes against the common perception that we all have: that we should tell our friends about our goals so they can support us.
Let’s look at the evidence.
In 1926, Kurt Lewin, the founder of social psychology, called this phenomenon “substitution.”
In 1933, Vera Mahler discovered that when someone else tells you about something, your brain perceives it as real.
In 1982, Peter Gollwitzer wrote a whole book about it, and in 2009, he published the results of new experiments.
So, 163 people wrote down their goals in four separate experiments; half of them announced their goals and the other half didn’t. Then, each person was given 45 minutes to work on a task that was directly related to their goal, but they were told they could finish whenever they wanted. Those who kept their mouths shut worked for an average of 45 minutes and then, when asked, said they were a long way from achieving their goal. But those who spoke up about their goal finished the task after an average of 33 minutes and said they felt closer to achieving their goal.
So if this is true, what can we do? You can resist the temptation to declare your goal, you can delay the gratification of being recognized, and you can recognize that your mind is mistaken for words. But if you really need to say something, you need to do it in a way that doesn’t give you satisfaction.
Guys, the next time you're tempted to talk about your goals, what would you say? NOTHING. That's just fine.