Increase Success in Reaching Goals: Hope & Pathways

There are other ways to increase your success in reaching your goal, besides goal writing and goal process. One major component is called hope and is part of a larger psychological construct called Psychological Capital, written about here. This post explains hope and it’s relationship to reaching goals, as well as how to create more pathways to goals, plan for obstacles and your reaction to obstacles.

Why is Hope Important to Reaching Goals?

Higher hope is related to higher self-esteem, better perceived problem-solving abilities, more perception of control, higher optimism, more positive emotions and the expectation more positive outcomes.

What is Hope?

Hope has two parts: agency and pathways. Agency is your belief, or your willpower, to reach your goals and you can read more here. Pathways are called your “way power” to reach your goals.

How do Pathways Increase Success in Reaching Goals?

Pathways are the different routes to get to your goal. To increase your hope, you want to increase your pathways. One easy way to increase hope is to brainstorm all the possible ways you could get to your goal, making sure to include ways you have not previously thought of before. Another method of creating alternate pathways is called mind mapping where you visually draw different pathways and related links out to those pathways.

We have a tendency to only pursue one path when we go after a goal. When that one path gets blocked or doesn’t work, we can get discouraged. The fact remains, there was only one path that was attempted when there are many paths to any given goal.  You can increase your hope by increasing your pathways, as well as imagining what obstacles might occur for each pathway and what your next course of action would be.

Foolproof Your Goal: Plan for Obstacles to each Pathway

This is the secret sauce to reaching your goal.  Plan for failure.  Then, plan what you are going to do when one pathway fails.  Planning for obstacles helps you have a better plan overall, as well as increases your resilience to deal with set backs.  Imagining what can block each pathway, and having the discipline to write it out and think of your next step, can help you conserve mental energy. It depletes your willpower when you have to think about what to do in a crisis situation. Planning ahead makes sure you are not caught unawares – and you already have a plan! This mindset can greatly increase your resilience and odds of achieving your goal.

What can you do to increase your pathways? How do you create multiple paths to your goal? Let me know in the comments!

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