Not always are our Subconscious Minds’ tricks large and obvious that it is derailing us from our goals. Sometimes, it’s the small, minuscule things that seem unimportant, which can get us miles off track. All your mind actually needs to do is slightly sway your thoughts towards the wrong direction. It’s like standing on a tall, towering mountain and shooting an arrow, you need to have a really precise aim. Even if you slightly miscalculate your angle to shoot from, the arrow could end up miles away from where it’s supposed to be. 

 

Similarly, when you think, say or do something, you need to be rather precise if you want it to work. Even a tiny difference can change the end result completely. For example, when I listen to my goal recordings, which is a powerful tool in aiding your new programming, I often face obstacles in all shapes and sizes. 

 

It’s not always something noticeable like waking up in the middle of the night to see that I’ve smashed my MP3 player that I use to listen to my goals into a wall; but it could also be something really small, like one side of my headphones not working. 

 

So every day on my way to and back from school, I try my best to plug in my headphones and listen to my goal recording. But there was this one time, not long ago, where most of my earphones only worked on one side. So in the meantime of waiting to get new ones, I decided to just use the ones I had, listening to my goals on my side was still better than nothing. 

The problem only occurred after a while, when I got used to listening to my goals on only one side. I started taking it easy, thinking that I could wait a while to get new ones. Little did I know that this small, tiny obstacle from listening to my goals was just a tiny seed waiting to sprout into a habit pattern.

Luckily for me, my mom did get me new earphones after a while. But even then listening to my goals on one side had already became a bit of a habit. So with fully functioning headphones, I still only put one side into my ear. I even did it when I was in a busy place, trying to do my work. I found myself starting to get distracted by outside conversations. The volume I was listening to my goals was also decreasing and I couldn’t really focus on it.

 

It took me a few days to realise what happened. I started putting on both sides on my earphones again and everything went back to normal again. But to think, some small obstacle like my headphones not working properly contributed quite a fair bit of derailment. 

My sub just made me think that everything was okay so that I would take it easy, knowing that I didn’t know yet what the bigger plan was. 

Just like how repeating your goals and focusing on part of your goals are two really different things. Like my goal, as part of the Ascendance team, is to help spread awareness. But I get easily excited when small things happen, like when we get a new follower on Tumblr or a new like on Facebook by a random stranger. Yes, these things do contribute in the long run in helping us spread awareness, but the goal is not to get the most followers on social media, it’s to actually help people out! 

So my Sub gives me an achievement like this and gets me into the mode of getting hyped up about our Facebook page more than our actual goal at times. This is my Sub trying to get me to focus on that instead, this small change of thoughts would be all my old programming needs to sway me off the track of my goals. (It may seem like I’m thinking about my goals, but it’s not because my goal isn’t to get one more like on Facebook.)

Well, don’t worry, there’s a simple solution to that. Just go back to your goals! Going back to your goals keeps you anchored to the bigger picture and not the small successes.

So I hoped this helped shed some light on how sometimes the small things can turn into huge obstacles. So happy repeating your goals!

– Harsha