I went to a seminar once where a guy who had written a best-selling book conducted a really insightful experiment with the crowd. There were about 800 people in the room. He asked everyone who had heard of his book to stand up.

Of course, the whole place was on their feet…

Then he asked the people who had bought his book to remain standing.

Half the crowd sat down.

“Remain standing if you read even one chapter of my book”

Half of those standing sat down.

“….if you read the whole book”

Half again

“Now remain standing if you tried any of the suggestions in my book.

Two people were left.

Two out of 800.

I was reminded of this from a tweet by Shawn Fairweather (@mindofchampions):

“Goal Setting is Overrated”… “what makes the biggest difference is what you do AFTER the goals are set”

Don Shula…you know, the winningest coach in NFL history…That Don Shula said that. Shawn’s tweet linked to that same story, and he has a good 4 part riff on goals here.

So what are you DOING?? Are you just ‘buying the book’?…or are you taking some action?

Are you writing down your goals?? Putting them on the calendar?? Creating a visualization recording to help you use imagery? Actually dedicating 15 minutes a day to visualize them?

….Going to a workshop to clarify your goals??

If you’re in the Bay Area (Berkeley to be specific) on the 30th, Sports Psychology Consultant Paige Dunn (@paigedunn, @XcelSports) is hosting a goal setting workshop.

It’s a step.

I heard once that people fail for only two reasons. A lack of knowledge, or a lack of action.

I’ll bet you already had the knowledge before you read this post.

Just do it.