Why Goals Alone Aren’t Enough — The Strength-Based Action System That Drives Real Success
I’ve just stepped off a training call with Dean Graziosi — energized and challenged — and the first thing I did was come straight here to frame our plan: why it matters, what the solutions are, and how we actually make it happen. We’ve all run the rhythm of goal setting — we write goals, we clarify why they matter, we talk about obstacles, logistics, barriers, excuses, cash flow, fitness, fear, confidence — and yet often, the goals don’t lead to action. It got me thinking:
Is goal-setting simply an academic exercise we live by, rather than a process that truly drives doing?
The Problem With Goals As We Usually Practice Them
Goals have dominated personal and business success frameworks for decades because they define the future we want — they give us a target. Psychological research shows that clearly stated, specific, and challenging goals improve performance and motivation more than vague objectives or “do your best” intentions. Specific and difficult goals sharpen focus, increase effort, and prolong persistence toward action steps, especially when monitored with feedback loops.
But here’s a crucial truth: setting a goal seldom leads to action. Goals are mental representations of desired outcomes. They describe where we want to be, but they don’t specify how we get there. Neuroscience and behavior change research highlights that goal intentions and the pursuit of new behaviors often diverge — we want to change, but without a clear action pathway, goals remain intentions, not reality
At a conceptual level, this has been known for some time — research shows that setting goals without action plans rarely results in behavior change. People will enthusiastically define a goal, but the process that links that goal to actual execution is where people stall.
Why Excuses and Obstacles Always Show Up
When we reflect on why goals don’t work, we can find every reason — valid or not — to avoid action:
“I don’t have enough time.”
“My cash flow isn’t ready.”
“I’m not fit enough.”
“Everything’s stacked against me right now.”
These are familiar reframes of the core issue: without an action system, obstacles become justification. A goal without an embedded system leaves space for the brain to justify inaction.
In writing down my own goals — especially around weight loss and strength — one insight dawned on me:
What happens if I change my narrative from “lose weight” to “gain 30 kilos of muscle”?
This shift in narrative is profound. It doesn’t merely focus on a number; it changes what must be done, how it must be done, and why every daily activity matters. To gain muscle, I must eat differently, train consistently, rest intentionally, and prioritize strength-building activities over convenience. Every action becomes tied to the outcome.
From Muscle to Money: What if We Applied the Same Mindset?
If we consume everything we do with the intention of building strength — physical or metaphorical — then everything we do is purposeful action. Strength isn’t a goal like “lose 10 kilograms”; strength is a process, a system of behaviors:
training sessions,
progressive overload,
dietary changes,
recovery patterns.
The muscle-building mindset demands a system. It demands behavior sequencing, not just a label.
So here’s the big question I asked myself:
What happens if we apply this same strength-based system to creating income and building a business?
The typical corporate or entrepreneurial goal-setting practice often ends up like this:
Define a revenue goal.
Write a “why it matters” statement.
List obstacles.
Hope inspiration and discipline do the rest.
We know how that script usually ends.
Action Over Academic Planning
What we need isn’t better goals — it’s a better action system. Goals give direction. Systems give progress. Science supports this idea. Leading behavior change models suggest that merely defining goals does not guarantee attainment — what matters is action planning: specifying how you will act in specific contexts.
And this aligns with powerful thinking in high achievers: it’s not only the destination that matters — it’s the daily pattern of activity that ultimately determines success.
That’s why muscle is a powerful metaphor. Wanting to gain muscle isn’t about a number; it’s about a pattern of behavior: deliberate training, consistent effort, incremental growth.
You don’t wish for strength. You build it.
How Do You Create That for Money?
Let’s break it down:
1. Identify What You Need Right Now to Move Forward
Ask: If everything I needed were at my fingertips, what financial outcome would move the business forward today? Write that figure down. What does it look like? What activities produce that number? This turns your goal into a targeted outcome with clear criteria.
For example:
revenue from specific sales calls,
contracts signed,
referral revenue,
asset creation.
2. Make It Grow with an Incremental System
The idea of getting “1% better every month” isn’t just motivational fluff — it’s a structure. Compound improvement matters because small changes in behavior accumulate into large outcomes. Building a business system is like building muscle — it requires repetition, feedback, and adjustment.
So consider:
Which activities produce the largest returns?
How can you embed them into daily routines?
How do you measure and iterate those activities?
This is not goal thinking — this is a business operating system.
3. Define the Asset or Solution You’re Going After
Ask:
What asset or solution delivers value?
What can you build with minimal capital that scales?
Who sees value in buying or investing in a piece of it?
This shifts the mindset from hoping revenue comes to creating something people will pay for.
4. Identify Who Can Help You Achieve It
Take an honest look:
Who benefits from this solution?
Is it your customer?
Is it someone who’s willing to partner?
Is it someone in your ecosystem who needs exactly what you’re building?
Business success is rarely a solo sport. Aligning your action system with others — partners, clients, investors — makes it more real and accountable.
So What’s the ‘Keyword’ for Income?
In physical strength, the keyword is strength — and everything you do must align with gaining strength.
In income, the keyword must be something equally actionable: value creation.
Income doesn’t come from wanting money — it comes from creating value that others will pay for. The question becomes:
What value are you producing every day that someone else will exchange currency for?
Every email written, every call made, every prototype built — if it is tied to value creation, then you’re operating a system, not merely setting goals.
Learning Is Easy — But Action Is Hard
Learning is valuable, especially when it’s targeted toward your next income-producing action. Reading yet another motivational book might feel productive, but until it translates into specific operating behaviors, it’s still just intention.
If you want to thrive in an AI world, sales world, or any business context, align your learning with the capabilities needed to execute your business system.
So What’s the Real Answer?
The science says goals give direction and intent — they activate your attention and mental representations of desired outcomes.
But action systems — daily, repeatable behaviors — drive change. Moving from goal intention to goal implementation demands specific plans and routines that automatically shape your behaviors without leaving room for excuses.
That’s the leap:
from “I want it” to “I am building it every day.”
Just like a muscle doesn’t grow by hoping, a business doesn’t grow by wishing. Strength — whether physical or financial — comes from a system of repeated action.
That’s the difference.
I've just got off a training call with Dean Graziosius, and the first thing I did was I went to chat and I thought I'll put in our plan to put it together, why it matters, the solutions, which is what we normally do all the time.
I ran through the whole rhythmic thing of setting up goals, making it matter, making it work, making it not work, all the reasons why it matters, because it got me thinking, is it just an academic process to winning that we live by rather than a doing, an action process?
Because I sat back and thought, well, we can find every problem and every reason that something can't work, from excuses to cash flow to absolutely everything to, you know, not being fit enough, not being strong enough.
Then when I was writing down my goals for weight loss and for looking better, it dawned on me, what happens if we change our narrative of weight to say, let's put on 30 kilos of muscle,
If you put on muscle, you're going to have to lose a fair bit of fat to put that amount on. But if you could start putting on muscle, it means you have to change your diet, it means you have to change what you're doing, it means you have to change literally everything.
So everything is consumed with getting more strength in your body and doing activities that would record more strength and develop more strength. So everything you're doing there, activity is to develop strength. And in developing strength, you start to develop your way of thinking and why you're thinking, and everything else.
And in doing so, I thought, well, okay, what happens if we develop it, the same process into creating income?
So we know that we want to develop, we have to create an action pattern for strength, which will then ultimately mean changing the way you eat, changing your actions, doing more activities to that.
How do you do that for money? How do you do that for building a business? How do you do that? That is so different from just following the normal academic process of goals and chasing everything. How do you create that for money? So what is needed?
So first, you've got to look at right now in your current situation, what do you need now to move forward?
Meaning if you could have everything at your fingertips, and you could move forward today, what amount of money is that? So if you look at that, you write it down and go, right, we need this amount.
Now, I also looked at, okay, if we had that amount, how do we make it grow? Like the old 1% better every month? How do we take a portion of that money and make it grow so that it is always growing?
You know, what solution are you going to fix that's going to pay you to make that happen?
What asset do you need to look at that's going to make you act on it with very little money down to make money so someone else can see value in buying a part of it, bits of it, developing it, whatever the case is.
And then look at who most stands to help in you achieving this result. Is it the person wanting to buy it? Is it the person hoping to buy it? Is it the seller? All right. Is it the seller of it all? So what actions do we need to do to make this income part come together?
So it becomes what is your keyword for income? You know, why do you want it?
So what's our keyword for creating money? We know we want to put on 30 kilos for weight to get stronger, so we have to change that.
What is it for money? That's really what we've got to ask. What do we need to have that process working? If we can work out that, we can change the metrics of goals so that's three actionable steps.
Learning is quite simple. Go and read something, go and learn something, go and find out a new idea, and that's always entertaining and great. But I'm not sure reading over the same personal development books is what it's going to be about.
It's about targeting what you want to achieve this year and learning everything about what that is.
So if it's a new language or it's a new idea or a new sales system, go and find out how it works. If it's AI, go and learn how to do more of it and find the way to make it benefit you. So that part I think we've got right. The bit we haven't got right is how the monetary side is actionable that one particular habit, one particular idea or belief fuels the lot, like muscle.
Muscle, I want to put on 10-20 kilos. So that's where we're at. It'll be interesting to see what your theory is.
What can you see as a person, as an organisation or as a chat thing?
What other ideas do we have?
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