I turned into a snowman…

Yesterday I took a couple of hours off and went fishing.

And before you ask… No, I didn’t catch bleak shit… But I wasn't far away from turning into a snowman for how cold it was out there.

To get my mind off freezing to death, I got my phone out and started reading…

I happened to read Gary Halbert's newsletter. The Gary Halbert Letter.

And these couple lines stuck with me regardless of the weather:

===

…It has made me decide to redouble my efforts to make this the most valuable newsletter ever published.

I think achieving that goal would be great.

But, I think striving for that goal is what’s really important.

===

Yes, this is an early interpretation of “enjoy the process”... which is getting thrown around everywhere by now.

But here’s the thing that got me thinking about this:

We perform the best with goals.

But the thing with goals is… Once we achieve them we have nothing. That goal is done for. We need another one to keep us motivated.

We do get a couple day’s worth of a dopamine rush… And then it’s back to the shadows.

That’s why “enjoy the process” became such a mantra.

If you hate the process of achieving a goal... you are frankly torturing yourself because the excitement and dopamine rush of achieving that goal will wither away in a split second .

But I’m sure you already know that…

What I found fascinating was… That still after all this… the best motivators for our brain are goals and not processes.

That's because of how we perceive them…

Goals are short. We see them as one little dot in the future… One turning point. Once you reach that turning point and achieve your goal... your brain thinks all your problems will get solved.

Funny that it never works that way.

Processes are perceived as long and tiring. It’s not one turning point in the future. It’s a road. A continuous journey that has no end, or even if it is, it's far away.

See the difference between them?

Goals give you a way better promise than processes do.

Even just the thought of your goals gives you more dopamine than the processes do.

But that’s not how life works.

Life in itself is a process.

Goals are great to give you drive and direction but…

Indeed, striving is what’s important.