Viktor Frankl teaches us that if our why is big enough, we can endure any how. He wrote this in a concentration camp, or after coming out of a concentration camp. If your why is big enough, it'll drive you forward. You've probably heard this before, you're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, start with why I know all this, but do you understand it? Do you understand the power of the why? Or did you say, well, yeah, I thought about it, and my why is my family or something? But what is the real why? What is the real goal? You're working for your family, sure, but for what? If you're working for survival to support your family, that doesn't motivate you. That doesn't push you through. That's just day-to-day. You've got to make this much this week, and the next week, I've got to do it all over again. The next week, I've got to do it all over again. That's not going to drive you. That's just survival. That's just grinding a why, a goal, something that pulls you forward has got to be bigger than that. A why that's a goal has to be definitive. It has to be something you're going towards that you can reach, that you can have a finish line. When you cross that finish line, then you can build another one for another finish line. It doesn't have to be huge. It doesn't have to be quit your job and move to the Maldives. It doesn't have to be replace your spouse's income completely. It could be something more modest, like send your child to camp every week next summer. Or it could be replace your crappy car with a new car. Whatever it is, it's something to work forward to, and then you can build the plan around that. You see, if you need to make $2,000 a week to pay your bills because that's your lifestyle and you're not able to change it because your family depends on you and all, okay, well, that might be tough for you, and you're just getting by week to week to week. If you had a goal of sending your kid to camp every week next summer, that might be as little as $100 or $200 a week more. Well, now for $2,200 a week, you have a powerful driving goal. You'll have something to show for it. You'll be able to watch that money accumulate in the account and say, yes, we're closer. We're closer. We're closer. We're there. What's the next goal? When we talk about goal setting, it's not just for arbitrary purposes. It has to be something that matters. The goal excites you, turns into the why, the why gets you working every day. The why allows you to work when you wake up with a headache or kind of tired or the computer breaks down and you hit those obstacles. If you don't have that clear goal that turns into the why that drives you, it gets really, really hard. But if you can just look at something and say, let's do that, that's a good next step. Let's get there, reachable, accessible, but powerful. Then you will discover the true power of a why to drive you forward through any how.
