The ultimate formula to take action and achieve your goals

How many times have you abandoned an activity that generated good results but required effort and discipline? What's more, how many times have you thought about starting a positive project that finally never did you carry out? I don't know about you, but I lack fingers to count them.

The procrastination and cognitive laziness are inherent to people since they allow us to save a large amount of energy, however, at the time trying to achieve the goals we want in our life are two great barriers that we must get around.

Achieve the objectives that we set ourselves: how to achieve it?

Psychology studies motivation as the psychological process that links our behavior towards our goals. However, this process has the great disadvantage of being temporary.

It may interest you: "Types of motivation: the 8 motivational sources"

We would all like the motivation that comes from watching movies like Invictus, Gladiator or the famous TED talks; remain in our day to day to achieve the objectives that we set ourselves, although experience tells us that in a matter of hours we return to the baseline of connecting to the 

social media and lay down on the couch.

The implementation of intentions

According to Theory of Planned Behavior for Fishbein and Azjen, the relationship between intentions and behavior is 26%; now you know the reason for your failed attempts. This low correlation shows that intentions are not enough and that we have to find a system that will continuously provide us with our objectives.

New York psychologist Peter Gollwitzer realized how often people encounter problems transforming our intentions into actions and created the concept of implementation of intentions.

According to this theory, when defining a behavioral objective in response to a specific future event, the passage to the act is notably increased. Therefore, the best strategy to carry out all the projects that we want to undertake even if they cost work, consists of define in advance the situations of our day to day in which we will act in a certain way to achieve our objectives.

The formula to stay motivated

This action formula is known as “if-then” planning and one of its determining phases consists of creating all those “If X, then Y” situations. Let's see some examples:

If our goal is get in shape we will consider:

• If I am at home and I have a spare hour ahead of me, then I will go down to the gym.
• If I enter the portal to go up to my floor, then I will use the stairs and not the elevator

If our goal is find a partner:

• If I see a girl I like at a party, then I'll go say hi to her.
• If there is chemistry between the two, then before the end of the night I will ask for the number and meet again

It is necessary to emphasize that these rules are established as universal laws of conduct so that every time that situation arises, we will necessarily act in the indicated way.

Why is this theory effective?

The effectiveness of this technique lies in the fact that the formula "If X, then Y" is the code that the brain understands best and, above all, take into account that motivation is temporary, so we impose a rational system based on situations-behavior that will be imposed when laziness assails us.

Likewise, numerous studies indicate that “if-then” planning increases team performance by emphasizing focus of the group and provoke members to carry out key actions in a timely manner according to Heidi Grant of the Business School of Columbia.

The fundamental idea is that the variable that mediates between intention and action does not reside in temporal motivation, but in decision. Therefore, lDecisions on how to act are shown as the mediating variables of the actions that will lead us to our most desired goals.

Time to take action

You already know that the most effective way to start training, get the best grade in exams, work more efficiently or whatever your ambitions are; It does not consist of watching motivational videos or improvement films, but rather locating the situations that occur to you daily (“Yes”), planning the most effective actions to achieve your objectives ("then"), implement them and consider them as rules of the game to achieve the best Outcome.