3 Reasons Why Vision & Goals are Inseparable

(From Ngina – I have the honor of hosting Mike Holmes as a guest blogger today. Mike is a blogger and speaker who heads the Simple Strategies for Startups community. He is also the author of I Shall Raise Thee Up: Ancient Principles for Lasting Greatness, a book that shows the timeless laws that people, organizations, ministries, and companies use to become great. You can find him on Twitter, or you can pick up his free ebook Top Twitter Traffic Strategies)

Nothing happens without vision.

Standing behind leadership, accomplishment, achievement or action is some unseen vision.

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Before one can build one must see.

For instance: when God told Moses to build The Tabernacle He told Him to build it after the pattern he (Moses) had seen.

And so it remains, you can only build your life after the pattern you’ve seen for your life. A vision is nothing but reality in seed form.

Accomplishment always proceeds vision:

1. It was a crystallized vision that helped Michael Hyatt turn around a badly run and unprofitable division when he was a publisher.

2. It was vision that took our own Kimanzi Constable from an ordinary disgruntled deliveryman to international speaker.

3. It was vision that pushed Lincoln Parks from an unhappy corporate drone to network marketer

4. It was the secret sauce of the late Steve Jobs

5. And it’s lack is the reason many people perish

But vision means nothing without goals.

An Inseparable Marriage

The Bible itself is very clear about the link between goals and vision:

“Record the vision and inscribe it on tablets, that the one who reads it may run. For the vision is yet for the appointed time; it hastens toward the goal and it will not fail. Though it tarries, wait for it; For it will certainly come, it will not delay.” (Habakkuk 2:2-3)

“If your goals are good, you will be respected.” (Proverbs 11:27)

The two have graced the pages of every inspirational and motivational book imaginable. Thought leaders have disagreed on many things but are unanimous as it relates to these two.

Here are the reason why vision and goals will never be divorced:

1. Goal setting helps the brain

It’s been estimated that human only use 10% of the brains power is used while 90% lies dormant.

One of the ways to harness the latent potential of the brain is through goals.

Why?

The brain loves goals!

When goals are set, dopamine is released in the brain. A motivated brain will be rewarded along the way to the achievement by the release of these chemicals.

The brain is a “goal seeking mechanism”-it derives its greatest pleasure from overcoming objectives.

2. Goal setting activates the reticular activation system

The brain receives millions of bits of information per second and that information goes through a filtering process.

The Reticular Activation or (RAS) is the brain’s filter it decides what to accept or reject.

So whenever you have a vision and that vision is made plain with goals, the RAS is activated to notice anything that will help achieve that goal.

3. God gets behind goals

This one I really don’t understand but I know it be true.

But it seems that God Himself gets behind deeply entrenched committed goals. I don’t know!

Maybe it has to do with the Law of Faith:

 “According to your faith, so be it unto you.”

One of things Michael Hyatt said that really stood out to me, as it related to vision and goal setting, was NOT to focus on the “how” too early but the “what”:

 “The problem is that people get stuck on the how. They don’t see how they could accomplish more, so they throttle back their vision, convinced that they must be “realistic.” And, what they expect becomes their new reality. This is simply faith applied negatively.”

But what do you think? How important are goals to you? Please share your thoughts in Comments below.

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