I love setting goals, but what I’ve found MOST effective in getting where I want to be is creating systems. Today, I’m going to share the difference between goals and systems and why you need both.

Update: I am no longer practicing yoga due to some personal convictions about it. I am continuing to stretch and exercise while being mindful of Christ, listening to worship music and sermons, and being in prayer.

Resources Mentioned:

Renew180 Christian Coaching: https://ashleyvarner.com

Highlights From the Episode:

It’s great to have goals but it’s even better to have systems. Today I am going to be sharing about the difference between goals and systems, and I’m gonna show you exactly how you can set up your goals and your systems for success. Let’s get started.

Hey there my friend and welcome or welcome back to “The Renewed Mind”. I am so glad that you are here. I just wanna ask you if you have been watching or if you like this content, I just wanna ask you to subscribe to the YouTube channel. It really helps YouTube know that you want Christian and biblically-based teaching on mindset and emotions and it helps other people find the channel, too.

Goals are One-Time Events

All right, so let’s talk a little bit about goals versus systems. First off, goals are one-time events. Whenever you focus on a goal, there’s nothing wrong with that, but sometimes whenever you focus too much on a goal or where you wanna be. Your default mindset can be one of failure. You know, you’re not there yet. I haven’t met that goal yet, and it really begins to give you thoughts that make you feel inadequate.

So I wanna explain to you a little bit about goals because I love setting goals, but I wanna show you the best way to approach your goals. That way, your mindset is in the right place because we know that our thoughts determine our emotions and it’s our emotions that determine our actions, and our actions over time produce the result or the outcome that we wanna have. And so if you wanna change your outcome, if you wanna change your actions, then you have to start with your thinking. And that’s really what I’m teaching today, is the difference between having a goal and having a system.

Whenever you are setting a goal I want you to think about what that goal might be. Maybe you want to run a marathon. And so, as you are training, and I know for myself, I had those goals several years ago. And whenever you have a big goal like that, something that is tangible that you know is like an event a goal, a specific weight that you wanna lose or a specific dream job that you wanna land, whatever, I want you to see goals as the top of the mountain, right? So you are right at the, whenever you reach that goal you’re right at the top, right? But when you get to the top, what do you do? Well, you usually just turn around and go back down or you set another goal, another peak that you wanna hit.

Matthew 17:1-11

I was reading in the Gospel of Mark the other day, and I read something that really stuck out to me and that was chapter 17, verses 1 through 11. And I’m just gonna read it to you so that you can kind of get the idea of what’s happening.

It says: “After six days, Jesus took with him Peter, James, and John, the brother of James, and led them up a high mountain by themselves.” So they’re on their way up this mountain. “There, he was transfigured before them. His face shown like the sun and his clothes became as white as the light. Just then there appeared before them Moses and Elijah talking with Jesus.

Peter said to Jesus, ‘Lord, it is good for us to be here. If you wish, I will put up three shelters, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.’ While he was still speaking, a bright cloud covered them and a voice from the cloud said, ‘This is my Son, whom I love. With Him, I am well pleased. Listen to Him.’

When the disciples heard this, they fell face down on the ground, terrified. But Jesus came and touched them. ‘Get up,’ He said. ‘Don’t be afraid.’ When they looked up, they saw no one except Jesus. As they were coming down the mountain, Jesus instructed them, ‘Don’t tell anyone what you have seen until the Son of Man has been raised from the dead.’ The disciples asked him, ‘Why then do teachers of the law say that Elijah must come first?’ Jesus replied, ‘To be sure Elijah comes and will restore all things. But I tell you, Elijah has already come and they did not recognize him but have done to him everything they wished.'”

Now, I want to explain why I’m talking about this whenever it comes to goals versus systems. I want you to see that the disciples were with Jesus, and they went and had this mountaintop experience. And I think a lot of us if we look back on our lives, can remember those mountaintop experiences.

I think about the big events in my life or the big times whenever God really worked something huge in my life. And I remember those moments. But I want you to see that the disciples wanted to stay in the middle of that experience, right? They wanted to be there and just live there and stay there.

But Jesus didn’t do that. That was a very specific event that Jesus had planned to be transfigured in front of those specific disciples. And he knew it wasn’t meant to be lived in forever, right? It was meant to be an experience. And then you come back down off of the mountain.

I know that I mentioned earlier my goal to run a marathon, and that was definitely a goal of mine. It was probably about eight years ago, and I decided to run a marathon, and I had the date set. I registered in everything, and I started training. And the goal was to complete that specific race. That was my goal. My goal was not to be a runner, it was not to meet a specific time. My goal was to complete that race. And when I did, I did accomplish it. But when I was done, I didn’t run again for several years because that was my mountaintop experience, that was my goal.

And whenever I met that goal, I felt burnt out. And I didn’t set another goal for a long time in regards to running because it felt like almost anti-climatic, right? Because I met that goal, I could check it off my list. But when I was done, I was done. There wasn’t, I mean, I had trained to do that to run those 26 miles, but I hadn’t really changed too much inside. I didn’t become a runner just because I had the goal of completing a marathon.

Systems are What Get You to Your Goals

Now, in very stark contrast to goals is the idea of systems. So a system is what gets you to your goals. It’s the actions that you take. It’s the person truly that you become as you’re meeting your goal. And I have taught a lot about goal setting. I work with Christian women all over the United States to teach them about goal setting and really learning how to change their mindset so that they can see the transformation.

I do this through this channel, but I also do coaching for women who need that extra help to see transformation in their lives. So if you are someone who needs that extra boost, if you need more in-depth teaching and coaching, then I really recommend that you check out Renew 180.

Renew180 Christian Coaching: https://ashleyvarner.com

It’s a program that I teach. It takes about six months, and you can honestly see extreme transformation in those six months. I really teach systems a lot to my clients in this program because when you focus on systems, it changes your mindset.

Remember, whenever you have goals your mindset is one of almost failure, right? The default is, I’m not there yet. You wake up every day knowing that you haven’t hit that goal. But whenever you focus on systems, your default mindset is progress. You are learning how to change yourself and become that person ahead of time.

If you want to be, you could say that you have a goal to run a marathon and that’s completely fine, right? Goals are great, but the system that would be in place under that goal is for you to become a runner. Maybe you wanna be someone that runs three days a week or you wanna be someone who runs every day. That would be a system that you have in place. A system is what gets you to your goals.

When you Focus on Systems, Your Default Mindset is Progress

So in the example of this marathon, whenever I changed my perspective and my mindset to one of having a system. I really started to think about what kind of workouts and what kind of movement really helped me and made me feel more, not necessarily an athlete, but made me feel fitter, more flexible, and I decided to try some yoga. I found a Christian woman who teaches yoga. She teaches at The Yoga Abby. I’ll leave a link in the description for you, guys. It’s not sponsored or anything but it is something that I go back to on a weekly, regular, weekly basis to really work on being more mindful of my health and my fitness.

So in this system that I created, I wanted a system to be more flexible on a daily basis. I wanted to challenge myself. I’m learning inversions and handstands and those kinds of things. But what I did was build a system.

Instead of having that lofty goal of a one-time event, I wanted a regular event every day. A regular system that I could measure off of to say, you know what? I felt really good after this yoga practice. I really felt good, relaxed, and flexible. And I did have some goals like being flexible and more flexible. Yeah, those aren’t necessarily one-time goals because you have to continually stay on top of them, right?

But I have met those goals, but I went to it with a different mindset than before. And whenever we incorporate systems in regard to our goals. So you can have that lofty goal, there’s nothing wrong with goals, but if you can place systems there to meet that goal. What it does is it changes you into becoming the person who meets that goal instead of just meeting the goal.

You Enjoy the Journey More

You begin to enjoy the journey a lot more. And what I have seen as far as benefits go for systems versus goals is you end up building lifelong habits because it’s more than just one experience. I would venture to say that people who identify themselves as runners are people who do it more for the experience of the daily run than necessarily having the plaque on the wall that they completed a marathon. It’s about the daily habit that they have. How it makes them feel whenever they’re done with a run, that kind of thing.

So remember that whenever you are setting your goals, there’s nothing wrong with setting goals, but it’s important to have systems in place so that you can measure your success along the way. It’s not just about that one time, that one goal, that one mountaintop experience. It’s about experiencing progress throughout your day and until you get to that goal, right? And even beyond.

Change from the Inside Out

So I wanted to finish off by sharing that in Matthew after this story of the transfiguration. Jesus and the disciples, those three disciples, come back down the mountain and Jesus continues to teach them. And in the next chapter, He actually sends them off to minister to people. I think that that shows more of a system in place than just a one-time event.

Now, that one-time event was amazing and those disciples probably never forgot it. But the ministry that took place after that, the actionable steps, the journey that they took. Those systems that they had in place were. I think proved to be more valuable as they were ministering to people. Even after Jesus went back up to heaven because they were able to see how to pray for someone and have them get healed. They were able to minister to people and see miracles happen. And I think that really is the difference between that one mountaintop experience and then getting in the trenches every day to change who you are from the inside out.

All right, that is all that I have for you. As I said, I’ll leave a link to The Yoga Abby in the description. But I also want to encourage you, no matter what your goals are. Maybe you have a fitness goal but maybe your goal is to have a better relationship with someone in your life. Or to have more confidence.

Renew180 Christian Coaching: https://ashleyvarner.com

Make sure that you check out Renew 180 because that is going to be the place where you really start to see huge transformation happen and experience that on a daily basis. You don’t have to wait until you lose weight or you don’t have to wait until you have a certain amount of money in your bank account in order to see progress and growth in your life and see the transformation. If you want to learn how to shift that mindset, then make sure to check out Renew 180.

I will see you guys next week with another video on goal setting.

Have a great week.