Why Most People Failed because of Planning

Planning is considered to be the core of everything before you actually started doing something. If you had experience going through some tough time in life, try to recall how many times that things are so much tougher than what you initially expected and try to think, would things became better if you had invested the necessary time for a complete plan before you actually dive into it?

Around my near-30th generation, I begin to experience hell lots of planning needed for almost every single thing that I need to fill up in my daily life. And I'm also at the stage where I can observe and easily see how others deal with their planning.

I'm always interested to see friends who wanted to start a business and at the stage of planning where they suppose to sketch the entire route map and list down the A to Z of their business plan. What interest me the most, is how much struggle they had during planning.

Don't get me wrong, it's not that I enjoy seeing people struggle and lost of direction to do something that they suppose to have great interest with. Just that the idea behind "doing something that they are interested with but at the same time, they had so much struggle in it" is kind of an ironic yet it's a real life situation occurred behind the human mind.

The Anatomy of Doing What You Like But You Ought to Struggle A Lot

Isn't it sounds familiar somehow? If it's something that you like to do or you have a strong desire to achieve it, where is the struggle coming from? Isn't that sounds like you wanted to torture yourself?

The truth is, doing things that you like doesn't always means the subject contain only things that you like and there is absolutely nothing that you don't like.

Being in a relationship with someone you love has the same concept. You love someone because of certain traits that attracted you. But at the same time, there is no human being that you would only love and he or she is so perfect that there is nothing you dislike or hate about it. You love the person you love, but at the same time you dislike or hate something that they have.

It's the same for planning for business. You love the idea where you are the owner of the business, and you are capable of taking up something challenging and hold certain positive value in the society and the business world that has the chance to compete and show the people and the world how capable are you to grow the little seed of yours into a huge and significant business, but you hate it when the times come where you have to deal with all sort of stuff that is not in your preference list but you know that you must go through them to get what you want.

Irony or not, that's how people practically is. There is no perfect plan in the world where you can just do what you want to do and throw away whatever you don't like but still able to achieve what you want. Those who want to do so ought to struggle even more because when they refuse to accept the reality, the cruel reality get to become more visible and taunt down their life. And thus, became one of the reasons you see situation where the more people hate about a subject, the stronger desire they had to do it.

And unfortunately, people is a creature that strongly depending on their feeling and desire. It's bloody difficult to accept something that you dislike and hate something that you like. In the end of the day, we frequently looks ridiculous to ourself when we say that we hate it but we want to do it so much. And we suffer a lot because of such a double edge feeling in our heart. As well as doing something that we really love to do even if it's something that you've been desired since years ago, you ended up hate doing it.

The Misconception Between Planning and Result

From my experience dealing with people, many people out there know the importance of planning. "Failed to plan is plan to failed" is always a practical idea for me, so it's a good thing I see people willing to put effort into planning.

The only problem is, I doubt people actually have any solid idea of why is the planning all about other than doing it because other people is doing it, or the so-call "successful" people are doing them, so they should do it.

One of the struggles is the idea of trying to use planning to achieve result. Well, you want result and therefore you need a good plan that can help you to eventually achieve the desire result. The idea is great and nothing wrong, just not accurate enough and that could increase the chance of failure and cause more obstacles than ever if you didn't consider properly.

Try to visualize and think about the concept of Planning-Result methodology to run a business, any type of business will do.

In this case, I will use a florist business as example. Imagine this, I wanted to run a florist business because I love flowers and plants, I want to own a shop that is full of beautiful and natural flowers and plants that looks colorful, feel comfortable and refreshing for whoever step into my shops. In the Planning-Result methodology, this will be my concept:

• Planning: To identify ways to gather the flowers and plants, and get a place to run the business
• Result: Own a florist shop full of natural and colorful flowers and plants

Now that I done what was stated in my planning, I got all the flowers and plants that I want, and I got a pretty nice place to put all my colorful kids, I can start decorating and run my business just like how I visualize it in the beginning.

But hey, is my desire result just to create a florist business like that for awhile or for long term? Needless to say, it's for long term, so where are all the following thoughts and planning gone to?

• Tools to maintain flowers and plants
• The brand of fertilizer for all the colorful kids
• Long term renting budget & planning for the shops/place
• The type of design and pattern to decorate the shop so that all plants and flowers look beautiful and comfortable
• Who is my targeted customer?
• Who is the supplier for fertilizer and tools?
• How much I need to earn per month to cover up all operation expenses to maintain the business?
• How much I'm able to earn after reducing all operation expenses for the business and is that enough for my living?
• Etc.

If I had thought of this in the beginning of my planning, my Planning-Result methodology suppose to be something like this:

All these little fragments are not something that I can finish them within a single day, probably not even a month or two. Every single one of them need another set of complete planning and thoughts, and they are necessary to maintain the result of owning a florist that full of the colorful and natural design, AND to maintain it as a business in a long term.

Now look at all the little fragments between the Planning-Result. With all the fragments stacking up, touching on the final result that I want is actually quite far away and not every single part of them is what I truly want to do, but I have to do it because that's what could achieve and maintain the result that I wanted.

And here is the main point:

Things that I want	Things that I hate but I have to do it
Own a florist business with colorful and comfortable flowers and plants	Deal with planning on budgeting & operation cost, dealing with suppliers, targeted customers, etc

When you learn that there are so much that you need to cater for when you plan, and you can't escape from it, you will feel the burden even though you knew that it's part of what you want in the end. As you go with it, you easily feel fed up and tired, and you might get to a point of wondering why are you doing this at the first place.

Don't find it hilarious or silly, it's actually quite natural for feeling tired over something that you have interest in but when it's not part of your preferences. This is exactly the burden and uneasy feeling that rip off your interest and passion to continue going for what you planning to achieve in the earlier stage.

Do not fall into Result Focused Mindset

Planning-Result is a straight forward thinking that somehow lead people to think that the end of their planning would be the result. It's just natural that we start to do planning and do all sort of things because we want the result. But reality don't work that way. planning is not a method to achieve result, it's a complete thoughts that help to identify the path you need to take, as well as identify which are the stepping stones and rocks that you need to beware and look into.

And all these definitely take time. If you are planning to achieve things as soon as possible, it's quite likely that the result would not be fruitful and you won't enjoy as much as you thought it would.

Planning is not just something that you need to do so that you can get the result. It's mean far more than that. It demonstrate how much you are capable of building the necessary path towards the desire direction. And the direction is not all about result, it's not suppose to be a straight path moving directly to the destination.

Your path should allow you to gain more and expose to more opportunity other than the result itself. If you see nothing but the result during your planning, I doubt you truly understand what's the result is all about.

Instead of going all the way towards one destination, create a path where you can learn more and make yourself a better person. Even if it's only for planning, it doesn't take only planning & management skill to draft a good plan.

You need perseverance, and you need to learn that you can't rush things out. You must achieve things one step at a time, and the targeted achievement need to be practical, small but meaningful enough to make progress.

You also need good decision making skill and deal with trade off. There are always times where you have to choose over something you dislike and work on it without failed, and best without complaining and hate it when things don't go as plan.

Last but not least, you need constantly watch where you are going. Planning is a must in the beginning, but it's also crucial in the long run. You don't plan because people say you should plan before doing something, you plan when you really understand planning is a practical behavior to ensure you know what you are doing and what is your aim, and you can clearly tell people what your idea is all about without hesitate and doubts in yourselves.

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