In one of my mastermind group meetings, I said this to an actor who has had the same goal listed in her fortnightly accountability declaration for about four months now:

“Put EDIT DEMO REEL at the top of your white board. Put it in China marker on your bathroom mirror. Put it on Post-It notes all over your world, in your apartment, in your car, EVERYWHERE. And every single thing that comes into your life every day, measure it against that goal. Ask yourself, ‘Does this task move me toward that goal or away from that goal?’ And if the answer is NOT ‘Toward that goal,’ don’t do that thing. Because what you’re saying is important — but never effin’ doing — is getting your demo reel edited. So do it. It’s binary. You’re either on that task or off that task, every second of every day.”

Now, I don’t always pull a CTJ moment in mastermind meetings, but because this was a task that had been at the top of this particular masterminder’s list for four freakin’ months at this point, with excuses for why it had not been inched forward every meeting, I knew it was time to make it binary.

There’s no middle ground when it’s binary. There’s no grey area. There’s either ON or OFF. You’re either moving toward a goal or away from it (and standing still *is* moving away from the goal).

Whether it’s a big-picture goal (“join the union,” “move to Los Angeles,” “write and produce that story I’ve been craving to tell”) or a short-term one (“get in an ongoing class,” “join an accountability group,” “shoot new headshots”), when you have a big, barking reminder that your one and only focus needs to be on moving that thing forward, it gets very simple.

“Ahh… a notification just went off on my phone, telling me that someone hit LIKE on a photo I posted.” Great. Does checking that out move you toward or away from getting your demo reel edited?

“Oooh… my actor friend wants to get together for coffee… during which we will bitch about how unfair this industry is.” Great. Does having that meet-up move you toward or away from getting your demo reel edited?

“I should send out a zillion postcards. I hear that works.” Great. Does doing that actor busy work move you toward or away from getting your demo reel edited?

My objective in sharing this with you is not to get you obsessed with goals. You already know how I feel about that whole thing. But if you say something is important but then it doesn’t get DONE over time, maybe it’s NOT that important after all. And if your reaction to *that* sentence is, “No! It *is* important! I just have this LIFE stuff that keeps getting in the way! It’s not my fault that I can’t get it done,” I encourage you to just make it binary.

You are either ON the task of moving the goal forward or you are not. No judgment for the time when you are NOT, but you certainly can’t complain about how it never gets done when you’re the one choosing that condition.

The way I wrangle this is with the phrase “clocked in.” I’m either clocked in for my goal or I’m not. And when something pings me (a text message, an email, a phone call, a bit of in-person drama, whatever), I say, “I’m clocked in for my goal. I’ll clock in for you later.” And then, later, after I’ve worked toward my goal for a bit, I can come back around to the stuff that’s not so important. Or not. 😉 Making it binary is a delicious way to get things done.

Bonnie Gillespie is living her dreams by helping others figure out how to live theirs. Wanna work with Bon? Start here. Thanks!

Originally published by Actors Access at http://more.showfax.com/columns/avoice/archives/001957.html. Please support the many wonderful resources provided by the Breakdown Services family. This posting is the author’s personal archive.