Who Do You Need to Become to Reach Your Goals?
How do you achieve your goals? This is a question people search for their entire life. I recently listened to an episode of The School of Greatness with neuroscientist Emily McDonald. The discussion centered around manifestation, but the part that caught my attention had less to do with manifesting outcomes and more to do with identity.
Emily talked about how the version of you that achieves a goal is often very different from the version of you who first set it. The more I thought about that idea, the more I realized how true it is. When we think about goals, we tend to focus on what we want to achieve. We think about the promotion, the business, the relationship, the degree, or the next milestone. But we spend far less time thinking about who we need to become to get there.
One of the points she made was that everyone has a to-do list, but very few people have a to-be list. In other words, we spend a lot of time planning what we need to do and far less time considering the habits, beliefs, mindset, and behaviors required to become the person capable of achieving what we want.
Looking back on my own life, the biggest changes rarely happened because I suddenly achieved a goal. They happened because I gradually became a different version of myself. The person who started an MBA wasn’t the same person who graduated. The person who co-founded a beauty brand wasn’t the one who launched the products. The person who started a doctorate isn’t the same person writing a dissertation today. The goals remained relatively consistent. The identity evolved.
What I found interesting was Emily’s explanation that our brains are constantly filtering reality through our existing beliefs. If we believe we’re not capable, not qualified, or not ready, our brains become remarkably efficient at finding evidence to support those stories.
It reminded me of something Dr. Joe Dispenza often talks about: the power of the subconscious mind. The stories we repeat to ourselves don’t just stay as thoughts. Over time, they become beliefs, habits, and patterns that influence how we show up in the world. If the internal narrative is I can’t do this, I’m not smart enough, or I’m not the type of person who succeeds, the subconscious mind begins to treat those statements as truth.
The opposite is true as well. When we start changing the way we see ourselves, we begin to notice different opportunities, make different choices, and respond to challenges differently. The circumstances around us may not change immediately, but our relationship with them does. I think that’s why personal growth can feel uncomfortable. It’s not just about learning new skills or gaining new knowledge. It’s about letting go of identities that no longer serve us and replacing them with ones that do.
We often focus on the outcome and wonder why it feels so far away. But maybe a better question is this: Who do you need to become to achieve it? Because sometimes the biggest thing standing between us and the life we want is the story we’ve been telling ourselves about who we are.
Dania Khalife
