Last Sunday close to 22 000 people from all over the world competed in one of the greatest marathons – The Comrades in Durban, South Africa. I’m a bit of an arm-chair athlete myself, so while others push their bodies to the absolute limit by running, walking, or crawling across the finish line, I’m happy to sit and watch in astonished awe at throngs of people snake their way along the route.

There are many great running and race analogies I could write about but I’ll leave that to another day. What I did want to remind you of, is that there is more than one way for you to reach your goal, and that being flexible in your efforts to attain your dreams will increase your chances of success. It’s a little like taking the shortest route to get to a meeting. It may make perfect sense to go a specific way, but when you come to an unexpected delay because of an accident or lights that are out, you would be wise to take the detour. It may be longer, and you may arrive at your destination slightly later than expected, but at least you won’t be sitting in a long queue, having missed your meeting altogether.

We are often so focused on a specific plan for reaching our goals, that we forget that there are in fact many possible ways we can get there. Flexibility on the journey to accomplishing our dream is what keeps us from freezing when we’re faced with an unexpected delay.

Here are four keys that will help you accomplish your goals by being flexible – this is an excerpt from a post by Megan Hyatt Miller, Chief Operations Officer of Michael Hyatt & Co. (A guest post on www.michaelhyatt.com):

  1. There are no sacred cows: Your goals may be sacred, but your strategy for attaining them shouldn’t be. All that matters is whether it works or not.
  2. A plan is still important: You may be tempted to think that creating a game plan to accomplish your goals is a waste of time. Far from it. After all, having a plan is what gets us in motion, moving toward our goals. Just remember to hold it loosely as obstacles arise.
  3. Possibility thinking is the secret sauce: Shifting gears from one strategy to the next presumes that you believe a better strategy exists, even if you don’t know what it is yet.
  4. Show your work: If you’re leading a team, this is a critical final step. You must explain your rationale for changing strategy to your team, and you must enroll them in your vision. This sets your team up for alignment with you, and the willingness to follow where you lead, even if it’s disruptive in the short term.

Keep in mind that the key to achieving your goals, whether it’s to get a promotion or to complete next year’s Comrades Marathon, is to develop a tolerance for “changing your route” as often as you need to get to your goal.