Coaching practices for Anti Goals Defining Success by What You Refuse to Accept When Burned Out

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Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?

  • I’ve been ruling out a path I tell myself I’d "never accept," but when I’m honest the real issue is I just can’t see how to make it work
  • On paper I’ve hit the goal
  • I keep getting dazzled by how brilliant or charming someone is and signing up to work or partner with them, and then the exact same painful pattern I’ve been burned by before
  • Every single one of my goals is phrased as "don’t screw up," "stop being lazy," "don’t embarrass myself"
  • I’m still steering my whole life by lines I drew years ago about what I’d never accept, and lately I’m not sure those rules even fit who I am now

Practices that may help

  1. Anti-Goals: Defining Success by What You Refuse to Accept
    Anti-goals, popularised by entrepreneur Andrew Wilkinson, are explicit statements of the outcomes, conditions, and trade-offs you refuse to accept — defined before deciding what to pursue. They complement positive goal-setting by creating a decision filter that eliminates technically "successful" outcomes that would make you miserable. The framework is a practitioner heuristic with no direct experimental study, but it applies well-supported principles from decision science and values-clarification.
  2. Distinguish true anti-goals from solvable constraints
    Some "I won’t accept" conditions are actually design problems — not genuine anti-goals — and can be solved rather than ruled out.
    Anti-Goals: Defining Success by What You Refuse to Accept
  3. Set lifestyle anti-goals to protect daily experience, not just outcomes
    The quality of your daily experience matters — define the daily conditions you refuse to accept, not just the outcomes.
    Anti-Goals: Defining Success by What You Refuse to Accept
  4. Apply anti-goals to relationships and collaborators
    Naming the relational patterns you refuse to accept prevents you from optimising for the wrong things in who you work or live with.
    Anti-Goals: Defining Success by What You Refuse to Accept
  5. Reframe avoidance goals as approach goals
    Translate "stop failing" into "get to X" so your system aims at a target instead of a threat.
    Approach vs Avoidance Goals
  6. Review and update anti-goals annually as values evolve
    Anti-goals based on your 28-year-old priorities may be wrong for your 38-year-old ones — review them explicitly.
    Anti-Goals: Defining Success by What You Refuse to Accept
  7. Recover from setbacks without quitting the goal
    Build a routine for bouncing back so setbacks don’t end the pursuit.
    Grit: Passion and Perseverance, Honestly Assessed
  8. Invoke the possible self during setbacks
    When you fail or stall, return to the hoped-for self — not to the outcome goal — as your re-orienting anchor.
    Possible Selves, Made Practical
  9. Engage fully in the present rather than deferring satisfaction to the goal
    Attaching well-being to future goal achievement reliably postpones happiness and degrades present performance.
    Goal-Free Living: When Process Beats Destination
  10. Name trade-off anti-goals: conditions that come bundled with attractive outcomes
    Many desirable outcomes come packaged with specific costs — name the hidden costs as anti-goals before you commit.
    Anti-Goals: Defining Success by What You Refuse to Accept

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