 later than those people who just indulge themselves in thoughts about how nice the future would be if the goal were satisfied.
New research suggests that an important reason why people satisfy their goals successfully when they contrast the future to the present is that this process gives them motivational energy to pursue their goals. For example, in a paper by Oettingen with Doris Mayer, Timur Sevincer, Elizabeth Stephens, Hyeon-ju Pak, and Meike Hagenah in the May, 2009 issue of Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, people were asked to either compare their future to the present when thinking about making a change in a friendship or to just think about a positive future outcome. Consistent with past research, people who were contrasting the future to the present were more likely to commit to this change in a personal relationship than people who just thought about the future.
At the same time, people’s blood pressure was being examined. Systolic blood pressure is a reasonable measure of how energized or aroused someone has become. People showed a bigger change in blood pressure when they were contrasting the desired future to the present than when they were just thinking about the desired future. This change in blood pressure was highly correlated with people’s statements about how committed they were to actually satisfy this goal.
In later studies, they found that people got energized when they were thinking about goals that were realistic to achieve, but not when they were thinking about goals that are unrealistic to achieve.
So, if you want to achieve your goals, you need motivational energy. Happily, this motivational energy is easy to come by. All you need to do is to keep your goals realistic, and then think carefully about the difference between your present reality and your desired future. When you think about the obstacles that prevent you from satisfying your goals, your motivational system will naturally give you the energy to get started on the road to overcoming the things that stand in the way of what you want.