In goal pursuit, embrace friendly competition 

Szu-chi Huang’s research has shown that while positive feedback motivates you to start a goal, negative feedback is more likely to motivate you to finish it. As such, she says it’s wise to leverage friendly support as you start to pursue a goal and then lean into friendly competition later on. Doing so can help you push through to the end.
Huang is a professor of marketing in the Stanford Graduate School of Business.