3 Simple Questions to Recharge Your Motivation

You know that great plan you had a while back?  Remodeling the store.  Maybe restructuring that department.  The website.  The great American novel. The gizmo that would launch your success.  What ever happened to that?

 

You and I both know you’re fully capable of achieving whatever you set your mind to do.  You’re bright.  You’re talented.  All your ducks are in a row and the stars are in your favor.  So, what’s stopping you?

 

How many creative excuses have you come up with?  Bad timing?  Too busy?  Too tired? Gotta do this or that first?  ‘The dog ate my homework’ may have worked once, but that was a long time ago.

 

Why can’t we maintain our motivation?  What makes us procrastination experts?

 

In my experience there are four things that stand in the way of us not fulfilling our potential, living our dreams or implementing our plans, and they all boil down to one thing.  Ourselves.

 

Let’s take a look at that:

 

  1. Fear of Failure: Everyone fails at something. What’s important is that we take what lessons we can from failure and move on.  That way, it’s not really a failure at all – just success in the making.  One of my favorite quotes is from James Barrie, author of ‘Peter Pan,’ who said ‘We’re all failures – at least the best of us are.’  We should wear our failures like Merit Badges.  We’ve earned them.  After all, each failure brings us closer to success.
  2. Fear of Success: Ah, the fine art of self-sabotage.  We play out scenarios that haven’t happened yet.  The solution? Be mindful.  Be present. We need to ask ourselves what we’re really afraid of. Chances are, it’s really the fear of uncharted waters.  We’ve never been there.  We’ve gotten comfortable living out the status quo. Time for the old Eisenhower Method. Draw a line down a piece of paper.  On one side write down everything success would allow you to do and on the other side write down why that wouldn’t work for you. When you’re done, ask yourself which side is more appealing.  Success is worth the risk. You can deal with it.
  3. Fear that it won’t be perfect:  Nothing is, really. Salvador Dali is even said, ‘Have no fear of perfection – you’ll never reach it.’  That being said, and knowing that we’re all our greatest critics, just do it! Nothing is carved in stone and doing is always better than not doing.  It shows progress.
  4. Fear that we’re biting off more than we can chew. Don’t look at the forest, but rather, focus on the trees. The problem with great big plans is that they appear overwhelming and sometimes unreachable. Once we break them down into small achievable steps, the bigger picture starts falling into place.

 

A friend told me her mother taught her everything she needed to know about motivation.  If she wanted to do something but was afraid to try, her mother would ask:

 

  1. ” What’s the best that can happen?”
  2. ”What’s the worst that can happen?”
  3. “So, what do you want to do about it?”

 

And you know, it’s really as simple as that.  What are you willing to risk to succeed?