Have you ever felt inspired to go to the gym after watching a video of someone’s fitness journey, complete with incredible music and an encouraging voice over?? Same. But then, the next day, you don’t feel the same spark and instead of going to the gym as promised, you end up staying in bed, telling yourself that maybe you’ll feel motivated again later. Yeah, same.
One of the biggest mistakes people make is to rely on motivation. It can be a great thing for our goals, but it’s not usually enough to carry us through to reaching our goals. One problem with depending too much upon internal emotions or feelings is that they eventually run dry — it’s fleeting and sporadic. This means those hours spent feeling energized could turn into hours of procrastinating and staring into the abyss instead. Motivation wears off after a certain amount of time. It is why you need to attach your goals to something more profound. You need to have intention because inevitably, when you’re trying to improve yourself, whether it’s relationally, in your mindset, or physically, you’re going to hit some hard times and it’s pretty well guaranteed that you’re going to have some struggles. If you’re relying on motivation and don’t attach meaning to what you’re doing, it is tough to continue forward.
Motivation is a byproduct of something else that you don’t have control over.
When you’re feeling unmotivated, consider the long term. Remind yourself that by doing the things you don’t want always want to do but know will benefit you in the long run, you’ll be one step closer to getting what you want and creating a better future for yourself (YAY FUTURE YOU!).
You can do affirmations in the morning and act on them.
“You got this”
“You are so strong and awesome”
“Keep going!”
This is where discipline comes in. Discipline creates action — doing the things you don’t want to do. And when action is done with consistency, that builds momentum. When anything has enough momentum, and a deeper reason behind it, it’s really hard to slow that down.
Let’s go!