Don’t wait for motivation to make a change E95

May 23, 2023

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Are you lacking motivation? Are you motivated for a bit and then it just fizzles out? And you don’t know how to get that motivation back but believe that you really need it to keep going? Today I am shining a light on all the myths of motivation and how you can actually create motivation on demand. Let’s begin.

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Why are we so eager to have motivation in our lives? We are searching for motivation to change a habit, start a project, complete a project, change our health, change our body, begin a new career and the list goes on and on. There are so many reasons in our lives where motivation is really helpful to get started or to keep going. But we all struggle with motivation: finding it, keeping it, recreating it.

Motivation is elusive

Motivation is so elusive to us: we don’t know how to create it, and we don’t know how to keep it alive when we have some motivation. When we lose it we don’t know how to bring it back. That’s why I like to describe it as elusive.

I will explain to you more why it seems to be so elusive and what we can do about it. And secondly, I want to share with you why it makes no sense for you to wait for motivation to magically appear for you to get started. By knowing more about motivation you can take control and create it for yourself instead of playing the waiting game.

And possibly, after hearing some of my tips, you might even realize that you don’t want to bother with running after motivation and use other methods to get started.

Motivation loves to fizzle out

So all of us know the typical situation around motivation that it loves to fizzle out, right? You get some motivation to make a change like going to the gym as a New Year’s resolution and you begin on the 01 January. And then by the time it’s the middle of February all the motivation is gone and you are dragging yourself to the gym once per week if at all.

And that is because you used motivation as the tool to help you change. But we all know that motivation loves to fizzle out. I will share with you in this episode how it happens that motivation fizzles outs or is not even sometimes creatable in the first place. But then I give you as well other tools that work better than motivation to get yourself started on the habit you want to create, the change you want to make or the dream you want to fulfil.

Myths of Motivation

Let’s, first of all, look at some beliefs people have about motivation.

Some people think that they are just lacking motivation. It’s just part of their personality that they have less motivation available to them. So they look at other people with their projects and who are changing their habits and they think: I am just not motivated like her. He has tons more motivation available than me. And with that, they leave it at that, accept it, surrender to that belief and just never get going.
The other misbelief around motivation is that we have no control over it, that it’s there or it’s not. And there is nothing we can do about it. And if we believe that motivation is something we aren’t in control of then we are at the effect of random motivation. True!
On the other end of the spectrum is that we can think we need to create it by force. If we cannot force motivation to be there, we cannot keep going or even get started. There has to always be motivation to be able to create. That is just a belief and I am sure you can see how it can hinder us from actually getting started with something.

Ultimately if we don’t know the formula for how to create motivation or when motivation is best created, we never get to fully leverage its power. Well, that’s going to change now.

Ingredients to create motivation on demand

So how is motivation created? There are a few ingredients that need to be in place for motivation to be created or appear. The first ingredient is desire. If you have no desire to do something, achieve something, obtain or create it, then you won’t come up with the motivation to do it.

For example, If you want to get yourself to start studying for something it needs to have a desirable outcome. For example, if you want to become a doctor, it means you need to study medicine for years. You desire to be a doctor and that gives you the motivation to visit university.

If you try to convince yourself to go 2-3 times per week to the gym but you have no desire to do so, you have no desire to get fit, more healthy, lose weight, or any other reason, how would you ever have any motivation to go to the gym? You wouldn’t, right?

No Desire = No Motivation

So you see that motivation cannot be created if there is no desire. That’s why it’s so hard to create motivation around something someone else wants you to do, like your parents, your partner, or your boss. If you don’t have your own desire, there is not going to be motivation accessible to you.

The second ingredient is that you need to strike a balance between something being impossible or not interesting or demanding enough.

So on the one side, we have the impossibility. If you have a belief in your subconscious mind that something is impossible for you, you won’t be able to create motivation easily or at all.

On the other side, if something is not demanding enough or is too easy to do, it won’t really spark motivation either. So it’s about making a goal, task or habit possible for you and demanding or interesting enough.

A balance between possibility and interest

For example, you create beautiful art for yourself and you are considering selling it online. Let’s say you plan to sell each piece of art for 1000$ right from the start. But deep down you don’t believe anybody is going to pay it. And you might not even be aware of this belief. So what happens is that you probably never get started in selling your art because you believe it to be impossible. Generally, it’s possible to sell a picture for 1000$, the question is do you believe that YOU can do it?

Or someone tells you why don’t you get started on Etsy and sell each picture for 10$ – just to get started. And you are like, what? 10$? I even paid more for the materials. So it’s not demanding enough and not of interest to you to even get started and do all the work.

So it’s about finding the right balance to be able to create the motivation of doing something.

In this case, you would want to find the balance in the price you ask for your first few paintings. Would it be maybe 150$ or 250$ that you could believe to sell it for and its motivation enough to do all the work to get it online?

You see that you want to mix a good cocktail of desire, possibility and interest AKA payoff.

Create motivation by taking actions

Moving on to the tips that I promised you at the beginning of this episode. The episode name gives away that I don’t want you to wait around for motivation to help you get started. So let’s talk more about that. Why do I say not to wait for motivation to get started?

The best way to create motivation for you is to get started even if you have no motivation. By getting started and seeing the first results you create motivation on purpose. You build up momentum to keep going. And this momentum made up of motivation helps you to keep going.

So really you are creating motivation most easily by actually taking action instead of first having the motivation to get started with your action. Motivation will come with the taking of action and particularly when you see the first results. Even the tiniest of results will give you proof that what you are doing is working and you suddenly create motivation to keep going. Does that make sense to you?

Add pleasure to taking action

The next tip that I have for you to get yourself started is to add pleasure to the action step. How can you make taking the action more pleasurable for yourself? If you want to repaint your whole home and the idea of that is daunting, start with just one room and make the experience as fun as possible. Play your favourite music while you do it. Maybe while you paint, chat with your bestie or listen to a great podcast.

If I have to do admin kind of work that is very easy but feels so tedious, I watch a TV Show that I like at the same time. I don’t need a lot of concentration on the admin work. Most of the time I don’t even remember what happened on the TV show but minimum it made the task more pleasurable for me to actually do it.

Feels good to have done

And the last tip that I have for you is something I am doing now for a couple of months and it really helps me to create great habits, and motivation to keep going and with that momentum. I keep daily track of things that feel good to have done. What does that mean?

There are lots of things that feel good to do, like having pizza every evening. Or watching the whole day Netflix. These kinds of activities feel good to do in the moment BUT afterwards not so much anymore. In comparison, some activities might not be so fun to do in the moment, but you feel really good afterwards for having done it.

So I started keeping a list each day of the things that I have done that feel good to have done. For me, these are meditating, a yoga session, breathwork, journaling, studying, so course work, admin work like tax returns or meeting with an insurance person, garden work and so on. Sometimes I even note down even social events which I wanted to cancel last minute and instead just stay home. Everything where my monkey mind can come up with better things to do but I overcome that part of my mind and do it anyway. It’s good for me and it feels good to have done it. So it’s belated gratification.

But the more I track it and remind myself throughout the day, the more I do it. Sometimes if I just have 2 or 3 things on my list by the evening I will even think about what else I can do today that feels good to have done. It’s beautiful and it’s a great good habit creator.

Don’t wait for motivation to make a change

Just to summarize everything I shared with you today: If you want to create motivation mix the right cocktail of desire, making it possible and still interesting enough for you. The best way to create motivation and to build momentum is to get started without it. And then create it as you go especially when you see the first results. A great way to get started with something is to add pleasure to the action steps involved to make it more fun. And to build good habits in your life you can use daily tracking of all the things that feel good to have done. Make a competition with yourself of how many you can do in a week. And celebrate and reward yourself!

OK, that’s all that I have for you today on the topic of motivation. Let me know if this was helpful or what you think. Connect with me via Instagram, Facebook or YouTube. I would love to hear from you and your view on your struggles with motivation and if you maybe solved them now.

I hope this has given you lots of insights and AHA moments around motivation and why it can feel so elusive and that you are not in control of it. Now you create motivation on demand and even get started without it because you know it will come.

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