How to Motivate Yourself

No matter how committed we are to our goals, there are times when we struggle to keep ourselves motivated and moving forward.

When we're not feeling fully confident in ourselves or our abilities or can’t see the next step, fears, doubts and inertia can quickly set in leaving us feeling stuck, even wanting to give up.

When this happens, here are 10 ways to help you ‘dig deep’, motivate yourself and rebuild your momentum.

1.  Use goals to define what’s important and to provide focus and direction

• When we don’t know what we want, it is difficult to focus on anything or feel that tasks and activities are important or worth doing.  We feel: ‘why bother?’ 
• Without goals, the things we do aren’t helping us move towards what we want - but more likely to reflect a passive motivation to avoid pain or punishment.
• Positive motivation starts with defining what is important to you and what you want, then setting goals and identifying actions that will focus your efforts to achieve them.
• Use your goals and action plans as the lens to evaluate the things you need to do: what activities are helping you move closer to reaching your goals? What activities are important?
• When you feel stuck, re-connect with your goal on an emotional level.  Feel how much you really want to achieve it and how your life will feel once you succeed.  Then think about the task: is it important? How will it help you reach your goal?  How do you feel about it now?   
• Keep focused and assess your progress daily: are you doing something every single day that will bring you closer to your goal?  Are you moving in the right direction?
• Goals only motivate effort and tangible actions if we believe that they are achievable and that our efforts will lead to the results that we want.  Goal Setting Theory sets out the characteristics of goals that motivate. 

2.  Ensure your goals reflect what really drives you and makes you happy

• What drives you? What activities and achievements truly make you happy?  Learning new things? Money? Caring for others? Travelling ? Creating? Building Security? Being admired? Making a contribution? Expanding and reaching your potential?
• It is one thing to have a goal and to work hard to pursue it, but if it is at odds with what really drives you and makes you happy, it will always feel like hard work!
• Sometimes, in spite of great success, for example, in our careers, we can still feel unfulfilled and vaguely dissatisfied - this happens when our achievements do not reflect what truly makes us happy.
• If you're happiest at home working in your garden or spending time with your family, will working towards a large promotion into a role with longer hours, even extensive travel, going to make you happy?  How does it impact your motivation?

To find out what drives you, work through the comprehensive ‘What Drives Me’ questionnaire in the Setting Your Goals Workbook.  Be prepared: what really drives you may not be what you expect or what you are currently working towards.

This 39 page workbook is FREE to iWise2 members and works through a series of activities to help you identify what drives you and makes you happy, define goals that reflect what you really want and build action plans to achieve them.  Try Now.

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