Don’t know what you want to do, or be, or see, or feel, or experience? Don’t know what really excites you and gets you buzzing for another day on Planet Earth? Neither do I, sometimes. So I start small. I look to my day ahead and find that which will bring me the greatest pleasure. It could be something seemingly trivial: I have an extra five minutes to get myself a cup of coffee on the way to work! Three minutes of extra sleep! Or it could be something more obviously ‘good news’: I have time to catch up with a friend. A full list of clients, yeah! More money in the bank, wooh! I can pay the bills this week (that’s always a nice feeling!!).
Whatever it is, it’s what gets me up, gets me moving and allows me to get into work with a smile and feel generally pretty excellent about what I’m doing. As the day wears on, I just add to whatever little or large motivator I started with, until I’m thinking big!
First rule of getting yourself going, start with something you know you can achieve right away (it can be super simple like kick starting your day with a healthy breakfast or seemingly irrelevant like wearing a different colour to work). Sometimes all that you need as a motivator is a little something different. It helps to get you out of the “I can’t” pattern. Once you’ve proven to yourself that you “can”, you start to comfortably set larger goals or plant bigger ideas with the confidence that you can actually achieve.
On the subject of can and can’t – Fool yourself into believing you can do something. Even if you don’t believe it to start with use the old “Fake it ‘til You Make it” trick to get yourself through. Repeat something as simple and direct as “I can do this.” Repeat it until you can’t remember what the words mean anymore, by which stage, you’ll have completed the task and you’ll have proven yourself right: You Can Do It.
Simplify. The more complicated something appears to be the more we tend to put off doing it. It’ll just take too much time to even get started, let alone complete!! So, take small bites of the apple, chew well, take the time to carefully swallow (thereby preventing the possibility of choking!), and then sit back and savour the flavour, before moving onto the next easily manageable bite.
Which brings up the next point: Enjoy Your Accomplishments.
A client of mine who has been running his own business for over 16 years said that if he doesn’t make sure he sits back now and then, takes a look at what he’s
achieved and acknowledges that his accomplishments contribute to the lives of others, he’d not be able to keep going. Too true! If we don’t smell the roses now and then, they curl up, fade, dry out and die and then we’ve missed all that they had to offer. So take a whiff now and then!
After tracking your successes, Learn. Learn from what does work and from what doesn’t work. Every success is reached through a series of failures.
“Remember the two benefits of failure. First, if you do fail, you learn what doesn’t work; and second, the failure gives you the opportunity to try a new approach.” – Roger Von Oech
Pretty cool, huh? So go ahead, FAIL! Just remember what got you there and don’t do it again!
Speaking of remembering things, thank those that helped get you where you are. Gratitude does wonders for the soul and reduces wrinkles. Okay. I made that last bit up. Gratitude is not scientifically proven to reduce wrinkles, but I’m pretty sure it helps, as does enjoying what you do. I have learned that if you begrudge what you do for others, they’ll not want what you have to offer. If you give what you can – your effort, your talent, your time – with joy and ease, you’ll get back seven hundred times the value. It’s true! You might not receive it directly from where you sent it, but it’ll come back around right when you need it most.
So, now that you’ve been given permission to fail as often as you like, take a break and sniff at flowers, eat lots of apples bite by delicious bite and lie to yourself until you believe everything you say…go out, feel great and self-motivate!
Yep, I know. I couldn’t resist….there’s a bad poet in all of us…from which I can now learn…to leave poetry to those who really love it!
And thanks everyone, for helping me get here! 
