Is motivation garbage…?

What’s your motivation…? That was the title I was going to use for this newsletter. My intention was to use it to help shed light on what is driving you right now. I was going to share my story of how I’ve been consistently training for over a decade, meditating daily for over two years, blah, blah, blah. Then I listened to something that gave me pause - motivation is garbage. …what’s that now…? Motivation. Is. Garbage. That’s curious. Does that mean we can keep hitting the snooze alarm on our life? No. What author, CNN commentator, Mel Robbins means is this. Our brains are not designed to do things that are difficult or scary even. Instead, our brains are wired to protect us from difficulty and uncertainty. We have been told that we need to ‘feel’ motivated; that motivation is a feeling and when we feel something we can take action. Mel states that this is false. You will never feel like doing the difficult things. Why is that? Why can’t we do the smallest things that will help us? It all starts subtly. It’s the habit of hesitation. When we hesitate, it sends a stress signal to our brain. Danger. Avoid. So if motivation is not a feeling, what is it? How can we improve? It all comes down to decisions. As Mel explains, your life comes down to your decisions. Your decision to act. Those small decisions add up. If we decide that we will improve just one percent each day, think about where we will be in a year. Small decisions to make small steps. When we think about this, it does make sense. Preparing your lunch, gym bag, clothes, the night before is a decision. As is eating breakfast from the McDonald’s drive-through on the way to work or not preparing for a meeting. All are decisions and all have different outcomes. Michael Phelps, with all the gold medals in the world, would train hard, especially when he didn’t feel like it, when he didn’t feel motivated. He noticed that pushing through made him even more resilient. Olympic events don’t wait for each athlete to feel motivated. What this all boils down to is we are going to have to push through when we don’t even have an ounce of motivation to move forward. Once we push through we can recognize we are indeed stronger than we thought. What pushed me to take action to begin training consistently over a decade ago? Truth be told, I felt something. The story I told myself - I’m in great shape, I’m an athlete - was tested. I was challenged and my effort was less than I thought I was capable of and I didn't like how that felt. Reality stared me in the face. I decided at that moment to do something about it and I have never looked back. Not feeling like doing your training or meditating, or writing that report or paper? Don’t wait to feel like it. Make the decision to do it and take action. It just may help… To your journey, Lisa Schaffer GreenNote Fitness P.S. Check out my Facebook page for inspiration. P.P.S. Discover GreenNote Fitness recommendations for recovery, supplements, protein bars & powders, nutrition, equipment, books and more. **Do you have a friend that would benefit from this information? Please forward it to them!**