The problem with motivation.
So you’re feeling motivated – maybe you’ve joined a gym, you’re getting married or you’ve just seen a sexy photo of your 20 something-yr old self & you’re feeling the itch to make a change. So you think let’s do this, let’s change EVERYTHING!
Your blood pumping, you set your alarm for 5am everyday to train, tell your partner you’re done with chocolate, wine, bread & tv. YOU are an unstoppable whirlwind of willpower & you’re going to crush this goal as fast as humanly possible 🤩✊🏻
Fast forward 6 weeks & you’ve lost a chunk of body fat but you’re also injured. You’re rundown, stressed, hungry, cranky, drained and deprived. Now you’ve just lost your sh** and raided the pantry – you’re surrounded by chocolate wrappers and empty Tim Tam packets like it’s a god damn crime scene. You’re feeling guilty, over it and in no time you’re back to where you began.
This turns into a vicious cycle fuelled by belief that the only way to reach our goals is to harness endless willpower or extrinsic motivation to get us through. We repeat the routine: wait for our motivator, ride the high with every ounce of our energy, then “fall off the wagon” once the inevitable lapse occurs and never make any lasting change.
The key message? Motivation and willpower are unreliable. They come and go and can’t be trusted when it comes to changing our lifestyle.
The solution? Make small, slow, easy changes that point you in the right direction then repeat / practice them so many times that they become ingrained in your psyche – aka habitual! Break down your goal into tiny incremental actions and practice the action everyday until it’s 2nd nature, then build it up slowly.
If it feels too easy, that’s perfect 👍🏻 because the hardest part of behaviour change isn’t the action itself – it’s committing to it everyday, it’s CONSISTENCY! Your chosen action may seem insignificant, but every time you practice it you are 1% closer, so imagine this compounded over a month, a year, 20 years etc. Let go of the focus on results and instead focus on what you can control – commit to perform your habits and tick them off each day. Action and consistency trumps waiting around for motivation every time.