Back in 2013, I started the year strong, with a lot of motivation to turn around my life.
I didn’t have a job, was broke, wasn’t confident, and didn’t know what to do or where to go with my life.
I had a lot of motivation at the start of the year.
But come the end of 2013, I find that I had burned out, no longer had any of the motivation, and still was out of a job, broke, not confident, and had no idea where to go.
What was missing?
Motivation doesn’t last.
Come April, I was already tired.
I wanted to change my life, and the enormity of the task, overwhelmed me, and slowly, ate away at my motivation.
See, changing a life, is a big undertaking. We’re talking beliefs that I have, the actions and habits that I do, and the way I see the world, which dictates what actions I take, and how I take them.
And when I didn’t see instant results, I floundered, I panicked, I became frustrated, and my motivation wasn’t recharged.
Motivation is a limited resource, and it’s subject to the law of diminishing returns. If you use the same thing over, and over, to motivate you, then over time, it’s going to have less and less of an effect.
Motivation doesn’t last.
But I found out there are ways to support your motivation, and in some cases, replace it entirely.
All the while keeping you moving forward.
Design how you live your life.
As part of my want to get healthier and stronger, I created a goal for myself to do 15 push-ups daily.
And coming from not doing any push-ups at all, I was feeling pretty optimistic about this.
And so I began.
If you haven’t been doing any push-ups, the reality of your physical situation will hit you hard, and fast.
In my first try, I wasn’t even able to complete 15, straight.
My muscles burned with agony, and so did my mind, questioning myself:
“Will I be able to do this?”
Not quite the result that I was looking for.
So then, what I did next, changed the whole way I viewed motivation, and getting things done.
For the next two weeks, I made it my goal to make one push-up per day.
Only one.
And week by week, I did more and more push-ups, until I got to 15, and more, every day.
You don’t need just motivation, you need a plan.
Because when the motivation runs out, the plan, and your faithful execution of it, is what gets you to the end.
It’s what gets your dreams done, even when everyone else is telling you, “No!”
Even when the doubts set in, and even when you don’t see immediate results.
Motivation can get us started, yes, but a plan, a process, and building habits and routines are what get you past the finish line.
What kind of 2017 do you want to be having?
If you want to have a breakthrough year, then don’t rely on motivation.
Get clear on what result you want, and create practices to help build momentum and direction that you want.
And when I started doing my annual planning process, along with executing my plan, I was able to finally turn around my life, and have a breakthrough year.
Year, after year, after year.
What are you looking forward to for 2017? Please share in the comments below!
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