I wanted to bring the next group of motivation Hacks that have brought me to a better mindset, and successful business's.
It's the crucial element in setting and attaining goals. Research shows you can influence your own levels of motivation, but far too often, we fail to do so. Staying motivated can be a real struggle. When trying to maintain motivation, our drive is constantly assaulted by negative thoughts and anxieties about the future.
There are three major reasons people fail to maintain motivation.
Lack of confidence : Simply put, if you don’t believe you can succeed, what’s the point in trying, right? Lack of focus: If you don’t know what you want, is there anything you really want ? Lack of direction: If you don’t know what to do, how can you possibly be motivated to do it?
Motivation Tips Part 2
1. Move your alarm clock—
It’s easy to hit the snooze button over and over and over. If you have trouble getting out of bed, put your
alarm clock across the room. It’ll force you to get up. While you’re up, you might as well get started on your day.
Getting a good start helps you be more motivated to reach your daily goals.
2. Schedule early meetings with those involved—
Early morning meetings because force you to meet the day head on. You’re dressed and ready to go from the start, so the rest of the day can only get better from there.
3. Wake up to upbeat music—
Sometimes waking up to music that gets you going instead of whatever nonsense is on the radio can help
get you moving and get your day going in a positive direction. It helps you undertake your
goals in a much more positive way.
4. Prepare the night before--
This is an essential component to motivation because it cuts down on the anxiety you may feel when
diving in. If you have small things that can be done in advance of a big workday, do them the night before. When you wake up, those menial tasks will be complete, so you can head straight into the heavy stuff.
5. Eat breakfast—
Breakfast is the most important meal of the day for a reason. It gives you the energy you need to get going in the morning. Be conscious of what you’re eating. Fruits and low-fat yogurt will fuel you better than bagels and donuts. You’ll also feel better about yourself, which is never a bad thing.
6. Develop a personal mantra—
Take some time thinking of a motivating mantra to keep you focused. It can simply be a few positive sentences about reaching your goals should help keep you moving in the right direction when you feel like you’re starting to derail.
7. Sign up for motivation emails—
Face it, sometimes you just need encouragement, even if you don’t know who’s sending it. There are
lots of websites that will send you daily motivational e-mails that will make you feel better the second you read the message.
8. Start the day doing something you enjoy—
If you’re looking at your to-do list and just can’t seem to muster the motivation to chip away at it, take an hour or so to do something that you enjoy instead. This will put you in a happy place and help put
yourself in a better situation to want to get down to business when you’re finished.
9. Cut back on alcohol—
Alcohol is a depressant. It can cause you to sleep less and give you a hangover. When alcohol is involved, all
motivation goes out the window. You should at least try to eliminate alcohol from your diet during the
week or at least cut back when you know you have to get something done.
10. See the light at the end of the tunnel—
Think of the end result and keep that finish line in the back of your mind the whole time. Focus on
how good it will feel when you reach it.
11. Spend your time on tasks you enjoy—
Given a choice, people usually select things they enjoy. This is important to keep you motivated. If you have a task you hate doing, delegate a small portion of your day to doing something you enjoy.
12. Take pride in what you’re doing—
There’s usually no way to avoid at least some activities that seem wasted. Perhaps you’re a small cog in a big machine at work, and it’s tough to see how your contribution matters. The truth is...it does make a difference.
If what you do isn’t important,your company wouldn’t have hired you in the first place. Live by the philosophy that anything worth doing is worth doing well. What you’re doing is worth something to those you work
for, so do it well. Take pride it and do it to the best of your ability. It will help you feel good about yourself and keep you motivated.
13. Don’t rely too much on your use of rewards—
Motivating yourself with rewards can be a good thing, but you don’t want to rely too much on them. If you do, you become dependent on the reward and not your natural motivation. Try to find some rewards that are inherent to the task itself. Instead of seeing the task as another item on your list, think how it impacts others. For example, answering the emails helps keep customers happy.
14. Stay confident—
Sometimes this can be difficult, especially in an area we are unfamiliar with. Struggling to do something well can cause you to feel insecure and lead to lack of motivation. Don’t be afraid to learn a new task. Learning how to do it properly will help you keep your confidence and improve motivation.
15. Stay focused while you’re working—
It is often easy to be motivated to start a task, but wandering attention can cause you to struggle to keep that motivation. Switching to other tasks like your phone or other distractions breaks your concentration. You should try to stay focused on one thing at a time, even if that means turning off your internet connection or blocking websites that distract you. If you keep stopping and starting, it’ll seem like your task is dragging on forever. You’ll find it more motivating to make steady progress.
16. What you’re doing right now is the most important thing in the world—
Think of every step you take toward your goal as important. Adopt the mindset that each action you take is the most important thing in the world, and it will help you stay focused on it.
17. Be the best "you" you can be—
We all have natural strengths and weaknesses. Instead of focusing on your weaknesses, choose to
work on your weaknesses and capitalize on your strengths. Creating the best “you” will help you feel more confident and stay motivated.
18. There's always more—
There is always more you can do to reach your goal. Don’t settle for what you can do right now. Don’t focus on
what you’ve achieved in the past, focus on what you can do in the future. You can always achieve more.
19. Results matter most—
No matter what anyone says, it isn’t just that you try and do your best. Never forget—Results matter most.
Never get complacent or comfortable just because you check a lot of tasks off your list every day, or you use strategies that your friends all agree are the best. Don’t confuse activity for accomplishment. There's a big difference between the two. If you aren't getting the results you want, you're probably working too hard on the wrong things.
20. Science and technology aren’t everything—
Use technology and science, but don't make them everything. Use the latest and most effective research to help you reach your goals. It doesn’t mean anything that you can use technology if you don’t ever reach your
goals. That's like a person priding himself on being a business school graduate but losing the sight of the fact he wants to become a successful businessman.
21.Perfection isn’t everything—
Look for effectiveness, not perfection. A strategy doesn't need to be optimal in order to be effective. An optimal strategy, without desire and determination, can be just as ineffective as a terrible strategy. Although perfect is great, you don't always need the perfect strategy if your head and heart are in the right place.
22. Let yourself be motivated by others—
If you see people who have better accomplishments than yours, admire them. Use what they've accomplished as a source of inspiration. Don't assume they have done anything extraordinary to reach their goals or were bred by geniuses. Use them as motivation that can end up proving you sold yourself short.
23. Associate with people at the level you hope to achieve—
If your goal is to get a promotion to a specific position, hang out with people holding that position. See how they got there, and learn from their successes. You’ll find hanging out with determined, optimistic, and
driven people will help you maintain motivation and reach your success faster.
24. The basics work—
Things don’t have to be glamorous or ingenious to work. Remember that the basics work too. Sometime
getting back to basics helps you focus on the goal itself instead of a creative way to achieve the goal.
25. Keep moving forward—
It’s not uncommon to get in a slump when working toward your goals. Remember—it will pass. Keep on
striving for success and focusing on the goal.
26. Think it and do it—
There’s truth to the saying, “If you think you can, you can.” Just think you can do it and start doing it. It may take a while, but always believe you can, and you will. Instead, too often people think they can’t, so they can’t—
or don’t.
27. Actualize your potential—
Potential is nothing until it’s actualized. People often say, “They have great potential” when speaking of someone. You might have it, but what good is it if you don’t put it to work. Knowing that you have the ability to do it isn’t enough to keep you motivated. Seeing that you can do it and actually achieving it, however, is a great motivator.
28. Measure from start to finish—
The most successful person creates the largest gap between where they started and where they
are now. The person who starts with few advantages but works his tail off to produce remarkable results is far more successful than the person who is extremely gifted and only ends up with good results. Being one of those who reaches remarkable results will be motivation to start your next project with gusto and you’ll be surprised how your motivation for new tasks will grow over time.
92.Remember...you’re not alone!—
You’re not the first person who has struggled to reach a goal, and you certainly won’t be the last. Everyone struggles with staying motivated and reaching their goals. The reality is that refocusing, changing, or making a new start on something, no matter how small, is a big deal, but it's not impossible. With the right approach, you can definitely do it.
29. Recommit to your goal if you slip up—
We all slip from time to time. If you slip up, don't give up. Forgive yourself and make a plan for getting back on track.
30. Don’t beat yourself up for mistakes—
Instead, pat yourself on the back for everything you did right. Remember, mistakes area natural part of the process.
31.Learn from your mistakes—
Look at your mistakes as lessons and reminders of why you're trying to make a change. When you mess up,
use it as an opportunity to learn something new about yourself.
32. Adopt a stick-to-it attitude—
Don’t just stick to working toward the goal. Stick to doing everything you can to make sure that you reach the goal. That includes learning more if necessary and revisiting the goal at a later time.
33.Use positive self-talk—
Tell yourself things like, "I deserve to get the promotion because I've really been working hard" or "I feel great
when I swim because I'm doing well on my exercise plan."
34. Create more than a resolution—
If you want to make a change or achieve a goal, it takes more than a resolution you make at the beginning of the year. Just declaring you want to do something isn’t enough. Just doing something that’s expected of you isn’t always enough either. You have to create a way to make your commitment more than that. It has to be something you want.
35. End non-supportive relationships—
If people are constantly tearing you down and depleting your motivation to achieve desired tasks, just break away from them. A friend isn’t a friend if they can’t be supportive. You can't stay focused on your goal if your friend doesn't believe in you or, even worse, is trying to hold you back.
36.Focus on what you can actually control—
Worrying about things you have no control over can be a real motivation killer. Just stay focused
on what you can control. The rest is not up to you, and trying to control what you can't control is a prescription for failure.
37. Stay true to your beliefs and values—
You’ll find motivation also blossoms when you stay true to your beliefs and values. Assigning value to an activity can restore one's sense of motivation and reflecting on why an activity is meaningful could make you more invested in it.People who spend too much time fantasizing about the wonderful future that awaits them often find they don't have enough gas left in the tank to actually get there. Dreaming is nothing without doing, so being motivated is important. Unfortunately, there are no “silver bullet” strategies for getting motivated. There will absolutely be times where you simply can't get motivated to do something, and have to do it anyway. In most cases though, you’ll find at least one of the above tip will help you get out of your motivational slump
Part One Available Here