Are You Stuck in The Cycle of ‘No Motivation – No Energy’?
You are not alone.
Over the last 10 years I have seen first hand how mindset and emotions can negatively impact your health, it’s all good and well to be told what to eat, when to exercise and how to meditate but once you hit a rough spot or are tired and stressed that little voice in your head takes over and you’re likely grabbing the chocolate and coffee before a kale smoothie and almonds!
I work closely with Katrina Bourke from www.katrinabourkecoaching.com.au in my clinic, she has many wonderful insights to help us get out of the ‘too tired and no motivation’ cycle. Katrina has kindly shared with us 3 ways to get your motivation firing.
If you’re looking to lose weight, get fitter, improve your diet, reduce your stress or indeed make any sort of change to your routines and habits then you’re probably thinking about how to get, and stay, motivated to achieve your goals.
Well, preparation is definitely an important component of success, but here’s some news that may surprise you: motivation alone won’t be enough to get you to where you want to be. That’s because motivation changes; some days it can be high, some days low.
So, what can help you supplement your motivation, keep working even when it feels tough and ultimately enjoy the sweet feeling of success when you achieve your goals?
Here are three simple tips for keeping you on track to your goals:
Break Your Goal Into Smaller, Easy To Do Chunks
For example break down your end goal of running 10kms into a more manageable starting distance of say 1 or 2kms.
Small steps work, because as you succeed at doing the baby steps you’ll notice:
- The behaviour gets easier to do the next time
- You get more encouraged, your hope goes up, you start believing in yourself and your ability to do it.
Want more on this tip? Check out tinyhabits.com
Think About Your Habit As A Tiny Plant That You Need To Keep Alive.
When you get busy or tired or unexpected events arise it’s easy to let go of your habits. It doesn’t take many days of not doing a habit to lose momentum for it. Instead of letting your habit die off altogether, think of it as a plant that needs to be nurtured: you want to keep it alive, you don’t want it to die, so as long as you keep doing even a tiny bit like 5 minutes a day, you’re keeping it alive and then when you have the time or ability again, the habit is there to be expanded and you don’t feel guilty about letting it go or not doing anything.
Practice Self Compassion
Perhaps the most important tip of all. Self compassion means being a wise and kind friend to yourself. It’s not about letting yourself off the hook, it’s about acknowledging that change is tough and you are doing your best. Be kind to yourself. Research shows that those who practice self compassion are more resilient, more likely to take risks, less fearful of making mistakes and more likely to achieve success with their goals. So rather than heaping criticism on yourself like ‘I’m hopeless, I can’t do that, I’ll never be able to do it’, adopt Growth Mindset language such as ‘I can’t do that…yet’.
Want more on growth mindset and the power of Not Yet? Check out this Ted Talk.
You can visit our clinic page Ascot Vale Natural Therapies to learn how both Katrina and I can help motivate you to get your health back on track.