Lack of motivation when it comes to achieving your goals It is one of the most frequent obstacles that those who come for consultation complain about. They argue that it is impossible for them to perform certain tasks because they do not have enough desire or because they do not feel qualified to do so.
Normally, these people have previously tried to perform mental exercises such as thinking positively or visualizing what they would like to achieve, obtaining very poor results or simply not obtaining anything, with the consequent frustration after verifying that their expectations have not been met.
And the mere fact that we think about something, no matter how much we insist, it is not going to happen. The formula most likely to give us the results we expect is the one that has action as an essential variable.
Believing that to do something or to achieve certain goals we must be motivated is based on a mistaken and limiting belief. If we think this way, we are delegating our possible achievements to very volatile factors.
The importance of habits
One day I may wake up with great motivation and another day it may not appear or be expected. This, like having the desire to do something, It depends on many factors, some of our own and others beyond our control. I may feel a slight headache or my boss is angry and this makes me discouraged for the rest of the day and I decide not to go to the gym, or study, or go for a walk…
On the other hand, if we observe how our mind works, we will realize that the more times we repeat an activity, the better we will be at doing it. If we practice a little daily with a musical instrument, it is likely that after a few months we will know how to play a melody and in a few years we will be able to play several songs. If we write a little every day, it is more likely that we will progressively get better texts that excite us more and more. If we go to the gym a few times a week for a few months we may feel better and have stronger muscles.
In all these examples what happens is that by taking small steps, We have built habits that will later help us achieve more ambitious goals. If we think that to go to the gym we must first have good muscles, that will seem like an absurd premise?
The key is in the word mentioned above: habits. It is about creating routines in our lives that become pillars, stable foundations, that help us, with greater probability, to achieve what we would like to achieve.
We must start from the smallest so that, later, almost as a natural consequence, this progress becomes greater achievements. We cannot run a marathon having only trained one week in our life. We must start with small, attainable goals, and behave as if they were part of our repertoire. A small advance each day creates bigger advances and, as a consequence, the much desired motivation arises in our minds. Without looking for it, without mental exercises, showing ourselves that we are capable of doing it.
We must make an effort without forcing ourselves. Making an effort means doing a little bit of strength every day, without exhausting ourselves, without getting frustrated. Forcing ourselves would mean doing more than we can. It would be wanting to achieve the goal without the process, which would lead us to generate false hopes that would take us back to square one, definitively removing our motivation. And here lies the paradox. If we insist that what we are trying to achieve arise spontaneously, the less likely it will come to us. However, when we focus on the process, on changing small things, unlocking occurs.
The change in our behavior leads us to a change in our perception, in our way of feeling.
