Lack of motivation can cause laziness, guilt, and depressive feelings. On the contrary, being motivated can give us a sense of purpose and well-being.
It is common to try strive to maintain the momentum of motivation in various everyday aspects of work and personal life Many people relate motivation to willpower and think that its development is essential to carry out certain tasks. However, willpower has a limit.
What goal are you focusing on right now? Whether professional or personal, before pursuing any goal, we must consider what is preventing us from achieving it.
When asking ourselves why we are incapable of achieving certain things we set out to do, we can begin to give external reasons as first answers: not having the time, not having the necessary skills or not having money are some of the most repeated excuses.
But ultimately, it is a lack of motivation that prevents us from progressing. However, motivation can be worked on and achieved using the appropriate techniques and resources. When we have both, we can achieve anything we want, as long as we have the true desire to do it. In addition, staying motivated can help us in different aspects of daily life.
In this article, We analyze what it means to stay motivated and we will see different self-motivation techniques that can help us achieve it.
Every aspect of life contains some form of motivation or self-motivation. For example, eating is motivated by hunger and gaining knowledge is motivated by the desire to educate oneself. Motivation is the driving force behind goal-oriented actions; It helps people achieve things like lose weight or get a promotion at work.
Simply put, motivation is the reason why someone does something. It refers to the emotional, social, mental and physical reasons behind a person’s actions. exist two main types of motivation: intrinsic and extrinsic
Recognition from others, trophies, money, and other external rewards are forms of extrinsic motivation. This term refers to motivation that comes from outside the individual. On the contrary, solving a complicated puzzle is intrinsically motivated because it comes from within the individual. The reward we get comes from within us: it is the pure pleasure of solving it
Some experts suggest the existence of a third type of motivation: family motivation. Someone can go to work motivated by this type of motivation: the person does not feel internally driven to do so and does not receive a personal reward, in this case, the motivation is to provide financial support to his or her family.
Self-motivation, a key element in Emotional Intelligence, is related to intrinsic motivation. Does not need the influence of external sources: refers to the ability to complete tasks without the need of others or specific situations. Self-motivated people encourage themselves to keep working toward their goals, even when faced with complicated tasks. They turn problems into challenges that they feel motivated to solve. Giving yourself reasons to act through drive, enthusiasm and interest causes self-motivation.
Let’s think about the successful people we know, they don’t have to be the richest or the most intelligent. The most successful people are usually extremely motivated by the desire to achieve their goals. Furthermore, a common trait among all successful people is that their desire exceeds their fear. By having enough desire to get what they want, they are able to motivate themselves, easily set goals and focus on achieving them.
Why is self-motivation essential?
There are many ways to get motivated: external sources like teachers, bosses or parents. However, the only sure way to get what we really want is to acquire the ability to motivate ourselves. This means cultivate deep confidence in ourselves and our abilities and decisions that do not change based on external experiences or events. If we have a high capacity for self-motivation, it is easier to overcome the obstacles that we encounter along the way.
The term self-motivation is frequently used in the workplace. During job interviews, candidates are often asked about their motivation. This question is asked to determine if a candidate fits the company culture and if he is excited about the future work he will do. Sometimes, this has more weight than skills or resume when deciding on one person or another to fill the position.
How to get more self-motivation?
As we have seen, self-motivation is very important. But can you get more motivation? To motivate yourself, you need a clear understanding of what you want. This stems from our own psychology and desires, which is why many people do not find motivation. For example, in the case of romantic relationships: we can ask ourselves why we want to improve the connection with our partner. Thinking about the reason and having an answer can help us when things get difficult and you need additional encouragement to get ahead, that is, when we need to motivate ourselves.
In addition to thinking about the reason for things and why we do what we do, we must also consider the meaning and emotion we assign to successes and failures. If when we face a setback, we tell ourselves that we are not good enough or do not deserve success, we need to review our psychology. This involves changing our attitude to motivate ourselves instead of becoming demotivated in the face of the challenges that life presents us. This means that if, for example, we fail an exam, we will face the recovery with more enthusiasm, motivated by our capacity for self-motivation.
As a last resort, We must know what self-motivation consists of to be able to motivate ourselves It is important to consider what positive state we want to be in when facing challenges or completing tasks: imagine body language, energy levels and how motivation makes us feel. If we are able to associate this positive state with self-motivation, we will be able to induce it more frequently and more easily.
Techniques to promote self-motivation
The psychology of human motivation is full of surprising facts that we are unaware of. Incentives and the “carrot and stick” model can be a useful way to achieve the desired behavior. However, research suggests that other factors, such as the desire to achieve something, may be even more motivating.
These are some of the useful strategies that can help us discover how to motivate ourselves and others.
1. Take responsibility for our lives
Self-motivation is complex because it comes from ourselves. To self-motivate effectively, we must first recognize the underlying and internal problems that hinder it. If we don’t, we will blame others for our lack of progress, but we will not move forward either It is normal to have the help of friends and external sources to motivate us. However, ultimately, it is up to ourselves to work and take control of our lives.
2. Find our why
It is necessary to have a “why” before we can motivate ourselves, having an idea of why we do what we do gives us a sense of purpose. This means having goals that go beyond professional success or material desires. We must look for inspiring and powerful reasons if we want to stay motivated. Success, ultimately, is doing what we want, when we want, and with whom we want. To the connect our goals with our purpose we will never lack the motivation to achieve personal success.
Many thoughts begin with the phrase “I have to…” We all have routines, customs or even self-imposed rules in our lives that are not really personal decisions. It is important to reevaluate our life project, not stagnate and create new goals that allow us to progress. Not changing and settling into habits and routines that do not satisfy us is the way to ending up feeling unmotivated and dissatisfied.
4. Be faithful to our own values
When we talk about values, we refer to the intrinsic convictions that determine our way of behaving and facing life. These have to be unique and come from yourself, no one can impose certain values on us. This is why they are so powerful, if we act in a way that we can be proud of, we will feel motivated and empowered to act and move forward in pursuit of our goals and objectives.
5. Understand mistakes as part of learning
Constantly striving for perfection is the surest way to fail On the other hand, understanding mistakes as a necessary part of the learning process and maintaining a positive attitude towards them puts us on the right path to success. As soon as we understand and are able to understand our imperfections, we will begin to improve significantly.
6. Maintain a positive life attitude
It’s hard to learn to self-motivate when we’re stuck in a negative spiral or constant complaining. If we want to motivate ourselves we must focus on gratitude and maintain an abundance mentality. It is important to be grateful for the good things we have in our lives instead of focusing on what we lack. The more we focus on the good and cultivate a positive mindset, the easier it will be to stay motivated. This does not mean interpreting negative events as positive or cultivating inner peace without taking action, rather it is about working on our resilience and facing life with enthusiasm.
7. Use music
Surely more than once you have felt more motivated after listening to one of your favorite songs. There is an explanation for this, our brain is programmed to respond to music. So, it’s a good idea, if we feel tired or notice that our motivation levels are starting to decline, to take a break and use the power of music to get an extra boost in our mood or energy.
