Wednesday, October 20, 2010 at 6:00AM | Amy C Motivation Missing? 5 Steps to Help You Track it Down
It happens to the best of us.
Injury. Business trips. Distraction. Interest in a new sport. Illness. Family obligations. General malaise. Whatever your reason (or is it an excuse?), our training gets derailed and off-track.
We have the best of intentions to implement a new routine. We watch it fizzle out. We oversleep. We come up with new reasons (are you sure it’s not an excuse?) why this particular time doesn’t work. And at the end of the day, we’re disappointed in ourselves and discouraged.
So what do you do? How do you get back into the habit?
1. come clean and let go
First of all, stop with the self-directed anger, recriminations, should’ve, would’ve and could’ve justifications. It is what it is. If you could go back in time, you’d have a patented time machine and be rich with plenty of time to get your workouts in, right?
So admit that you didn’t get it done. Fess up to your excuses. And then let it go.
I’m going to say that again, because it’s really important: Let. It. Go.
2. take the lessons objectively
How’d that go? It might take time. Letting go isn’t easy, but it’s really important. So take some extra time if needed, but try not to dwell on it.
Now that you’ve forgiven yourself and allowed all the bad feelings and judgements about your lack of training to go, it’s time to look at what happened objectively.
A quick side note about the definition of objective. It means without judgement. It means impartial and unbiased. So pretend you’re a stranger who’s describing what happened and respond as you would if you were completely unattached to the situation and outcome. With reason and not emotion (we’ll get the emotion involved soon, but this is not the time.)
Okay. So what happened? What excuses were you favoring? Are your challenges pretty straight-forward (injury, family crisis)? Or are they a little more nebulous (you’re just not putting in the time and can’t put your finger on why)?
Understanding the past is an important tool to help you plan for what’s next. But focusing too much on it can bog you down. Absorb the lessons and move on.
3. redirect your focus
Now that you have some new insight, it’s time to look ahead. One of the most important things to realize is that our goals often change without telling us. So we have to do a little revisiting to make sure the goals we think we want, we actually do want.
Define your goal today. Is it a particular event? A distance? A speed? Learning a new sport? Getting started for the very first time? (Note: these steps can also be applied to most other areas of our lives as well.)
Visualize yourself meeting your goal. This might sound a little out there, but stay with me. This is where I want you to get your emotions fully engaged. Imagine yourself crossing that finish line; redpointing your climbing project; surfing a new break.
What does it look like? Smell like? What are you feeling? What’s around you? Trees? A cheering crowd? Sea turtles? Who’s with you? What are the textures around you? Feet falling lightly on the trail? Granite beneath your feet? Salt water washing over you as you paddle in?
Remember why you love doing this. Sit with this vision for a moment. Let it seep into your bones. Do it a few times each day.
4. break it down
Got your renewed goal? A really clear vision of what it’ll look like when you make it? Good. So now it’s time to break it down into manageable steps. What are you going to do tomorrow to get to your goal? What about the next day? Write it down. Tell someone. Whatever has helped you in the past is always a good starting point to helping you now.
Oftentimes, we get stuck because our goals are so big. We get overwhelmed and freeze. But the adage of “one step at a time” really holds true. One step. Then another. It’s all the little steps in between the big ones that make the biggest difference in change. Notice those. Focus on the small steps.
It helps to look back every now and again to check your progress. Look how far you’ve come! Be sure to reevaluate every so often (not too often, but probably more often than you’d think). Refine and check back in. What’s helping? Keep doing that.
What’s hindering you? Adjust and alter. One more step forward. What are you going to do tomorrow?
5. go. get out the door. do it.
Action. Ah... action. Frankly, sometimes I think we can chuck steps one through four and just concentrate on number five. Action begets action. And when we’re moving, we’re actively reminded of the why.
Why this is fun. Why this feels good. Why we do this thing in the first place.
So what are you waiting for? Shut down the computer, get out there and go have fun.
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