It's Not About Motivation
People are very kind. More than a few times after I have given presentations on my writings, I have been applauded as being very motivating even though I seldom use the word in my lectures. I understand it. The motivational umbrella is hot right now. Whether it is books, speaking engagements, writings or whatever, people are in fact mobilizing and want to be doing more. It is in part why I have become passionate about the things I have become passionate about. But, it's not about motivation.
I truly believe that we all have infinite potential. I know that we can all be doing more with ourselves. So why don't many of us work to this end? I believe it comes down to four things essentially: we don't know they can be doing more, we don't know how to achieve more, we don't believe we can do more or we don't believe we deserve more. For purposes of this writing I will be addressing the 'know how to' component.
I don't believe we need more motivation. We are already motivated. We all have hopes, dreams, desires, things we want. What is missing is the bridge to mate our wants with what we get. What we lack is the know how on how to create the behavior to get those things we want. What we lack are habits and the way to create them.
No matter how you define success, you do not achieve it without the habits to get it. Willpower is not enough. Willpower is finite and runs out. This is why it is essential to create behavior change small and slow. Habits have to be created incrementally. Once a new behavior is habitualized, we can then add to it with another small and slow behaviors change until we are operating with a collection of habits then move us in the direction of our goals.
Consciously create environments, situations, and experiences that will pull out the behaviors you want to turn into habits. This is a technique that is not employed because we generally underestimate the effectiveness of it. It works. It is powerful. Another reason the small and slow approach is necessary is because we inherently resist change. We don't like being taken out of our comfort zone so when we try to do so too abruptly, our brains react to this as if it is a threat because it is breaking its prediction model. But by incorporating the small and slow approach the brain reads it as novelty and actually desires more of it.
Habits are our secret weapon to success. We will create them even if we don't want to so better to take advantage of this evolutionary mechanism we all have and consciously create them and have them serve us as opposed to it being the other way around.
#elliotyi
#paradigmleft
#habits
#mindset
I truly believe that we all have infinite potential. I know that we can all be doing more with ourselves. So why don't many of us work to this end? I believe it comes down to four things essentially: we don't know they can be doing more, we don't know how to achieve more, we don't believe we can do more or we don't believe we deserve more. For purposes of this writing I will be addressing the 'know how to' component.
I don't believe we need more motivation. We are already motivated. We all have hopes, dreams, desires, things we want. What is missing is the bridge to mate our wants with what we get. What we lack is the know how on how to create the behavior to get those things we want. What we lack are habits and the way to create them.
No matter how you define success, you do not achieve it without the habits to get it. Willpower is not enough. Willpower is finite and runs out. This is why it is essential to create behavior change small and slow. Habits have to be created incrementally. Once a new behavior is habitualized, we can then add to it with another small and slow behaviors change until we are operating with a collection of habits then move us in the direction of our goals.
Consciously create environments, situations, and experiences that will pull out the behaviors you want to turn into habits. This is a technique that is not employed because we generally underestimate the effectiveness of it. It works. It is powerful. Another reason the small and slow approach is necessary is because we inherently resist change. We don't like being taken out of our comfort zone so when we try to do so too abruptly, our brains react to this as if it is a threat because it is breaking its prediction model. But by incorporating the small and slow approach the brain reads it as novelty and actually desires more of it.
Habits are our secret weapon to success. We will create them even if we don't want to so better to take advantage of this evolutionary mechanism we all have and consciously create them and have them serve us as opposed to it being the other way around.
#elliotyi
#paradigmleft
#habits
#mindset
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