The dictionary will define motivation as:
1.The act or an instance of motivating. This could be something you do to motive yourself or others. Perhaps you give someone an encouraging remark that makes them feel good about themselves and what they are doing with their life. Encouragement is very important, whether you are doing it for yourself or for others. Lack of motivation and encouragement is the number one reason people fail to succeed at their goals.
2.The state or condition of being motivated. Society may also define motivation as a noun, as something we’ve already achieved or have been given. If you’ve received motivation from someone, you have been given a great gift. Often it is hard to motivate ourselves and having the support of others can make a big difference on whether we succeed or not.
3.Something that motivates, induces, and gives incentive. In the next few paragraphs I will talk about how you define motivation. What gives us motivation is such an individual and personal thing. Most of us are driven by different needs and desires, and the incentives we all desire are different as well.
Let’s look at motivation from another perspective. I define motivation according to what is important to me. We all have different motivators in our lives. Perhaps you desire to have lots of money so you can travel the world. Or maybe just some extra cash so you can take the kids to the movies every week would be enough for you.
Can you see how those two different desires might lead to different paths of action, all depending on how you define motivation? No path is a wrong path, and each person’s path is unique to them.
To define motivation according to your goals is a good trick to keep moving towards your goals. Instead of thinking of it as “the state of being motivated,” define motivation as a vacation, a new wardrobe, or maybe something as special as a new baby.
If you have a few specific goals you are trying to reach, it may help to sit down and define motivation to yourself. What are your goals? Why do you want to reach them? What positive outcomes will there be if you succeed in making your dreams come true? Those “whys” and “what” are going to be your definitions of motivation.
Let’s say you desire to get a new job. You want this new job because
a) you’re unhappy in your current position,
b) you’d like to earn more money, and
c) you want to push yourself to do the best you can in your career.
You could go a step further with one of those answers and ask yourself “why” you want to earn more money. Perhaps you need to pay off debt, our maybe you just want to stop living paycheck to paycheck. Keep asking yourself why until you reach a concrete picture or word that you can write down – that is how you define motivation for yourself.
Once you have the concrete picture, close your eyes and envision how you feel after the goal has been achieved. Notice all the emotions you are experiencing in that moment. This is when you establish your motivation to achieve a goal.
Find a compelling reason for you to take the first step towards your goal and reminding continuously the reason why you took this step will keep you focused.
A WORD FROM CLARIFICIENT:
After establishing the motivation to achieve your goal, write it down along with your end goal and post it where you can see it at least two times in a day. This will encourage you to stay focused and make right choices during the day.