What is it that keeps you motivated?

Are You Still Motivated? HOW?

I was recently asked “How do you stay motivated?”. I do
speak about motivation, but usually not on a personal level.
So, forgive me, but I will be talking about me, myself, and I
for the next few moments.

The fact is, I am not always motivated. Motivation is not
something that just happens. If you are human at all, you
know that you do not always want to be productive.

The 3 “Selfs”

You like to sit and watch a movie, take a vacation,
take a nap – maybe take another nap. That’s okay.
I enjoy those things, but there is more. The “More” part
is self-responsibility, self-reliance, and self-respect.

I would feel worse taking that nap when I knew
that I had things to do that are going to
keep my family fed (self-reliance).

I know that there are a lot of people who rely on the information
that I give them to help keep THEM motivated,
and that I need to keep up with reliable content (self-reponsibility).

Self-respect is something that I would lose quickly
if I fell into the trap of allowing myself to get lazy.

Self-Responsibility

Let’s begin with Self-Responsibility. Being responsible for
the things that you do, and taking that responsibility
seriously, is a major milestone in becoming successful – at anything!

How do you know if you are a responsible person?
Do you always begin work on time? This means that
even if you are working at home, you begin your
day at approximately the same time each day.

Do you manage distraction effectively? If you can’t control
the things that take you away from your work, then
you are not managing your time very well. You may
mean well, but to others you may be tagged as irresponsible.

Self-Reliance

Self-reliance is important because it shows others that you
are confident in your abilities. If you have confidence in yourself,
then others will be drawn to you, and will be more willing to give
you their time, and their business.

Self-Respect

Self-respect keeps you in touch with yourself, and helps
tie together your other two “Selfs”.

When you have self-respect, you have personal guidelines that
help others like and respect you.

Self-respect holds things like honesty, integrity, and trust at the
forefront of personal and business dealings. Your self-respect keeps
you in touch with what is important to you.

As with anything else, some of these things are learned
through trial and error. Even though we are often taught
these things growing up, listening, understanding, and
believing is often a difficult concept for youthful desires.

I was a hard study. I often thought that I was working hard,
but would fall short of my goals. It wasn’t until I learned
to control myself (mind, body, and soul) that I finally
was able to overcome most (unfortunately not all) of the
obstacles that were standing in my way of success.

I did become successful by working harder, and becoming
stronger. I later realized that I had gained a close
relationship with my 3 “R’s” which made my successes possible.

By mind-body-soul, I do not mean that you must be able to
drop into some state of sub-conscious enlightenment at the
drop of a hat, but that you recognize what directions you
need to be taking – and when.

You need to be able to control your body so that you can
get up and get to work, instead of continually hitting
that “Snooze” button on your alarm. When I get tired, but
I still have work that must be finished, I finish it.

The soul part has nothing to do with being religious, not
that religion will not be helpful at times, but it is
keeping in touch with your “Self”. Something that I have
been talking about for a number of paragraphs!