Hi Mr. ENTJ. Firstly, I want to pay my respects to your current struggle with the loss of your grandmother and wish you well. I hope that you have logistical and emotional support during this time. Secondly, whenever you next get to your asks, which is clearly not a priority at this time, I would like to ask you how you trained yourself out of the selective motivation mindset, as I'm currently struggling with this. I have read your asks about this and wanted to know any concrete steps that work.
Thank you for your thoughts.
To your question: Iām glad you asked this because selective motivationā the motivation to only do the things you like while avoiding the things you dislikeā is a goal killer and it needs to be tackled early and aggressively. Most goals in life are paved with steps that are difficult, monotonous, and unpleasant, but they still need to be done. For example, if your goal is to lose weight and get a great body, then you need to diet and exercise. The diet and exercise part is where most people fail because it requires tremendous discipline, energy, effort, and commitment to sustain over a long period of time. You canāt eat one stick of celery and do one sit-up then have abs the next day. Thatās not how it works.
The way I achieved this was toĀ find an emotional anchor.
For example, one of my goals in life was to become financially successful because I grew up in deep poverty. I wanted to be rich but I wasnāt motivated to make a lot of money so that I could buy gold Rolex watches, alligator shoes, and Lamborghinis to flash on Instagram. Materialism is a weak source of motivation because itās externally defined which is why most people who try to make money for the sake of showing it off end up unsuccessful and broke. I was instead motivated by my emotional anchorā my motherā who I once witnessed sell her wedding ring to buy rice for our family when I was 8 years old. This emotional anchor motivated me over the span of 15+ years because I knew that every crappy college class I took, every difficult professor I dealt with, every tough job interview I attempted, and every grueling late night I endured at work put me one step closer to securing a better future for her and our family. It wasnāt easy, I disliked many parts of my journey, but after years and years of work my brother and I were able to fulfill a lifelong dream to buy our parents a home. The reason why I didnāt give up is because I had my emotional anchor and I never let it go.
To the health example above, I know a colleague who couldnāt stick to a diet to save his life. For years, he ate garbage, smoked, drank, and treated his body like a crash test dummy. Heād try to stop, fail, try again, then fail again. He knew better but he wasnāt able to alter course. This finally changed when his wife gave birth to their daughter early last year. He now had motivation because he wanted to live long enough to see his daughter grow up, get married, have children, and beyond. He couldnāt implement lasting change before she was born, but after he held his newborn in his arms, he finally had an emotional anchor that helped him commit.
Understand that motivation is not a rational issue that stems from a lack of knowledge. Who here doesnāt know that eating healthy and exercising are the keys to good health? We all have the internet and we all have access to the same information so none of this is should be breaking news. Motivation isnāt a rational issueā itās an emotional one which is why I didnāt bring the āstick to a routine and be disciplined!ā spiel. Motivation comes before discipline. If discipline is the āhow,ā then motivation is the āwhyā and the āwhyā is very important because the emotional and logical sides of your brain that we all have need to be in sync for you to stick to any plans you create.
Thatās how I did it and how I still do it. Find an emotional anchor. The deeper, stronger, and more meaningful the emotional anchorā the more resilient youāll become against the threat of demotivation. Find a positive emotion (or many positive emotions) associated with the goals youāve set whether thatās yourself and your own well-being, the people you deeply care about, or a vision of the future that youāre absolutely in love with that you want to make a reality. Itās not a perfect process because there will be days where youāll regress and fail, but if you can remember why you started in the first place, then you can get back up and try again.
Find your anchor and hang on tightly.Ā
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