Success From Habits vs Motivation – At American Forklift Training Centers, INC., we’re not simply a forklift training school – we’re here to help you better yourself, make more money for you and your family, and help you line up with great opportunities.
Accordingly, during a team meeting we discussed this topic of bettering oneself. How can our students improve professionally and personally? As we bounced ideas, one thing that came up is the concept of motivation and whether success must be derived from your level of motivation.
When we’re motivated, there’s not really an issue about taking actions to accomplish our goals. But what happens when you lose motivation? There are times that we all wake up unmotivated. What happens then? Are we bound for failure?
Well, what happens if your success isn’t a derivative of your level of motivation? Studying the advice of some of the most successful individuals, we’ve realized that motivation isn’t their source of success. Rather, there’s something else more powerful than motivation.
As you may know, if you want to lose weight, you have to eat right and workout. If you want to make more money or stop living paycheck to paycheck, then you have to work more, earn more, and/or reduce your expenses. If you want to take that cruise you’ve always dreamed of, you have to possibly make sacrifices and save to afford it.
In short, whatever your goals may be, if you think about it, deep down you already know what you need to do to succeed.
Let’s look at New Year’s Resolutions. So many start off the year at a sprint doing everything right to achieve their goals, but sooner or later, they’re back at their old ways and consequently their old results.
How? Why? Many make excuses as to why they can’t stay on track. They may be too busy, too tired, too scared, too bored, or have “other” tasks they need to get to prior to what they need to do to achieve the success they seek.
Ultimately, it comes down to a lack of motivation, leading to excuses, and consequently bringing about procrastination.
Given that motivation is based off your amount of desire to do something, when your desire to act is strong, your motivation to act is effortless. Conversely, when your desire is low, your motivation to act becomes a struggle.
The truth is, the most successful people don’t rely on motivation to succeed. They don’t allow their feelings and willpower to dictate whether they will achieve success or not. Instead, they rely on rituals, routines, and habits.
Successful people break down their goals into steps and create rituals out of the steps. Then, they incorporate their rituals into a daily routine – creating a system they can rely on. Ultimately, by doing their routine daily, habits form – where they’re established routines have become ingrained and they act on autopilot. They no longer have to think about what they’re doing and how they’re going to go about it.
Let’s look at this idea in practical terms. Let’s say you’re trying to get into shape. Accordingly, you decide you want to go to the gym each morning. If you’re going to base your subsequent actions on motivation, it’s fair to say that sooner or later you’ll find yourself lacking the motivation to wakeup and workout – so you don’t. By creating a ritual, however, your decision to go to the gym wouldn’t be based on motivation. Rather, the ritual may be something as simple as waking up, putting on your workout gear, and walking out the door. That’s it. If you focus on just those few little steps each morning, the subsequent results of going to work out follows. You’re already in your workout gear and outside. What’s next? Why not go workout, even if it’s just for a few. Like a domino effect, your new habit will lead you to success.
There have been numerous studies and books written on this very topic, but a few key takeaways in regards to creating rituals and habits are as follows:
- The most successful people wake up early and implement a morning ritual focused on taking them from sleepy to prepared to take on the day (i.e. via journaling, working out, and/or meditating). In doing so, they can take advantage of the early morning hours, without being distracted and interrupted.
- Successful individuals schedule their core activities – the one’s they can’t negotiate – onto a calendar. This way, they’ll have to complete these tasks like any other appointment. It’s not negotiable, and as their day gets pulled into different directions and to unexpected events, they don’t lose track of needing to complete their core activities. In other words, by scheduling your activities into a calendar, you’re more likely to complete it and overtime, these activities become a habit – accomplished on autopilot.
- Whereas a morning ritual starts your day, an evening ritual is all about winding down and getting fantastic sleep in preparation for tomorrow, such as by clearing your head by writing all you controlling thoughts onto a piece of paper and/or indulging in a bit of self-care. Successful put in as much energy and focus into a quality evening ritual as a morning ritual.
As you can see, there are days you’re going to wake up unmotivated. Days that you just don’t want to do anything. But, that’s ok. Your success doesn’t need to based on how motivated you’re feeling. Your success can be based on the habits you create through rituals overtime. So we ask you…what habits are you going to create?
And as always, if we can be of any assistance, please don’t hesitate to Contact Us Today!