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How to stay disciplined when you're unmotivated
Discipline is freaking hard. It can be a struggle to get yourself to do things we don't want to do. Especially because now our culture can be immediate gratification focused. We want all the benefits now. We want all the success now. It's not natural for me or us to trust the process and give things time. It can actually be hard to take those baby steps in hopes of the end goal.
I can have a hard time with this and my business. I want consistency and a thriving business now. Why do I feel I deserve this? I’m not sure but don't a lot of us have those tendencies? I want the end goal now. To reach our dreams now. When I get into one of these funks I have to bring myself back and ask myself “ who do I think I am” ? To deserve all the benefits with no grit and hard work.
I sometimes fluctuate with not wanting to work hard because I don't want to give my life away to my job. I want to find that balance in work and play. But then I need to remind myself. If I have these big dreams for my business I can't expect that if I give 50% to it that I'll get there. It doesn't make sense. So what I've concluded is that I need to work hard and I can't do everything. I can't be everything to everyone and I need to choose what is important. I'm still figuring that out. But what I'm saying is we need to understand what's best for us and what we want for our lives. I know I don't want to eat, sleep and think about my job 24/7. But I also want to help as many people as I can to change their relationship with food and fitness. So that's going to take time and hard work
ANYWAY. All of that to say- what do you want. What is your goal? Whether it be for fitness or your job or your family. What do you want it to look like? It's important to be specific with our goals and what we want because then. We’ll need to make sacrifices. You will have to make sacrifices to hit the goals you want.
For example, Peter and I felt like we needed a little more discipline in our lives. To do something we didn't want to do for a bigger purpose. So we chose to do the 75 hard challenge. It's a mix of fitness and learning. But in the end it's staying consistent for 75 days in the 5 components of the challenge. It's freaking hard to show up in big ways every single day. Especially the part of needing to exercise outside everyday for 45 minutes. It gets freaking cold and I still have to bundle up and get out there. Why am I doing this? Because I want to get in the habit of showing up for my family or my business when I don't want to. When it's not convenient, when I don't feel like it I want to show up. That's why I'm doing this challenge and sticking it out.
SO. How do we stay disciplined when feeling unmotivated? Know why you set your goal. Have reason behind your decisions. Very specific reasons.
THEN. Let's say you start to lose motivation. You’re not feeling it. You've lost the drive and are over it. I hear you. That has happened to me on several occasions. With my job and my fitness journey. So then you need to ask yourself. Why did I make this a goal in the first place and have my priorities or goals changed? That's okay if they have. There is nothing wrong with that. But you need to be honest with yourself. Confide in a friend or family member about it.
For example, I am working on a new program for my business. I am STRUGGLING. I debated quitting a few times and so I asked myself is this not for me? Maybe I jumped the gun with this one. So I talked to Peter about it and he encouraged me to not give up. To keep going with it and finish it out. I was losing steam because I wasn't getting anything out of it and may not for a while. I had to have that conversation to see it was still a good thing to be working at.
Another example is I started getting up at 6am everyday a few weeks ago. I wanted to get my day started earlier. I'm not totally sure why I wanted to do this. But I was finding I was getting up at different times each day. I have personal training clients in the morning at different times so I would get up when I needed to on the early days. I Slept a little later when I didn't have them. I found this routine did not work well for me. Getting up at 6am. I was so tired by like 5pm and my husband and I sometimes can't get to bed before 10:30 because he works until 9 some nights. SO it wasn't working for me in helping me function at my best. So I told him and evaluated some things and now I get up at 6:40 every day and what a difference. SO it wasn't a super drastic change but it made a huge difference. Maybe I'll try it again at another time but for now it is 6:40.
So it's important to reassess and see why certain changes aren't working. You want to make sure your choices are enhancing your life, not making them more complicated.
NOW. Another thing to ask yourself is. Is this a consistent habit of yours? Do you often start something and quit? Maybe it's time to suck it up buttercup and stop coming up with excuses to sabotage yourself. It could be time to have a real conversation about why you tend to quit. Is it a habit from when you were young? Is it something that has prevented you from finding success? It's important to acknowledge these things. Again, include someone in on these habits and then work to change them. It takes grit and time and wanting it for yourself. But sometimes it does come down to pushing yourself past your comfort zone for that bigger goal. But you have to make sure the goal you are setting is one you want.
I hope this encourages you to set goals, work hard and freaking crush it. Motivation comes and goes. It's going to take a deeper desire to keep you going. We talked more about discipline in my free facebook group this week. Join us!
