What You Need To Stay Motivated on Your Projects and Goals

This week it’s all about your goals and staying focused so you actually get round to completing them

 

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Script

Episode 130

Hello and welcome to episode 130 of the Working With Podcast. A podcast to answer all your questions about productivity, time management, self-development, and goal planning. My name is Carl Pullein and I am your host for this show.

I hope you are faring well during these difficult and unprecedented times. Disruptions to our lives like this do not come around very often, fortunately, yet with anything bad, I always like to see the silver lining and in this instance the opportunity to step back a little, review what we want to accomplish and how we want to accomplish it is an opportunity not to be missing. 

I’ve written and spoken in the past about the need to stress test any kind of system you build for yourself, and now is a great chance to test your system. How does it cope when you are thrown out of your normal, day to day routines? How does it manage when you are surrounded by interruptions and demands from family members? Does it still work? 

These questions can really help you to find that balance and find the best way for your system to be set up.

Now this week, I have a goals related question. We haven’t answered one of these for a while. This week it’s about staying focused on a goal and how to avoid being distracted and or lose interest in it once you have started taking the necessary action to make it happen. 

Now before that, I would like to remind you that if you have not done so already I have a FREE online course that will teach you the concepts of COD - That’s collect, Organise and Do. 

Collecting your tasks, commitments, ideas and events into a place you trust, spending a little time each day organising what you collected and the rest of the time doing the work you have identified needs to be done. It’s simple, it’s powerful and it works. 

Details of the course are in the show notes.

Okay, it’s now time for me to hand you over to the mystery podcast voice for this week’s question. 

This week’s question comes from Toby. Toby asks: Hi Carl, I had a number of goals and projects that I was so excited to start this year and yet after a few weeks I lost interest and stopped working on them. I think I have a problem with motivation as this has always happened to me. Is there anything I can do to stay focused on them?

Hi Toby, thank you for your question and I can reassure you you are not alone. Struggling to stay focused on your goals and projects is hard. To achieve goals you are going to have to leave your comfort zone and that requires some big changes to your way of life. 

Completing projects can also be hard if you don't have a boss or colleagues keeping you accountable. It’s much easier to slip back into our normal way of doing things and find excuses about why we cannot achieve a goal or complete a project when we do not have someone keeping us accountable. 

And that’s something you need to be very alert to. The excuses your brain will come up with that prevents you from making the necessary changes you need to make to achieve your goal or complete a project. 

And boy our brains are fantastic at coming up with excuses about why you are so different from everyone else. Why you cannot write a blog post, why you can’t apply for that promotion or why you cannot run a 10km road race. 

What I’ve found is whenever a person says “I can’t” the vast majority of the time it’s got nothing to do with a lack of ability or qualifications or money. It’s got everything to do with a reluctance to make the necessary changes one needs to make to achieve that goal or to complete that project. 

The “ah but they are different” excuse. The thing is we are all different. But that does not mean you cannot achieve your goals or complete your projects. 

I recently heard a podcast talking about how Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson became the highest-paid Hollywood actor. It certainly wasn't luck. It’s because The Rock does the work nobody else is willing to do. 

Despite all the success he has had in recent years, the amount of money he has earned, he still wakes up at 4 am and goes for a run or spends 45 minutes or so on the running machine. The Rock understands this. He knows the secret to his success is in the gym, not on the sofa or lying in bed. It must be so easy for him to sit back and say I’ve made it. I don’t have to go to the gym today” Yet he still goes. Why? Because he knows why he is successful. He knows what it takes to be successful and he’s made the decision to make those sacrifices. 

You know, if you want to the physique of Dwayne Johnson you have to do the work Dwayne Johnson does. 

And if you are not prepared to do that that’s okay. Accept that as your reason for not having the physique of Dwayne Johnson. But don't delude yourself by saying The Rock is a special case, or he was lucky. No, he wasn't. He puts the work in day after day after day. There’s nothing lucky about that. 

That is commitment. Not luck. 

And this is the same for your projects and goals. It takes commitment and consistency. I suppose a good question to ask before you decide to start any project or goal is:

What am I prepared to sacrifice in order to complete this?

That’s because to commit to completing a project or goal will require you to make time for doing it. That means you are going to have to sacrifice something. What will you sacrifice?

It could be you enjoy sitting down at the end of a long day to watch TV. Or you love going out for a few drinks with your friends on a weekend, or your favourite place is your nice warm bed. 

If you really want to achieve your goal, complete your project what are you going to sacrifice? 

You see, if you’re not prepared to sacrifice anything to achieve your goal or complete your project your motivation is not strong enough to carry you through. 

A classic one is as the summer approaches many people feel the urge to lose some weight. So they embark on a crash diet. They go from eating three meals a day plus snacks to eating only one or two and no snacks. After a few hours on their new diet, they feel hungry. Then very hungry, then unbelievably hungry and after a few hours or a day or two they give up depending on the strength of their willpower. 

The sacrifice—the discomfort of feeling hungry—is more powerful than the urge to look good on their summer holiday. 

I often hear people talk of the desire to write a book or to start an online business as a side project. And these are great ways to develop skills and push your potential. Yet, once again there is a sacrifice to be made. There’s the risk of failure and the perceived embarrassment that will come from that—seriously if you fail that’s far better than never actually trying. There’s the time sacrifice—you are going to have to commit time to do these activities and that means you are going to have to stop doing something you already do. 

All of these sacrifices will test your resolve and test your motivation. 

So how do you develop motivation that is strong enough to overcome the discomfort of moving away from your comfort zone? 

Now that’s a very difficult one to answer because it depends on where you are in life. By that I mean if you are in your early twenties, you feel you have plenty of time to write the book, start your own business or start an exercise programme. 

I was a smoker when I was in my twenties—I didn’t care about lung cancer or other smoking-related diseases—they didn’t happen to people in their twenties. But as I got older that little voice in my head was telling me to give up—my long-term health would suffer and I would die young. And sure enough, the point came where my motivation to stay alive and live a healthy long-life became stronger than the nicotine hit I got from a cigarette. I quit. 

If you are in your early thirties you are thinking about settling down, developing your career and building a family life for yourself, By the time you get to your mid to late forties, you motivation to preserve your health will be becoming stronger. 

So a lot of our motivation comes from where we are in life. If you’ve just experienced the birth of your first child, your motivation to protect and preserve the financial well-being of your new family will be incredibly motivating. (Probably less so once that child becomes an adolescent teenager) As you approach retirement your motivation to build a sustainable retirement fund for yourself will be strong. 

So, if you are looking for motivation you need to be asking questions about why a goal or a project is important. 

And the final step to all of this you need to figure out what you need to do consistently every day to make whatever it is you want to accomplish happen. 

The truth is, motivation will not last. The discomfort of your sacrifice will always trump your motivation later in the day. What you need to be doing is developing habits and routines that take you towards completing your project or your goal.

Writing that book? Write something every day. Set a minimum target say 500 words per day. Want to lose weight? Change your eating habits. Find the foods that you currently eat that directly contribute to your weight gain and replace them with healthier alternatives. Want to get that promotion at work? Find out what you have to do in order to get it. What training courses can you take, what skills need developing and make doing the work a habit or a routine? Something you just do.

Look for the action steps that will directly result in you completing your project or achieving your goal. 

The Rock wakes up at 4 am because to him going to the gym and working out directly contributes to his success. Warren Buffett reads for 5 hours a day because he knows that the knowledge he picks up reading those financial reports directly contribute to his bottom line. 

What can you do that will directly contribute to you achieving success with your projects and goals? 

There you go, Toby. I hope that has helped and given you some concrete steps you can take to achieve your projects and goals. Thank you for your question.

And thank you to all of you for listening. Don’t forget, if you have a question, then you can email me—carl@carlpullein.com or you can DM me on Facebook or Twitter.

It just remains for me now to wish you all a very very productive week.