We're all familiar with the Refresh button on a web browser. You hit Refresh in order for a web page to update, to show new information, or to reflect changes made.Wouldn't it be nice if we had a Refresh button for life? When we feel stuck or stagnant, we would just hit the Refresh button and surge forward.
While we're at it, let's get a Refresh button to help us out when our creative energy is low. {sigh} Sadly, there isn't a Refresh button for either life or creativity. It's up to us to climb off those plateaus or out of those valleys of despair.
We're in the last quarter of this year. If your motivation for achievement is lagging, here are some ways to get back on the road to success.
7 Strategies to Refresh Your Motivation
1. Use the Just Do It principle. Regardless of your mood, take action -- one small step in the direction of where you want to go.
You can't wait to be in a good mood in order to write a book, paint the living room, or clean out the garage. Chances are you have a job in the outside world. You go to that job whether you're happy or sad. Often you go whether you're healthy or sick.
Goal achievement must command the same dedication. If your garden needs weeding, then take an action to achieve that no matter how small the action. Do it even if you're depressed. If you want to write a book, then write every day even if it's only 100 words. Set a quota and meet it even if you're sick, depressed, homesick, or ecstatically happy.
2. Grow an attitude of belief in yourself.
If you find yourself constantly thinking negative, defeating thoughts then do some inner exploration to figure out why you like to beat yourself up. Lack of confidence in one's own abilities is a killer. Face your fears in order to get beyond them. Write out a script that changes your self-talk from sabotaging to empowering.
3. Hang around with people who are charged up. Charged up with creativity, excitement, and optimism for life itself. their excitement doesn't even have to be about the same thing that excites you, but it helps more if it is. Let their general exuberance for life rub off on you.
4. Stay away from people who are black holes of negativity. These people are only too happy and quick to tell you why you can't get what you want. These black holes of the universe will suck the life, ambition, and motivation right out of you.
5. Be very specific about what you want. You can have anything you want, but you can't have everything so figure out what it is you really want. Is it to be a mystery novelist, a crime writer, a botanist, a dancer, or what? You have to know what you want in order to go after it.
6. Make a list of strategies to help you through the challenging times. Write down what you're going to do when you're sick and need to work toward your goal. What will you do when you're depressed and need to take action to achieve your goal? What will you do when you're overworked and underpaid, and you can't seem to get to first base to achieve your goal?
7. Adopt the U.S. Marine Corps motto: "Improvise, overcome, adapt." With every obstacle that crops up or every setback, resolve to use the situation to your best benefit. Figure out how you can improvise, overcome, adapt.
Takeaway Truth
Refresh using these strategies or some of your own. If you've got a good strategy for boosting your motivation or creativity, leave a comment and tell us about it.
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October Prize
A copy of my new book Cinderella Blue, Book 2 of San Antone Two-Step, to be published this month, and a Starbucks Gift Card.
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