The post is developed in partnership with BetterHelp.
You can’t succeed at anything in life if you don’t have the proper motivation. Motivation is the energy and will that are necessary to achieve any goal. Very few people achieve their dreams without enormous motivation, so it is absolutely essential to build it up in yourself.
But if you struggle with motivation, how can you increase it? Luckily, no matter your disposition or past, you can increase your motivation to improve yourself and achieve your goals. This primarily involves creating good strategies for success and being positive about your potential. Read on to learn some great tips that will increase your motivation.
Set SMART Goals
Goals are a necessary component of any form of success. However, it is essential to set the right goals, as poorly defined ones may actually decrease your motivation.
Therefore, you want to set goals that are SMART: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound. Goals that don’t follow these traits may be too overwhelming, vague, or unachievable. This is why so many New Year’s resolutions or other personal goals aren’t achieved. People struggle to make them specific enough or measure them out to be achievable.
So, therefore, make goals that follow the SMART guidelines. Prevent yourself from making goals that are vague or can’t be easily achieved. Otherwise, you may set goals that actually deflate your motivation instead of increasing it.
Visualization
It’s so much easier to work hard towards a goal or dream when you can already visualize the finish line. Those who struggle to see themselves succeed often lose motivation to keep working hard towards their dreams. Therefore, simply visualizing your success can help increase your motivation.
This doesn’t involve much work or effort to try. Simply spend a few minutes each day alone and in a quiet space. Close your eyes and use your imagination to see yourself achieving your goal. But don’t just visualize the end goal; visualize the necessary steps to get there too. That will motivate you to keep going towards the next subgoal, as you know it can be achieved and will ultimately lead you to the end goal.
Furthermore, notice your emotions during this exercise, such as pride, happiness, and satisfaction. Carry those emotions with you throughout the day to keep your motivation up.
Surround Yourself With Inspirational And Positive People
Successful athletes rarely make it on their hard work alone. They usually have coaches, teammates, and loved ones who support and inspire them along the way. If you’ve surrounded yourself with negative people or those who don’t believe in you, you will have difficulty reaching your dreams.
Therefore, find yourself teammates, friends, coaches, and mentors who are positive and inspiring. Let them push you to be a better version of yourself and allow their positivity to rub off on you. Lots of optimism and energy are crucial for success, and these are highly influenced by the people we spend the most time with.
Focus On Accomplishments
Every athlete goes through rough patches and periods where they aren’t performing their best. However, beating yourself up about it won’t motivate you to keep going. Instead, it is important to remain positive and build yourself up.
One way to do this is to focus on all your achievements and accomplishments. This will remind you of all the hard work you have put in and the successes you have achieved with all of your efforts. Furthermore, it will help inspire you to keep going because, ultimately, you probably failed a few times before achieving those past successes. If you were a success before, then you can succeed again.
Bottom Line
Motivation is absolutely critical to achieving our goals and dreams. However, not everyone is wired to experience instant motivation on a whim. Luckily, there are many ways you can increase your motivation and drive. Hopefully, this article gave you a few pointers on how to get started and push yourself to work on your dreams and goals.
If you wish to learn more about motivation and how to increase it, you can find more resources and advice here.
