Tuesday, January 11, 2022
You may feel that you lack aspiration, motivation, and inspiration. But what you lack is action, and furthermore results. Life requires that you interface with your reality through action and interaction. It also seems to prefer that you interact peacefully with your reality. When you neglect action, or when you fight reality, you forfeit the feelings of motivation and inspiration. But most importantly, you forfeit sustainable joy. Another way to look at it is this way – you often have to pick up a paint brush before you feel inspired to paint a picture.
Action items, some form of effort seems to be the key to unlocking sustainable joy and contentment. When the idea comes, it’s important to write it down, or to take even the slightest action towards it, so that you may give it some form of life. Birthing an idea is one of the most fundamental purposes of being a human, but the idea often has to take physical form before you feel inspired to create it.
If you lack motivation, or if you feel uninspired, see those as signals – clarion calls to action. Something is calling you to apply an effort to it – better health and eating habits, a worthwhile project, a fun event, etc. If you are able-bodied, and you have time (even just a few minutes), all that is required of you is small step forward. Then, the second step becomes easier. By step three, you’ll have more motivation than when you started. Remember, if you feel unmotivated or uninspired, procrastination only enhances that funk. Effort, work, and action are the key verbs that you are looking for. You’re not looking for feelings, per se – those are byproducts of action. Results require actions, so move towards what you resist – work. There’s no other way to go. If you want to be motivated – do something about it.