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How to Get
Motivated
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Changing involves knowing how and then wanting to. It is important to see that learning is different from doing. To improve and work on new behaviors you must learn. Motivation may be just as important as the learning process, when you think about what you want to achieve in your life. In a very basic view of weight loss, we know in order to lose weight, you simply don’t eat. Where things get muddled, is knowing you have to eat in order to survive. So it is about the choices you make when you do eat that are going to make a difference in achieving a weight loss goal. Often you set yourself up for failure when trying to accomplish a weight loss goal by not wanting the goal enough or not giving enough time or effort to accomplish it. You often sabotage your goals by convincing yourself that you can reach the goal in some easier way, like a fad diet. When you set realistic long term personal goals, you set your life in motion; you now have an incentive or purpose to strive for. People that reach those long term goals, have calmer, happier, healthier lives. There are two kinds of goals that you should consider before you sit down to set your own. Mastery Goals: Seeking to improve your skills, results in feeling good about trying hard and an increased effort when an obstacle is met. Mastery-oriented goal setters, understand that success depends on their skills, not their emotions or feelings Performance Goals: With the idea of winning, or being the best at something often result in avoiding tough challenges, and giving up when you start to lose, feeling more anxious and you loose self-esteem. Performance –oriented people are more likely to strive for attention and view beating others as a “life or death” matter, in these situations failure to achieve the performance goal is interpreted as “I don’t have the ability” then interest declines. This is why coaches, personal trainers, and teachers, are focusing on encouraging mastering skills, rather then performance goals. In weight loss, it is important to set short-term and long-range goals. When you set your long term goals, they should reflect your values and rules that you live your life by so that they are motivating to you. Good goals are fairly hard, they challenge you, but they are achievable, it is like taking small steps at a time. As much as possible you should define your goals in terms of specific behaviors.
In order to stay focused on the goal, our motivation has to be focused on important tasks. You can get more done, and become more effective if you spend more time doing things that are important, rather then things you “think” are more urgent. E.g. planning and preparing for important upcoming tasks, reading, exercising, resting, etc. An example of this:
A man came
upon a hard working woodsman sawing down a tree and asks,
A lot of us are sawing with a saw that needs sharpened. We need to know a lot more about the processes of motivation and self-direction. Challenging, but achievable goals keep you motivated. Easy to reach goals are boring or demeaning. Impossible goals are frustrating. Challenging but realistic goals will force you to attempt and learn, these goals are dynamic and you must constantly access and change them to match your current situation. You will be most motivated when you feel capable, responsible, self-directed, respected and hopeful.
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