“Motivation is what gets you started. Habit is what keeps you going.” Jim Ryun
Even the most passionate people sometimes lose focus, run out of will-power or get short of motivation. Truth be told, motivation is usually extremely powerful at the very beginning of a process. It is what pulls us in into the action. But it tends to wear down with time or when we see our efforts are not getting the desired outcome. So what do we do then? You either give up or you keep on going. Both are valid choices, if taken consciously. If you notice that giving up is how you usually tackle feeling you lost your motivation though, then there’s something for you in the following lines.
Photo credit: Peace Revolution
Meditation boosts, or better yet, revives motivation in at least three ways.
- Positive habit creation
Firstly, having a regular meditation practise is a constructive and supportive habit in itself. Many of the people who started meditating can confess to having also had difficult moments when they felt like giving up. But a strong commitment fires a relentless willpower to keep on going. Choose those habits that would help you increase your motivation levels. One that also spring naturally from a sustained meditation practise is visualisation. Waking up and going to bed visualising the outcome that you want out of a certain situation sets in your mind the image of what fulfilment looks like and feels like. reconnecting to that mental image when you’re low on motivation might just spruce it up.
- Focus reset
When we fail to materialise what we set our minds upon, we might tend to place our attention on that feeling of failure. Through meditation we learn how to recognise what are the thoughts that are most present in our consciousness. Not only that, but we also get to choose what we want to have as thoughts. So, for example, if you feel down and you think nothing ever works, you can observe your present situation and choose to shift your attention on something else, say what you learnt from not succeeding and how you could use it in your next trial. Being able to reset your focus on thoughts and action that are empowering is also a source of motivation.
- Emotional wiring
Motivation is directly linked with what we think we would feel like if we were to obtain what we set our minds on. Many of us do not get in touch with our emotions. It is important to realise how motivation manifests at the level of the body and at the level of the mind. How do you feel when you are filled with motivation to carry out a certain project? Try to think of a situation when you felt highly motivated. Once you have it, make it your emotional anchor and create the habit of going back to that place whenever you feel low on motivation.
These are three way in which meditation boosts motivation. We’d be happy to hear it from you, if you have other tips and tricks on fuelling your motivation.