7 Tips to Stay Motivated
(Strategic and Emotional)
Have you found yourself staring at your computer screen in the last week or two, unable to muster the motivation to work on your business?
Yep. Me too!
Here’s why this happens: When your world is filled with uncertainty, motivation takes a nosedive. Your subconscious mind is nervous about negative scenarios, and your little inner voice keeps a running monologue on the futility of doing something that might not produce any results.
Can you relate?
There are ways that you can keep growing your business – you just need new methods during these times, both strategic and emotional.
Here are my 7 tips (3 strategic, 4 emotional!) to keep working, growing, and building when your motivation is low.
The 3 Strategic Tips:
Unless your business is in a state where you can just walk away for weeks and not worry about the business functioning, you do want to be strategic in your approach to the next 30-90 days. If you’re stressed and not focused, that can be tough. Take these three tips in order to create a consistent, powerful workflow.
1. Focus during the motivated times.
You’re unlikely to be completely unmotivated (if so, see tips 4-7!). More likely, you’ll feel motivated for short periods of time at your highest energy part of the day. For me, that’s 5am-7am. It might be morning for you, or maybe late night, but the important thing is to recognize that time, whenever it is, as your most likely time to be productive.
Use these brief periods of motivation to uncover the dreams. Use that time to brainstorm, and to be creative about the things that you want to accomplish in your business. Make lists of results that you want to achieve, without worrying about the “How?”s.
2. Create the project in small chunks.
Once your dreams and goals are recorded during your brief motivation time, you can be more practical about how those will happen at other times. You may want to set a timer for 25 minutes, and use that time to create a list of things that I need to do to make this happen (in other words, a project plan).
Don’t try to project-ize your dreams for hours, or an entire day, unless project management is a real skillset of yours. You can get an amazing amount of work done in brief spurts.
3. Boss Days vs. Employee Days
When you’re building a business, especially in the early days, you’re usually wearing many different hats. Sometimes you’re guiding the company, other times you’re doing the tedious work. Recognizing the difference between these two types of activities is critical to being productive, especially when motivation is not high.
During the motivated times, make the big decisions. Identify the projects that you want to work on. Get guidance, and make a plan. Those are your ‘Boss Days.’
Then, during the other times, you become the worker bee. You’re following orders, you’re your own employee, and since the work you are doing tends to be more routine and less creative, there’s less energy and motivation needed to accomplish it.
To learn more about Boss Days vs. Employee Days (and get a Bonus Checklist!), check out the latest episode of my podcast, ‘A Profitable Impact.’
The 4 Emotional Tips:
If you’re not feeling well physically, you give yourself extra TLC. You may take vitamins or supplements, get extra sleep, eat the healthiest food, etc. Likewise, when you’re stressed or challenged emotionally, you want to give yourself more healthful emotional inputs. These tips can help you do that!
1. Generative Gratitude
Gratitude is the best feel-good attitude there is. While it’s easy to feel grateful when someone does something nice for you, ‘Generative Gratitude’ is different. It’s the gratitude that you feel when you work to actively appreciate the things you already have in your life.
I use Generative Gratitude every morning as a mental reset to remind myself of the things that are actually going RIGHT for me, even in the midst of chaos.
What can you generate gratitude for? Create that as a ritual to give yourself a boost in the middle of a trying day.
2. Mindfulness or Tapping
Whether your favorite emotional remedy is tapping, mindfulness practices like meditation, or something else, give yourself an extra dose during these times! It’s OK to spend extra time working to improve and uplift your mindset.
Have you wanted to have more mindfulness in your life, but haven’t taken the time to do it? Now’s the perfect time to start.
3. Exercise
With spring upon us, getting outside is a pleasure, even if you have to do it alone or just with your close family. Take a walk, go for a hike, or enjoy a bike ride to get sunshine while you move your body – and since you’re outside, you can still practice social distancing while you rev up your endorphins.
4. Certainty Reflection
We started this conversation with the fact that uncertainty creates stress. However, for most transformational entrepreneurs, there are things in your life that DO feel certain. You may feel certainty around your spiritual beliefs, for example, or the care of your loved ones.
Take a few minutes each day to identify the things you are certain about, and enjoy that feeling.
What’s your biggest barrier to productivity? Is it Lack of Focus? Overwhelm? Disorganization? How about Bright Shiny Object Syndrome?
To discover how to improve your productivity and increase daily motivation, listen to my new podcast episode!
Want to create your own High-Ticket Offer, and price it right? Join my ‘High Ticket Offer Challenge’ and create something in just 5 days that you can sell for thousands of dollars!