We’re driving home, my son and I, talking about addiction to screens and social media and also about productivity and motivation.
He’s speaking my language. “I’ve been studying and dealing with motivation my entire career, as a Coach, facilitator and trainer”, I told him, “and I still haven’t figured it out”.
I mean, what makes one person take immediate action and make massive changes in their life; while others struggle to shift their thinking into action and make any change at all?
We spoke about how we all naturally move away from pain and towards reward. And yet, it also depends on whether it’s short term or long term; whether we get immediate gratification or are able to see the very distant end game and still decide it’s worth the effort.
We concluded that it’s complicated. And always worth the discussion but maybe we don’t have all the answers!
Thinking about it later, I realized that I’d forgotten to talk about story.
Not the ‘once upon a time’ type of story. But the inner story, the story we tell ourselves.
If there’s one thing that can shift our ability to get and stay motivated, it’s to become aware of, and change our inner story.
You see, it’s the story we tell ourselves that often (if not always!) determines the reality we create in our lives. So change the story, change the reality.
And that has an immediate effect on our ability to stay motivated and take action.
It was this that led me to story coaching. And years later, I’m still fascinated and asking the questions about how our story shifts our reality and effects our levels of motivation.
I guess that’s our conversation for the next car journey!
I’d love to hear your thoughts on this too. Hit reply and let me know what you think.
