Written by Georgia Hill, Digital Project Manager at Will It Make The Boat Go Faster?.
At Will It Make The Boat Go Faster? we’re all about setting and achieving clear, stretching and aspirational goals – what we like to call ‘Crazy Goals’. But once we’ve set them, what are the practical ingredients you need to implement to actually execute them?
Motivation was a key ingredient for Ben and his crew achieving their ‘Crazy Goal’ of winning a gold medal. Sure, the idea of winning Gold was thrilling, but when it came to getting up every morning at 5am for six years, training day-in and day-out, missing countless social occassions, losing regattas on the way – that wasn’t so much fun. So, the crew had to be really disciplined about actively managing their motivation to ensure they could consistently keep showing up. If they hadn’t done that, there’s no way they could have stayed the course all the way to Olympic gold at Sydney in 2000.
Motivation is crucial to the achievement of both the small day-to-day and large over-arching ‘crazy’ goals. But motivation isn’t a continual state of being. When the going gets tough, and the day-to-day reality may be boring, painful or difficult – how do we keep ourselves fired up? So, what happens when your ‘oomph’ is lacking, or your goals are feeling more farfetched than ever?
In the below article we’re going to look at three solutions for when this might occur:
- What to do when you’re overwhelmed in the face of a daunting goal.
- What to do when you’re stuck in a rut.
- What to do when you’ve lost enthusiasm for your goal.
1. What to do when you’re overwhelmed in the face of a daunting goal
Whether you’re just setting out on a new goal, or simply not sure how you will achieve it, a sense of overwhelm is common. Our advice is the same:
a). Break it up into small, measurable milestones
Looking at a whole goal at once can be like looking at the peak of a very big and intimidating mountain – it looks very far off, and you have no idea how you’re going to make it to the top.
But if instead you look at the path ahead and break it up into small sections, you can see where you’re headed with a much clearer process of how to get there and all the steps in between.
Make sure you also acknowledge each milestone you hit as an achievement! This is great evidence that you’re on-track to achieving your goal and helps reaffirm regular progress.
b). Think proactively about how you’ll stay motivated
How can you give yourself the best chance of staying motivated going forwards? If you know you struggle to stay motivated on your own, try building an environment around yourself that will help keep you on track. Try:
- Using the help of others – by either joining a group, setting time aside for collaborative work or just having regular 1:1 check- ins
- Get competitive! This may or may not work for you depending on how you operate and what your goal is, but competition can be a great motivator for many of us!
- Keeping the momentum up by rewarding yourself. What nice thing could you do for yourself when you hit a milestone? Treat yourself to a nice walk, visit your favourite café, organise drinks with friends, buy that piece of equipment that’s going to help you further towards your goal?
The above can help in a) keeping you accountable and b) making the journey more fun too.
By taking the time to break up your goal into smaller chunks and putting some energy into setting yourself up for success, you’re much more likely to make that first step feel easier on the path towards your goal.
Next, we’ll look at what to do when you hit a bump in the road to your goal.
2. What to do when you get stuck in a rut – getting unstuck
So, what happens when you’re on-track with a goal, but you’ve hit an obstacle? This has the potential to throw you off course, but we’re going to show you that you’ve got the power to deal with it and there are always more options than you think. First you need to acknowledge that you have the ability to get unstuck. You’re more than a victim of circumstance!
A common mantra at Will It? is “Today is going to be a good day, because I’m going to make it a good day.” Coined by Rob Waddell, Olympic Gold Medallist in the Single Sculls. How we perceive a situation influences how we deal with it. So, if we think “Today’s crap and it’s everyone else’s fault” we’re much more likely to a) feel sorry for ourselves and b) take no action. By taking responsibility for your mindset and the decisions you make, you’re putting yourself firmly in the driving seat to be a) positive and b) proactive.
Once you’ve embraced the fact that you’re able to influence events, the next step is to look at all the options you’ve got available to you. We recommend being totally open-minded and creative here – go for quantity not quality. Don’t worry if it’s messy for now! Write a list of all possible options.
Some prompts that might help – try asking yourself things like what would I do if…
- … timing wasn’t an issue?
- … I had limitless money?
- … I had no money?
- What would a coach, colleague, family member tell me to do?
A great example of this comes from one of our Consultants, Natalie Macaluso, who for reasons best known to herself, runs marathons for fun (I know, bizarre). When she was training for one earlier this year, her planned training runs kept being thwarted by terrible weather. Did she let this put her off? Not at all! Instead, she looked at all the options available to her, and did her scheduled training on a treadmill indoors instead. These two steps – acknowledging your power to make things happen and getting creative with the options available to you – are crucial to getting unstuck. While simple steps, they are often overlooked and undervalued in keeping our momentum going.
Lastly, we’re going to look at how to kick-start your motivation in the moment to achieve action.
3. What to do when you’ve lost enthusiasm for your goal
Many of us assume that we need to feel excited in order to take action (in the absence of someone making us take action!). The reality is, it’s actually the other way around: more action creates more excitement. So, what happens when some of the initial excitement of your goal has worn off? Maybe you’re a repeat offender when it comes to jumping from challenge to challenge, goal to goal – always looking for something new and exciting!? Below are some quick practical tips to motivate action.
a). Flick the switch
Flicking the switch is all about making something non-negotiable. You just have to do it. There are times when it is perfectly acceptable to ask yourself if something is a good idea, and then there are times when it’s actually a one-way ticket to procrastination.
b). Ten-Minute Rule
This is an old favourite of ours for getting into action-mode! The rule is that you commit to taking action on something you’re putting off for just ten minutes, and then you have permission to stop if you don’t feel like carrying on.
Often, the biggest effort in completing a task is getting started in the first place. The trick with the Ten-Minute rules is that once you’ve made a start, you’ll normally end up exceeding the ten minutes you initially set.
c). Temptation bundling
Originally proposed by James Clear the idea is that you link an action that you want to do, with an action that you need to do. E.g., only listening to your favourite audio book when you’re at the gym.
To try this out, write a two-column list – one of all the things you enjoy doing (your temptations), the other of the tasks and behaviours you should be doing, but often don’t. Now browse your list and see if you can link one of your instantly gratifying “want” behaviours with something you “should” be doing.
So, what have we learnt?
Motivation is a key ingredient to achieving our goals. It helps us keep moving in the right direction, even when you’re overwhelmed, stuck, or just can’t be bothered.
We can deploy it in different ways to help us overcome specific challenges en route to our goals, whether that’s breaking a difficult goal into manageable chunks, adopting the right mindset when you’re stuck, or just forcing yourself into action.
Action is very important! If you rely on enthusiasm alone to help you reach your goal, the actions associated with your progress will quickly grind to a halt. Instead, you need to build the habit of getting into action as this will generate the excitement and sense of purpose that you need to keep on keeping on.
