How do you stay motivated?
The definition of motivation, according to Success Through a Positive Mental Attitude by Hill and Stone: Motivation is that which induces action or determines choice. It is that which provides motive. A motive is the "inner urge" only within the individual, that incites him to action -- such as an idea, emotion, desire or impulse. It is the hope or other force, which starts in an attempt to produce specific results.
Why is it that some days your motivation is high and it seems easy to get to the gym and eat healthy, and other days you have to fight yourself all day to stay on course?
During a recent conversation with one of my clients, she said, "Everything has been going great and it has been easy to get my workouts done and follow the nutrition principles until today. Today I'm having cravings like crazy. Every smell or thought of food is tempting me. Why is it so hard today?"
My answer: "Suck it up. Don't give in. You are burning fat."
Anytime it gets uncomfortable and your body is telling you to give up, it is because your body doesn't want to change and the physiology of your body starts to override the "inner urge" that you had to be motivated. It is more work for your body to break down and burn fat than it is to have you move less or eat more. Anytime it crosses your mind, to give in to a craving, or skip a workout, you have to take action immediately to stay on course to tap back into that "inner urge" and tell yourself, "Suck it up, I'm burning fat!"
If you did not have a planned spurge -- suck it up, push through the uncomfortableness and remember that you are burning fat!
Shift your mindset from "Poor me, I'm craving X and can't have it" to instead thinking, "I must be burning fat," and get through those uncomfortable moments.
Each time you do this it will get easier to override your body's urge to go off course. You are already going forward, keep moving forward. It is a universal law: It takes more energy to overcome inertia in getting started from a standstill than to continue the momentum of a moving body when it is once in motion.
Stay on course, keep moving forward and when your inner urge tries to detour you off course, redirect it and say to yourself -- suck it up, and burn some fat!
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