When was the last time you wanted to take action, but sat doing nothing, wishing you had some way to increase your motivation?   You might have wanted to exercise more, change your diet, start a new project, complete long overdue tasks around the house, or spend more time with your friend or family.  Most people have an experience like this on a regular basis.

Why does it usually seem so difficult to motivate ourselves?

bigstock-Beautiful-bored-and-tired-busi-102213Let’s start with defining motivation so we’re all talking about the same thing: “the art or process of giving someone a reason for doing something.”  (Free Merriman Webster dictionary)

So when we say we need more motivation, we are looking for a reason that will get us to act.  And yet, I contend, we usually have plenty of reasons for taking action.  We know what we want to do and why we want to do it.  And yet we still don’t act.

Well, if we don’t need more motivation to take action, what do we need?  Why don’t we do what we want to do so often?

As readers of this blog know all too well, our behavior and feelings are ultimately the result of our beliefs.  If we want to do something and have reasons for doing it, but are still not acting, we have beliefs that are acting as barriers.

So when we fail to act it’s not because we don’t have sufficient motivation; our beliefs are overpowering our motivation (our reasons for acting).

Specific beliefs that squash motivation

Ask yourself how the following beliefs might undercut your motivation and keep you from acting:

  • Mistakes and failure are bad.
  • If I make a mistake or fail I’ll be rejected.
  • I’m not capable or competent.
  • What makes me good enough or important is having people think well of me.
  • What makes me good enough or important is doing things perfectly.
  • Nothing I do is good enough.

Imagine there is something you intend to do, such as starting a project that could bring in some additional income or impress your boss at work.  You clearly are motivated in that you have plenty of good reasons for taking action.

Now imagine you have some of the beliefs listed above.  Can you see how they would sabotage your motivation and keep you from acting?  So when you say to yourself: I wish I had more motivation, can you get that you already have all the motivation you need.  What you really need is to get rid of the beliefs that prevent your motivation from moving you to initiate and sustain action.  Once you eliminate the destructive beliefs, the motivation you already have will be sufficient to get you to take action.

We usually don’t need to motivate others

Although we’ve been talking about motivating ourselves, the same principles are relevant to trying to motivate others.

There clearly are times when we’d like someone else to take action and they see no value in taking the action we’d like.  In such cases, all we need to do is inform them of our reasons, i.e., provide motivation.

More often than not, however, the people we want to take action already know the reasons for acting.  In other words, they are already motivated.  They are stopped from acting for the same reasons you are stopped: negative beliefs.

I’ve written about how “service technicians” often don’t provide excellent customer service even though they’ve been told all the reasons why that is important, because they believe they are technicians whose job in to fix and maintain equipment, not take care of customers. If they believed they were “customer satisfiers” they would automatically take care of customers, without any additional motivation.  (For more details see https://www.mortylefkoe.com/everyone-knows-change-is-difficult-%E2%80%A6-are-you-sure-2/)

Friends and family don’t require motivation either

All of us have had the experience of having a family member or friend offer to do something for us and then not do it.  We immediately try to think how we could motivate them to do it the next time.  But if they offered to do it to begin with, they probably already know what we want and why we want it.  They already are motivated.

What’s keeping them from acting are beliefs, such as, What others want is not as important as what I want or What others want is not really important.

The next time you ask yourself how you can better motivate yourself or someone else, ask yourself is it really a reason for acting that’s missing, or are there beliefs that are overcoming the reasons that are clearly there.

Procrastination isn’t caused by a lack of motivation

People who procrastinate often think that they put things off because of a lack of motivation.  Is it clear now that putting things off, not doing what we intend to do, has nothing to do with a lack of motivation? Get rid of your limiting beliefs and watch yourself move forward without the necessity of any additional motivation.

 

Thanks for reading my blog.  Please post your questions or comments about why motivation either isn’t necessary or doesn’t work.  Your comments will add value for thousands of readers.  I read them all and respond to as many as I can.

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If you haven’t yet eliminated at least one of your limiting self-esteem beliefs using the Lefkoe Belief Process, go to http://www.recreateyourlife.com where you can eliminate several limiting beliefs free.

Copyright © 2013 Morty Lefkoe

15 Comments

  1. Sean October 25, 2013 at 5:11 pm - Reply

    I’ve taken all your courses and I’ve been finding and eliminating beliefs using your methods for a couple of years. Now my life is mostly joy where it used to be mostly anxiety. What helped me a great deal was to realize that I often have multiple variations of a given belief–for instance I had the belief, “If I make a mistake or fail, I’ll be rejected” but also, “If I make a mistake or fail it will be terrible, hideous and awful”, “if I make a mistake or fail my life will come to an end”, “if I make a mistake or fail the world will come to an end”, “if I make a mistake or fail I’ll be obliterated”, “if I make a mistake or fail I’ll be eliminated”, and “if I make a mistake or fail I will be killed”. It took me a while to realize I had these “extra” beliefs. For a long time I just thought the method had shortcomings. Now, if I get rid of a belief but somehow it doesn’t feel totally gone when I say the words, then there’s usually something close that I haven’t found yet. Now I know to look for them, and I seem to use the same set of words over and over, so that makes them easier to find too.

    • Becky November 5, 2013 at 12:17 pm - Reply

      I found the same to be true as well. It seems there are many variations of the main belief. When I get that “A-ha” moment, I know I’ve nailed another one! I’m going to start using variations on conditioning now. I’ve been rather stuck lately.

      Thanks for sharing your experience.

  2. Jake October 24, 2013 at 12:36 pm - Reply

    Hi Morty,
    This stuff is great thanks.
    I’m working through your confidence beliefs at the moment, I can tell I have the beliefs but am really struggling to find the source, I have a good relationship with my parents now and not a great memory of my early years. Would you have any tips on this please?
    Cheers
    Jake

  3. Jose October 23, 2013 at 12:46 pm - Reply

    Hello Morty

    I believe this post does not solve procrastination in a practical way like the fantastic audiobook “The Now Habit” does.

    In my experience reality conditions you in a very powerful way. You go to toastmasters, give a talk and every time you do, people clap, so you feel safe and confident with time. If you were to give a talk and everybody jeer at you end feeling really bad. So you can tell yourself they won’t jeer at you, but then they do, you can train yourself to not care about what they think but you will be becoming psicopath by training.

    You can train yourself to believe water is solid and then see it is not all the time, retrain, but reality is stubborn. What happens if mistakes are bad? e.g if people could lose their lives or all their savings. What happens if I am really not competent in some area and other people can do it better than me?.

    I experience this problem with what I have to do in my job. I really love 90% of what I do, but there is a terrible 5 to 10% that I can’t do, but I need to do to finish a project. I can fool myself with your techniques to believe that I can but then reality says I can’t.

    Like jumping with the mountain bike bicycle, other people can do it very fast, I train and train for years and can’t, training my beliefs to be that I can only to realize again and again that I can’t. The same happen in my job, I do certain things way better and easier than anybody else but other things takes way more effort.

    So this 5% 10% can grow enormously as I procrastinate into doing it, as I need to do it to finish a project. There is no way out of it.

    People are different and people have strengths and weaknesses. Most people have the left hand weaker than right, and people have different personalities and we use division of labor for this reason.

    I need a practical way for this 10% to really take me less effort and resources.

    • Morty Lefkoe October 24, 2013 at 7:01 am - Reply

      Hi Jose,

      I understand all the things you have said and I thank you for taking the time to write.

      We have worked with almost 14,000 clients directly, many of whom procrastinate. ANd we have found that when you eliminate the beliefs and conditionings that cause it, it stops. Totally.

      Here is a list of the beliefs and conditionings that cause procrastination in most people.

      Mistakes and failure are bad.
      I’m not good enough.
      Change is difficult.
      What makes me good enough or important is having people think well of me.
      Nothing I do is good enough.
      I’m not capable.
      I’m not competent.
      If I make a mistake or fail I’ll be rejected.
      I’m a failure.
      I’m stupid.
      I’m not worthy.
      I’m powerless.
      What makes me good enough or important is doing things perfectly.
      Conditioning: Fear associated with criticism and judgment.
      Conditioning: Fear associated with not meeting expectations.
      Conditioning: Fear associated with rejection.

      Re: the issue of mistakes. The belief (All) mistakes and failure are (always) bad is not true. All it does it make you afraid of trying something new. It obviously is true that a mistake in some situations (on an operating table) can be bad. That does not make the generalization true.

      Love,Morty

  4. KZ October 23, 2013 at 10:43 am - Reply

    Hi Morty,

    I always enjoy reading your posts and learn a great deal from you. Thank you! In your list of reasons why people lack motivation (which I agree with all of them), I think you can add another reason to the list and that is “laziness.” There are times I don’t do something just because I’m lazy and I talk myself out of doing what I originally wanted to do. I’m confident I can do the task at hand, but for whatever reason I get lazy and put it off to another day or time. So, how do we fix laziness?

    • Fidelma Pereira October 24, 2013 at 5:48 am - Reply

      Hi KZ,
      I find myself in the same situation and recently I’ve been reading about individual time perspectives. Some people are predominantly past-oriented, others present oriented and others future-oriented. There’s a great book about this subject called “The time paradox” by Phillip Zimbardo. Usually people who don’t procrastinate are future-oriented. I found out I’m more present oriented and there are several beliefs that I realize are the cause of it. What I’m working on now is eliminating those beliefs so I can become more future-oriented. Some of the beliefs I know I have are:

      “I should only do what I like”,
      “It’s more important to do what I like than get work done”,
      “Everything will workout eventually”,
      “I have time to do it later”,
      “It’s easier to do it later”

      So in the end it always comes down to beliefs, even laziness.

    • Morty Lefkoe October 24, 2013 at 6:50 am - Reply

      Hi KZ,

      There is no such thing as “laziness.” That is a vague word that means putting things off you know you should do (or even want to do), which is solely the result of beliefs and conditionings.

      The ones that are the major source of procrastination are:
      Mistakes and failure are bad.
      I’m not good enough.
      Change is difficult.
      What makes me good enough or important is having people think well of me.
      Nothing I do is good enough.
      I’m not capable.
      I’m not competent.
      If I make a mistake or fail I’ll be rejected.
      I’m a failure.
      I’m stupid.
      I’m not worthy.
      I’m powerless.
      What makes me good enough or important is doing things perfectly.
      Conditioning: Fear associated with criticism and judgment.
      Conditioning: Fear associated with not meeting expectations.
      Conditioning: Fear associated with rejection.

      Love, Morty

  5. Randy October 23, 2013 at 8:10 am - Reply

    Hi Morty,

    I eliminated a belief that what makes me important is being thought well of. Now my concern with what people think has lowered but I find myself worrying about how I look to others. I’m concerned with the way I look to others. I don’t understand what the belief might be. Can you shed some light on this ?

    • Morty Lefkoe October 23, 2013 at 8:19 am - Reply

      Hi Randy,

      I’m not sure what belief that might be. I’d have to talk to you and ask you some questions to figure it out. It sounds as if you have specific beliefs about the way you look, but I’m not sure what they are.

      Love,Morty

  6. Jerry Grad October 23, 2013 at 5:21 am - Reply

    Simply put: Beliefs trump motivation. I have seen this in my coaching practice over and over again. A plan is created with a time stamped clear vision. An honest assessment is made of the clients current reality in relation to the vision. A business strategy is developed, which answers the question, “How do I reach my vision”. Finally an action plan is outlined and yet – the client makes some feeble attempts and fails.

    Morty you are correct. Beliefs are the dominate force in our lives and the lives we want to create.

  7. Marley October 23, 2013 at 4:18 am - Reply

    Isn’t there a difference between motivation and inspiration?
    Inspiration comes from inside, and is often much stronger than motivation, which comes from circumstances, situations and people.

    However, I agree that one can be inspired, and still not take action due to their limited beliefs.

  8. Terence October 23, 2013 at 2:38 am - Reply

    I used one of your free belief change and it was excellent, really made a change in me. I understand you have a belief change for “limited beliefs on money and abundance”……I always make a lot of money and then lose it all, it is a repetitive pattern.

    Can you help??

  9. smith October 23, 2013 at 2:14 am - Reply

    so how do we find out what our particular limiting belief is?

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