MAWMonday Motivators 06/12/2016

by: Dr. Michael A. Wright In Blog, Coaching DiaryTagged , , , , ,

movingI am moving to another part of the country, and people are upset! But, the thought struck me in conversation this week about how much we value consistency in one way, yet disrespect consistency in another. We value the comfort of always having a person, a space, a security, yet we act as if “having” is enough. We often take our supports, our helps, our resources for granted. The comfort becomes a blanket of complacency we can crawl under and sleep metaphorically. We can safely refuse the challenge of becoming and expanding. The 3-year come up or the 5-year plan can stretch into 7-year labors and 15-year slumps. Well, I am excited to offer an exemplary life lesson in shaking off that blanket of complacency and donning a cape of action. I’m moving, and you should be too!

This week, Twitter informs such a pursuit and confirms the idea that stagnation is YOUR choice. Wake up! You can do it. Whatever it is. Schedule it. Start. Be consistent. You may have to radically alter your surroundings, but the alternative–to sit idle–is just not acceptable.

1. Choose Creative Power
The place you reside, the comfort and predictability of that space, may be keeping you from living your full potential. It’s not the cost of living, the morals, the people, the heat or cold, or the fact that you don’t know anyone. Those are just excuses. You have become an expert at excuse making. You’re 40, but still blaming your childhood for your hesitance. Please realize, right now, that you have lived more life as an adult than you did as a child. I know those formative years were most important, but I also want you to know that you can begin to relearn, reprogram, and reorder your choices toward new outcomes. You can be something different. Not having the ability to be what you have always wanted to be is not an excuse to be less than what you can be. What if it is YOU that is holding you back?

2. Keep Your Heart Forward
This quote focuses on eyes, but seeing is more than eye sight. Your desires, preoccupations, daydreams, and wishes give insight into your purpose. Look forward into what choices with time get you 20 minutes, one step, one contact closer to what you want. The past is the past. You have heard that before. But, the past is also a great and often costly lesson. Heart forward is acknowledging the lesson while inviting new information to inform your decision making. Don’t just make the decision for Door #2 because Door #1 was a failure. Research the game and realize that windows, floor boards, and sheet rock can be opened to reveal new options. Learn that you could move from this house and set of doors to new homes and new doors. Your options are more vast than you have been led to believe. What if what you have been told is keeping you in a prison of limited choices?

3. Believe Help is Coming
I am going to resist making this motivator into a pitch for my services. But, if not me, get help from someone! We all know that person that chooses to be negative about everything. It is not that they are bad people or haters toward your dreams. They are down on themselves, and that drain sucks the energy out of the room. They seem unable to benefit from sound advice. They seem to refuse referrals and connections. They find excuses when presented with options. We each know a person like this. Is this person you?

4. Celebrate Success. Always.
Make no comparisons with others. Peek to see what they are doing. Follow their feeds. Ask questions and explore their process. But, resist the temptation to apply their pattern and choice architecture to your life. You just don’t have enough information to work with. You are not with them enough of the time to observe those subtle differences that make their choices a success. For example, she may have a 2am, 20 minute routine that she shares with no one. It’s a private re-energizing session involving her patio, Jazz music, and sparkling cider. She doesn’t share it because it’s all hers. She only tells you to “take time for yourself.” Her success is because of what she does in HER uniqueness. You can celebrate her success, follow her feeds, AND find your own activities withing YOUR uniqueness. Celebrating her success is not attempting to do what she does. It is rejoicing in the example that success is possible even in uniqueness. What about you must be uniquely, privately fed?

5. Make Sustainable Choice a Habit
I am adamant about this point. If you value it, you MUST commit to doing it regularly. Weekly, daily, or moment-by-moment. I don’t care how often, as long as you are consistent with it. Twenty-minutes, an hour, 2 minutes. I don’t care what the duration is as long as you do it like clock work. I can predict your success by how consistently you invest in it. It is just true that anything you do over and over again will define you. I suggest that you make sustainable choice a habit. Sustainable choices are all around you as options: better eating, exercise, meditation, financial discipline, daily writing, and so many more. The choices are tied directly to your aspirations. Choose now. Set it to a schedule. Invest in yourself, and Don’t quit. What time is scheduled for practice of your sustainable habit?

Dr. Michael A. Wright received his Doctor of Philosophy in Social Work degree from the University of South Carolina - Columbia. Since 1997, Wright has led MAWMedia Group, LLC, a firm helping individuals and organizations tell stories and translate ideas into capital.