Have you lost motivation in business? Then this is the post for you. My oh my, this is a juicy episode. Why? Because if you’ve been in business for a while, when you’ve lost motivation in business it’s HARD to get it back. You’ll also know that motivation is like bathing, it doesn’t last which is why we have to do it every day. The late and great Jim Rohn said that quote so i can’t claim it as my own. It’s a great one right?
But what happens if you’ve lost motivation in business and just can’t find that motivation again or your way back to that energy you once had?
Self Determination theory, people are motivated to grow and change by three innate and universal psychological needs.
I get it. I really get it. Particularly with the shit show that was the last few years. We have collective PTSD from everything and it can be so so hard to pick yourself back up again when you’ve lost motivation in business and start again when the momentum is gone.
You see, we are spiritual beings having a human experience, meaning, no matter how enlightened or whether we can get our foot over our head in yoga means nothing when global pandemics happen, grief hits or business revenue drops off a cliff.
Side note – I am still trying to get my foot over my head in yoga. Tried it last night. I wish I had filmed it, it would have been some comedy content.
The definition of motivation is the human need or desire to change something about themselves or their environment.
The definition of motivation is the human need or desire to change something about themselves or their environment.
According to the Self Determination theory, people are motivated to grow and change by three innate and universal psychological needs.
- Autonomy – people need to feel in control of their own behaviours and goals. To take direction action that will result in real change.
- Competence – people need to gain mastery of tasks and learn different skills .when you feel you have the skills needed for success they are more likely to take action to achieve your goals.
- Connection – need to experience a sense of belonging and attachment to others.
So if we can link our vision of what we want to each of these three categories, it can help to motivate us again.
Now the only tricky situation here is that sometimes our personal lives can stop the motivation completely. If we were a cup, it’s overflowing and not in a good way. We are so exhausted that we don’t have space for motivation and following someone’s theory.
So let’s look at a real life example to bring colour to the situation and see if it will help.
Let’s take a fictitious name, Alysia here.
Maybe you’ll be able to identity with Alysia here to let’s see.
What do you want? I want to feel more motivated in my business.
Why do you want it? I want to feel joy for me, I want to help others and it’s part of my legacy work.
What’s stopping me from getting there? I’m tired. I have a huge amount going on personally and I can’t concentrate. I feel like I’ve lost my spark and I don’t quite know how to get it back. I feel a film of fog over my head and can’t seem to clear it.
So what do we do first?
Let’s look at tiredness. If you’re tired, the greatest thing you can do is show yourself some compassion and rest. Business is a marathon not a sprint. Let’s not buy into the time is running out mantra right now. In order for us to speed up, we must also slow down. Rest is revolutionary and one of the greatest acts of self care we can give ourselves. So let’s give yourself permission to rest. And rest indulgently. More on that in another episode.
Let’s now look at what’s going on personally. If there is a huge amount; maybe grief, your child is worrying you over illness or behaviour or school or you’re having relationship troubles, it could be anything but it’s distracting you, let’s allow ourselves to actually feel those emotions so we can move through them.
This is where we can take autonomy over the lack of motivation, release what we need to emotionally so then our completely full up cup can have a little space to let some joy and maybe motivation in.
To add to this, we can then develop a mantra, which I have personally used that I created with my therapist a while back which helps to realign. It goes ‘I can feel all the feels AND be a badass in business’. Feel free to create your own.
Once we are feeling like we have control a little more through these self care practices, that’s when we can look at competence. Our belief that we can figure things out is paramount here. And given the personal situation we could apply a new theory here call the marginal gains approach. This is where we can tiny changes, 1% changes each day to get towards our goal and then once we have done that 1% change we go back to resting, to emptying a bit more out of our cup so we can then have a bit more capacity the next day. So what one task could we do today that would make the most impact to move things forward and get us closer to our goal?
Then we can move onto connection. Is this a case of us needing a coach to help us move through this more or is it just a great meal out with a friend? The connection here is one to help us feel understood and held by someone before we then move on to being held accountable once the personal situation is better. (If you’d like to work 1:1 with a coach then you can check out my services here > )
And this process can be repeated again and again until you start to gain more motivation back into your day. And it will come my friend. Because you have survived 100% of your hardest days. Every thought and moment you thought you couldn’t get through you did. You got yourself through it. This time too, shall pass. So honour yourself for how far you’ve come, rest now for it is a revolutionary act of self care and then once you’re ready, the motivation will come again.
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