Keeping Your Steam Up

When you are in pain it is a constant drain on your motivation.  You want to do things but you don't always have the energy or desire to do what you want to do.  Often times it is easier to start a task than it is to complete one. The initial drive and desire to bring about change is not enough to keep us motivated for the long haul. We struggle to find any reason why our motivation wanes with time. Motivation is an energy of thought centered upon a desire to change what we find undesirable. But thoughts are not tangible so it is difficult to see them as having substantive value. But at the same time we feel the very real effect of lacking the motivation to do what is needed in order to reach our goals. Obviously in order to stay motivated you have to accept that thoughts have real power over what we do. You have to begin to think in terms of a discrete state in which you thoughts are either of a positive or a negative polarity. You need to create a positive pool of intellectual energy that fuels your desire to create change. That is the very definition of motivation.
It is easy for me to speak in general terms about the concept of motivation. But to serve you a plate full of sanctimonious platitudes about the power of positive thinking does not help you to know how to stay motivated. You need a plan of action that you can easily implement and use to stay motivated. It is a simple two step process, evaluate and do, its that simple. The first step is to take inventory of your thoughts. For an entire day keep a tally of all of the positive or negative thoughts that you have, hear or read in a single day. I think that you will be amazed at how many more negative thoughts you are exposed to than positive ones. It has become a cultural norm to complain, bad mouth, bash and berate. If you spend any time on Facebook than you know that negative comments will usually get much more feedback than positive ones do. So naturally people are more inclined to post negative comments than positive ones. But why are these people negative? People are negative for two reasons, they are being rewarded by the acceptance of others and they are not content with their current situation for some reason. Is there a causal relationship between being negative and being discontent. Absolutely! Suppose that you break your leg and you are out of work for three weeks. To one person this might be seen as an unexpected three week paid vacation, to another it is a miserable stroke of bad luck. Both people are dealing with the very same situation however the polarity of their thinking is from opposite sides of the spectrum. This brings me to the second step that you need to implement in order to stay motivated. Hold your self accountable for your thinking. Now that you are able to recognize positive and negative thoughts staying motivated is simply a matter of keeping your thoughts positive. As simple as this is it is also very difficult to do however it becomes easier with time. I said it was simple I never said that it would be easy. Once you begin you start to condition your mind to stay on course even when seemingly bad things happen you find the good in them. In time you become quite proficient at this and motivation becomes a given and despair becomes an elusive concept. These two things are also on polar opposite ends of thought so reversing the state of your thinking reverses the polarity of your perspective of problems that you encounter. Thoughts have power its up to you to direct this power to reach your goal.