Do The Small Thing

Removing Obstacles to Motivation

One of the dopiest things I ever heard from a self help guru is that your momentum should be "effortless".

I agree that removing obstacles to momentum is a good thing, but momentum is never effortless.

When I had all my exercise equipment in a storage building behind my house, I stopped using it. I brought the weights and elliptical machine into the studio, and suddenly started using them again. Having it here, easy to access and in my face made it easier to commit to. That didn't make my momentum effortless, it just created an environment for momentum to be easier to achieve. 

This is so important because momentum can be easy to break. My diet is harder to stick to when I'm traveling. My exercise program goes out the window when I'm on deadline. As a freelancer and as someone with chronic illness, momentum is harder because I never know when something's going to throw a spanner in my wheels.

That exercise equipment in my studio?

Eventually it became eye furniture and I stopped using it. Now I go to the gym.

Go figure.

I don't know anyone who doesn't struggle with momentum, getting it and keeping it going. And you probably wouldn't be reading this if you weren't a little bit dissatisfied with it. Dissatisfaction can be very motivating. But it can also tip right over into overwhelm, which for me, and I'm sure for many others, is a major mind obstacle.

The good news is no matter how high you have to climb back up out of whatever hole you're in, one step at a time is how everyone in the world gets somewhere. One step at a time can work for you, too.

Here are the things you need to do to get the momentum to get moving.

1: Establish Clear Goals

"I want to feel better" or "I want to be rich" or "I want to be a rock star" are goals, but they're not clear. They're magical thinking totems. 

"I want to create a realistic fitness routine and be healthier and lose twenty pounds and keep it off," is a clear goal. "I want to complete a 100 page graphic novel by December," is a clear goal.

Clarity is power. Overwhelm and generality drowns clarity. Keep goals clear.

2: Take Decisive Action

Start small and build. Commit to modest, achievable goals for 7 days and build on them. They can be anything, like cleaning out the fridge, or taking out the trash daily, or walking for 15 minutes a day, or writing that novel for a half hour a day. 

Do-able, positive, moving forward goals that can make small differences you can build on create momentum. And that momentum can help you move forward on bigger things.

3: Pay Attention

As someone who spends a lot of time living in my head, paying attention can be a challenge. I go down the rabbit hole. What, I didn't exercise for three weeks? Has it been that long? Oops, I forgot all about that assignment. I never followed up on that email. Is that project I'm working on actually doing well or am I living in a delusional fog?

How are others responding to you and what you do? What you say? Are you actually paying attention to the value of the contributions you make to a project, or are you just so invested in your forward energy, you are walking right past all your problems?

4: Change Your Approach

Don't become married to a process, an idea, a thing. Change is good. Mistakes are good. You can learn from mistakes. Be open to altering your approach at all times. Routine is good...but is it the best routine it can be? Flexibility is key. Be willing to change anything.

Touting the value of routine while also touting being open to change may seem contradictory. But routine is for the things that should make your day go smoothly and to make the things you need to focus on easily accessible. 

You shouldn't be putting life energy into figuring out how to do basics every day. Energy should go into your creative works, your more challenging goals. You don't want to fritter away time trying to find socks, or remember where you put a file. Put the small stuff on the autopilot of routine to allow your mind to process the big stuff.

5: Role Model

There's no need to reinvent the wheel every time you do something new to you. There are plenty of people out there who are probably already doing what you want to do. Study them. 

Don't feel you must copy them: they may be wrong, or their process may simply not work for you. But there is no reason you can't pick and choose from one person's approach while picking and choosing from yet another person's approach. 

Find out who is doing what you think will work for you and study that. Then format it to your needs.

6: Today's Goal

Journaling is good, and motivational journaling is best when you write things down by hand. You remember things better when you do.

Write down two things that would improve your life today if you were to take action on them.

I don't mean you need to immediately achieve world peace or get your own biplane. I mean two things you've been putting off that would make your life better. 

I don't care if it's finally dealing with that pile of laundry, or cleaning out the fridge. Maybe it's reading that good book you bought six months ago and kept in a stack and didn't enjoy because you keep putting it off. Maybe it's making a phone call you've been delaying. 

Write these things down in your journal.

NOW immediately DO WHAT YOU NEED TO DO.

Do not wait. Go do it.

If you can do this small thing...you can do bigger things.

So, go do the small thing.