This series comes to a close with the most important element of motivation, goals. Perhaps on an interview or a first date you may have heard the question, “What gets you out of bed in the morning?” No matter what your response, there’s a strong chance that your answer focused on one of your short or long-term goals. It’s been said that the most successful people in the world have their goals written down and visible in order to see them every day. Staying focused on short and long-term goals is an easy motivator, or at least it should be. Staying focused on goals can work against you when they’re toxic (e.g. revenge). “Success will be the best revenge.” and “I’m doing this to prove my haters wrong.” are just two examples of toxic goal setting.
The common mistake that I see in the fitness world is people coming in to the gym and working out without clearly defined goals. This is made even worse when they hire me and they just “want to get in shape.” Without a clearly defined goal your moves in the gym and in the world are often without purpose or direction. Therefore, it’s challenging to keep moving forward without a specific destination. “Just drive Southeast from Frisco and you’ll reach Barstow some day!” Where are you going? How will you get there? When you know what you want, it’s an easily renewable energy source. When I get tired and I want to just say, “fuck it” and sleep in, I have to ask myself a simple question. “Why am I doing this?” “What gets me out of bed in the morning?” That’s when I lean on those goals of mine to giddyup and get after the day.
I once had my goals written on poster-sized paper in my apartment for all to see. People often spoke about how it inspired them. The important thing was that those goals inspired me. I’ve taken them down because I needed to focus on school, but in my recent search for intangible energy, you know fire of the spirit, I’m going to get back to that form of clear goal setting. If you try the same, tapping into your goals as a source of energy, you just might surprise yourself.