How to Get Motivated

My friend Felicity is a runner. We recently flew to Melbourne, and on our first morning in South Yarra, I woke in our hotel room to find her missing.

I lay there. I made coffee. I flung myself on the couch like one of Michael Jackson’s panthers – nonchalant and bored-looking. Then the door opened.
 
Felicity strode inside covered in sweat, half bent-over – holding her knees like runners do in advertisements for breakfast cereal.
 
She flashed me a huge smile – pride mixed with fatigue.
 
No matter where she is, or how busy her life is, Felicity runs. No matter where I am, or how busy my life is, I don’t.
 
How can I be more committed to fitness? More like her?
 
I did some research.
 
“Motivation is a much more complex process than just ‘wanting’ to do something,” writes Dr Susan Perry in Psychology Today. If you’re not motivated and the going gets tough, you’ll quit, she says. And the going always gets tough!
 
To raise your motivation, Perry’s advice centers around three principles: 

• Challenge yourself so you stay engaged
• Think creatively about how you approach your goal or commitment, so it doesn’t become boring
• Understand the ‘why’ behind your goal. Really understand it

For the first two points, let’s take running as an example: to stay challenged you could set your sights on a nine km run, or a half marathon later in the year.

To think creatively about how you run, so it doesn’t become dull, you could mix up the locations in which you run – on the beach, through the bush, around your city or on a ‘running tour’ of your town’s landmarks.
 
You could run with a friend once a week. Or use your runs to catch up on pod-casts – this may even help you find ‘flow’, and forget you’re exercising at all.

And the big one….
 
Questions to ask yourself
 
“Look deeply to find your intrinsic motivation,” says Perry.
 
To do so, here are the questions that author and dietitian Susie Burrell suggests you ask yourself. Write them down:  

• What are the benefits of keeping my body fit and healthy?
• How would my life be better if I felt better about my body?
• Am I the kind of healthy role model I would like to be for my children (or future children or grandchildren)?
• Can I physically do all the things I would like to do with my body?
• What am I really putting into my body each day?
• If I was fit, healthy and happy what would I be eating and what training would I be doing each day?
• If I knew I could keep my body disease-free by eating well and moving, would I be more inclined to move more and eat less?
• Who are the people in my life who would support me living like this?
• What changes can I make to my lifestyle today that will help move me closer to my goal of living well and feeling healthy?

“Remember,” Burrell writes. “Motivation starts with a single positive thought and is maintained with every small, single step you take in the right direction.”
 
I am nine steps (or questions) away from the couch/coffee pot.
 
I am one step closer to my joggers.
 
References available on request