A statement of your philosophy can build your motivation

This is the third of four blog postings directed at helping you discover your vision. The first two strategies I wrote of were indirect ways of discovering your vision. In this strategy we approach the issue head on. We contemplate the question, “Why am I here?”

This strategy is called my philosophy statement. This strategy consists of two steps. Both of them involve paper and a pen or pencil.

Step One: Sit down in a quiet place where you will be undisturbed for a while. Write on the top of a clean piece of paper the following words, “I was put here on this earth so that I could …” Then take some time to get quiet and still. Think about all the possible reasons you are here. You may come up with many reasons. Think about all the different roles you play. Write down all your thoughts. This is brainstorming, so do not be critical of what you write down. After you have worked awhile and are out of ideas, stop for the day. Come back another day and pick up where you left off.

Step Two: After you have taken at least two sessions working on Step One, it’s time to move to Step Two. In Step Two, just as we did in Step One, we start with a clean sheet of paper. We write down on the paper the following words, “The things that are important to me are …” Think about the principles that guide your life, or have guided it in the past. Think about difficult decisions you faced, and the choices you ended up making. Think about why you decided the way you did. What was there about that choice that made it the right choice for you? Write down all your thoughts. After you have worked awhile and are out of ideas, stop for the day. Again, come back another day and pick up where you left off.

These are not easy exercises. Don’t be surprised if you have difficulty with them. And even if you are in touch with the answers, you may find they make you uncomfortable. Getting in touch with who you are can be disturbing. But finding that person is worth the work it takes, and worth the discomfort that may come. Finding your vision is the most important work you do in motivating yourself, because it sets the tone for all the other work you do.

Why not take some time now, it doesn’t have to be a lot of time, to get in touch with this powerful motivator.

A personal inventory can lead you to your vision

Today’s posting will tell about a second strategy you can use to help you find your vision. It is called my inventory. In this strategy we look at our abilities, in order to get a handle on our potential. We do this because the vision is the manifestation of our potential, the reason we were put on this planet. The vision is the most important of the three factors that determine your motivation.

Emmet Fox once wrote that you will never be content unless you find your true place, your heart’s desire, what you are uniquely qualified to do. This is what this strategy is designed to do.

My inventory involves brain storming, answering a question (in this case three questions) by intensely thinking about them. When we brainstorm we are tapping into our imagination and our creativity. The most important rule about brainstorming is we do not judge our answers, no matter how shocking, crazy or futile they may appear. We merely record them, for we are looking at possibilities. We write them down, and then, at a later time, evaluate and improve them.

The first question we brainstorm is “What do I do well?” In answering this question, we look to our strengths, our special talents and our blessings. These are the special gifts we have received.

The second question we answer in my inventory is “What do I love to do?”

To find the answer to this question we look at what we love to spend our time doing, our passions. We also look at what we consider to be the highlights of our lives.

Looking at just these two questions, “What do I love to do?” and “What do I do well?” will frequently reveal our vision. But just in case it doesn’t, we have a third question to answer that may lead us directly to our vision. This third question asks us to identify our heroes. Our heroes, the people we identify as having it all together, are frequently evidence of what’s important to us; they are doing what we would like to do.

My hero is Wayne Dyer. He is doing what I want to do, and is doing it well. He writes books that help people, and that are fun to read. I also love the low key way he has of presenting.

After we identify our hero, the next step is to make an inventory of our hero’s positive attributes. We then look to see which of these positive attributes we can see in ourselves. These positive attributes are keys to our vision, the reason we are on this planet. We also need to identify those positive attributes that may actually be hidden in ourselves. These hidden attributes are referred to as our potential.

Make sure to write down your answers to each of the questions you address as you prepare your inventory. Your inventory is not something you should finish in one sitting. By writing it down, when you come back to do further work, you can easily continue your journey.

Your waking dreams lead you to your vision.

As I explained in my most recent posting, the vision is the most important of the three factors of self motivation. I also explained that your vision is the reason you are here, God’s purpose for your existence, your calling. Knowing your vision, your purpose, has an incredibly powerful impact on your motivation. Not knowing it can have a very detrimental one.

Many of us have heard the calling and are well aware of our vision. But in case you don’t know what it is, here is the first of four strategies to help you identify your vision.

Strategy 1. My waking dreams

A waking dream is a dream we have when we are awake. We all have these dreams. One of my waking dreams is sailing around the world on an ocean going trawler, a Nordhavn to be specific. Another is speaking Spanish. For most of us one of our dreams will be more special than the others. It will mean more to us. It will be a dream we are willing to work on and commit to. This special dream is likely to be related to our vision. To help us find this special dream, we need to examine our waking dreams.

As a first step, I suggest you take some time to write down your waking dreams. Don’t be critical as you do this first step. Don’t examine the feasibility of your dreams. Just write them down. You will examine them in the next step.

Once you have written down your waking dreams, the next step is to critically examine each one to see if it has the makings of your special dream, if you are willing to put in the time and energy necessary to make this dream come true.

As an example, one of my waking dreams, as I related above, is me speaking Spanish. However, although I do want to speak Spanish, I am not willing to commit the time necessary to learn Spanish. If I were I would have signed up for Spanish classes at the community college, or at least used the set of Rosetta Stone dvd’s I borrowed from the library and would now be speaking Spanish. So I know it is not the waking dream that relates to my vision. It is not a special waking dream.

So how do you know which of your waking dreams are possibly special waking dreams? By taking the next step of asking the following questions for each of your waking dreams:

• Would I pursue this dream if my success at it were guaranteed, if I could not fail?
• Would I pursue this dream if money were no object, if I didn’t have to worry about money?
• Would I pursue this dream if I didn’t have to worry about status or about disappointing anyone?

The answers to these questions may not tell you for certain which of your waking dreams is your vision, but you will certainly be closer to discovering it, and you will be finding out who you are.

Are you already aware of your special dream? If so, why not share it with the other readers, and maybe tell how you came to be aware of it?

Motivation by Challenge

I was talking to a friend a couple of weeks ago about my plans for when my book comes out. I shared with her that in two and a half years I would be a full time speaker and workshop leader and would leave my current job. She said to me, “Bob, there is no way you are going to leave the security of your present job to become a speaker. No way.” Now normally if you were to tell me this story, my knee jerk reaction would be this person is a naysayer, and should be immediately removed from your social environment.

Naysayers can rob you of your motivation by making you question your successability, your confidence in your competence. What was funny about this exchange, however, was that her comment did not have that impact on me. To the contrary I considered it a challenge. In fact I immediately made a small poster, writing on it only, “The Challenge” and taped it over my desk, my physical environment. Every day when I sit down to work, it motivates me.

As I sat down at my key board to write this blog entry, I came up with several other examples of how naysayers with their negative comments had motivated me to push even harder. I recall how when I mentioned to a fellow lawyer that I was working on my Masters in Education, his comment was to the effect, “That’s your goal today. What are you going to come up with tomorrow?” Not that there was much doubt in my mind that I was going to continue working on my degree (even when they cut the funding for tuition payments) but if there had been, that challenge would have played a role in keeping me marching onward.

In one Glazer Kennedy marketing group meeting I was in the hot seat. I explained what I was doing and what my goals were, public speaking and workshop leading, and some issues I was facing. Next was feedback from the group. One guy suggested I try out public speaking first, before I dove into it, because I wasn’t at all dynamic. He said he had been answering emails as I was talking, that’s how unengaging I was. Didn’t this clown know I had been in Toastmasters for over ten years, in fact was a Distinguished Toastmaster and yes, had even been paid to teach public speaking? If he did, he wasn’t particularly impressed. I was externally gracious, especially since I knew I hadn’t been particularly dynamic in my presentation. But inside I was angry, and swore that this guy would eat his words. In retrospect I realize he taught me an important lesson: I am always selling myself and my products. There is never a good time to get sloppy.

So how does motivation by challenge fit into the M=f(V,S,E) model?

The “E”, environment, is the obvious one. This person is in your social environment, and will impact your motivation.

But the challenge also relates to the vision, because most often the challenge is directed at your vision. “You will never become a full time speaker; you’re not good enough,” or “you’re not motivated enough,” or “you’re not engaging.” But the stronger you are connected to your vision, the more worthwhile it is to you, the more likely you will hear such negative words as a motivating challenge rather than demotivating truth.

The challenge also relates to your successability, because if you accept the negative words, it will detrimentally impact your confidence in your competence.

As intentional man, we control how we respond to these negative words. Sure, we can let them gnaw at us and make us unmotivated. But we are so much better off when we respond to them as a challenge, and use them to fuel us to work even harder to achieve our dreams.

Passion and the vision

I was reading about the new Patti Smith autobiography, Just Kids, and was amazed at all the things this woman did in her life, not just the quantity of things, but even more so the variety of things. For those of you who weren’t around when Patti Smith was popular in the media, she is most famous, certainly to me anyway, as a musician. Her album Horses is on many of the “100 top rock albums” lists. But, in addition, she was a painter, a performance artist, an actress, and a writer. She even co-wrote a play with playwright Sam Shepard. She says, “I was born rebellious.”

When I read about someone like this, I wonder about my quiet little life. Do you ever have similar feelings, sort of amazement at what some people accomplish in their lives, and more than a twinge of jealousy?

It always makes me wonder why I am not like that. My first wife was certainly like that. At 21, after earning her bachelors degree, she started a drug rehab program with a group of nuns. After she got her MPH (Masters of Public Health), she started a home day care program for out-of-work women (welfare moms). I was always amazed, watching her, experiencing her passion and creativity, and, as usual, feeling more than a little jealous.

I was recently reading an article (http://tinyurl.com/ygyz3vl) about persons who do extreme sports, BASE jumping (parachuting off bridges and skyscrapers), hang gliding, rock climbing. Such people, according to the study, frequently have deficiencies of dopamine. This deficiency means they need more excitement than a “normal” person just to feel alive. The author labels such people Type T personalities.

Maybe those people envy my type of life, (there are downsides to being Type T), but I doubt it. I think they are too busy living their own lives. And, anyway, books aren’t written about us quiet people, and we aren’t seen on ESPN 2, so how would they even know about us?

But just because you don’t have a top rock album, and don’t BASE jump off of bridges, doesn’t mean you don’t have urgings, urgings to create something big, to do something special, to give your life more meaning.

You don’t need to have been born rebellious, like Patti Smith, and you don’t need to have an inadequate amount of endorphins like extreme athletes, to have a more meaningful, fuller life.

You just need to discover your purpose. Most of us (yes, I believe most of us – Patti Smith’s autobiography is so popular because her life is unusual, because she is unique) just need to dig a little bit deeper to discover our purpose. We have to work at it. But we can find it; it is there. There is no need for us mere mortals to settle for “just getting by.”

It is this “purpose” that I am referring to when I write and speak about the vision.

Once we discover our purpose, why we are here, the reason for our existence, our life gains so much more meaning. There is passion in our lives. We become filled with energy. But until we know what that purpose is, there is no way for us to fulfill it.

Vision is the first factor of self motivation, because it is the most important factor of the three. In my next posting, I will give some strategies on how you can discover your vision, your purpose for being here, so that you too can find passion in your life.

I woke up Monday morning in a funk

I woke up Monday morning in a funk. I just wasn't in the mood to do all the stuff I knew I needed to do. Maybe it was because I’d had a great weekend, having fun. I’d spent Saturday taking photos at the Mag Lab Open House (Tallahassee houses the world’s most powerful magnet and once a year the public is invited in and the kids are entertained and taught at the same time.) Saturday night I edited the photos and discovered I’d gotten some great shots. (I need to remember to put some on my Flickr account - http://www.flickr.com/photos/bobprentiss, if you’re interested). Sunday evening I’d had a nice dinner with my brother who brought along his daughter and her husband who are visiting him from Buffalo.

So why was the Master of Self Motivation simply not motivated? Darned if I know. I guess I was due for it. But you know what? I doesn’t matter where it comes from, that’s history. What matters is what you do with it. That’s now.

When I am in a funk, and just happen at the same time to be in automatic man mode, my tendency is to sort of enjoy the funk. Do you ever get in that place, the “woe is me” place? I’m not sure why it can be so attractive. Perhaps because it allows us to give up responsibility.

After studying and writing about self motivation for so long, you’d think I would have eliminated my automatic man. Unfortunately, it’s not true. I go automatic just as much as anyone else. The difference is that now I usually catch myself more quickly than I used to. And when I catch myself going automatic, I take steps to increase my motivation and quickly pull myself out of that space.

My favorite strategy for getting out of a place of low motivation is to revisit my vision. This strategy comes from the Resonance Performance Model I shared with you in an earlier blog posting on motivation in sports. You can use this strategy when you are feeling unmotivated, feeling unconnected to your vision, or when you have run head on into a road block and need to get off the ground and get moving again.

I revisit my vision by reading it aloud, which is why I have it posted above my desk, and by envisioning what my life will be like after I have manifested as my vision. I try to get in touch with how it will feel when I have reached that place. I make that image as real as I can.

In an essay recently printed in Michael Masterson’s Early to Rise newsletter, best selling author Harvey Mackay quotes Woodrow Wilson, "You are not here merely to make a living. You are here in order to enable the world to live more amply, with greater vision, with a finer spirit of hope and achievement. You are here to enrich the world, and you impoverish yourself if you forgot the errand."

When I read that, and thought about my vision, I couldn’t help but get charged up, and think about the important reason I am here, to enrich the world by teaching people how to motivate themselves so they can achieve all their dreams.

So don't wait to get in touch with your vision. It's a great motivator.

The Vision

The Vision

In my second blog I presented the model for self motivation:

SELF MOTIVATION = ƒ (VISION, SUCCESSABILITY, ENVIRONMENT).

It is read "self motivation is a factor of vision, successability and environment." This equation means that any positive impact on any of the factors on the right will result in a positive impact on the left. It’s like a law of nature, human nature.


I explained in recent postings what the third factor, environment, means. Now I want to explain what the first factor, vision" means. When you understand what each of the factors means, you will be able to create your own ways of increasing each factor and thereby increase and maintain your self motivation.

When I think of the factor vision, the word I think about most is potential. When I was a boy I was not particularly driven. I did well in school, but not exceptionally well. Some parents would have been satisfied with good, but not my mother. She wasn’t happy with good, because she knew that I had a lot more inside of me than just good. She know I was coasting. She would always scold me, “You’re not working up to your potential.” I knew she was right, but I didn’t know what to do about it. I wasn’t motivated to work up to my potential. And so I didn’t.

I know my mom had my best interests at heart, and I believe now (years after she passed away it occurred to me) that she didn’t want me to make the decisions she had made. I now believe she felt she hadn’t worked up to her potential, felt bad about it, and she wanted to spare me from similar feelings. Telling me I wasn’t working up to my potential was the only way she knew to stop me from suffering the same fate. But it didn’t work. Telling me I wasn’t working up to my potential didn’t help. I already knew I wasn’t working up to my potential. So what was the problem? Why wasn’t I motivated?

The problem was I had nothing to be motivated about. What I didn’t know then, and neither did my mom, was that in order to be motivated I needed a worthwhile pursuit. I needed something to feel passionate about. And if I didn’t feel passionate about something, I needed to spend some time, maybe lots of time, finding something I was passionate about, something that was worthwhile to me. I needed to find my vision.

Vision is an image of yourself that is special, ever so much more special than you already are. Vision is who you were put on this planet to be. A visual image that resonates with me when I think about vision is an acorn. The vision of an acorn is an oak tree. All that potential is in that little seed. But it also symbolizes something else with vision. And that is that vision is not what someone else is telling you to be, not what society says you should be, not what is practical for you to be. Vision is what you are, deep down inside, but which you haven’t yet brought fully into your life.

Vision is who you were meant to be.

In my next posting I will talk more about vision, and, if you aren’t yet aware of your vision, I will give you some strategies to help you find out who that marvelous person is.