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You don’t need to be motivated to do your best work.
Just do your best work.
You don’t need to be motivated to study.
Just study.
You don’t need to be motivated to go to the gym.
Wayne Rooney did it again.
For the third time in his professional career, Rooney managed to kick a goal from beyond the half-way line, with an audacious strike.
How does he do it?
Firstly, he needs to see the opportunity.
A football team needs a goalkeeper, strikers, midfielders and defenders.
Not everyone the same and winning doesn’t happen due to one participant.
Everyone needs to play their part.
An orchestra requires strings, woodwinds, brass and percussion.
Not everyone the same and one person can’t play an entire symphony.
Everyone needs to play their part.
Looking at your lawns won’t get them mowed.
Looking at your bills won’t get them paid.
Looking at the job ads won’t get you a job.
Looking at the spreadsheet won’t fill in the numbers.
Looking at what the scales say won’t help you to lose weight. Read the rest of this entry »
There’s an obsession sometimes with becoming the greatest of all time.
Or perhaps the best in the world.
Or the record holder.
But because those comparisons are so extravagant, we don’t even try.
Pick a team.
The game doesn’t matter as much when you’ve no-one to cheer.
Pick a colour.
That wall won’t paint itself.
Pick a book.
According to author, James Clear:
“Most people need consistency more than they need intensity.”
Intensity looks impressive.
In the short-term it can be very productive.
And the energy generated by intensity can be helpful at times.
Even on the worst of days, there’s a reason to praise the people you work with.
Even when they are annoying you, there’s a reason to tell your kids that you love them.
Even when you’re feeling as though life isn’t fair, there’s a reason to be grateful.
It may not be obvious.
In the midst of the stress and chaos of making the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Sir Peter Jackson often said to the people around him,
“One job at a time, every job a success.”
He knew that it was easy to get distracted and intimidated by the sheer volume of work that had to be done, so he encouraged his team to focus on the task in front of them and to deliver it with excellence.
And then move on to the next task.
For most of human history, the vast majority of people couldn’t read.
Literacy was a rare luxury confined to the clerics or the ruling classes, with the rest of society not being able to discern what had been recorded.
Thankfully, times have changed and most of our communities are able to functionally read. It makes the ability to communicate and learn much easier and has broken down a lot of barriers over the generations.
But with this almost universal ability comes an unfortunate complacency.
We forget that reading is a privilege and squander it.
