Today I am going to go straight to the jugular and give you something really helpful today if you're willing to hear it...
This advice has helped my clients to lose hundreds of pounds and quit relying on being "motivated" to reach their goals.
It's a serious life hack and it's only 3 words long...
Before I tell you what it is I want you to PROMISE me you'll read to the end of this blog post. Because if not, what will likely happen is you are going to read these three words and then think:
I do not have time for this...
Ready?
CHANGE YOUR ENVIRONMENT.
That's it. That's the hack.
Now let me explain...
I chat with people CONSTANTLY about motivation and get the question a lot- "How do you stay so motivated?"
The truth is, I don't. And you shouldn't rely on motivation either.
You need to build your environment in a way that helps you to be successful.
It is easier to change your environment than to change your behavior.
Example: If you love to eat sweets and you have a dozen of your VERY favorite cookie sitting out on your kitchen counter, you're probably going to eat them.
Now, if someone got rid of the cookies (read: changed your environment), it would be MUCH easier, or even impossible to eat them right?
Make the right thing, the easy thing.
No cookies = harder to eat cookies.
When we change our environment to support our goals, we do three things:
Increase awareness
Increase ease of doing the right thing
Lower friction
When we aren't completing habits we desire, it's usually because we forget, it's hard, or doing the opposite behavior is too easy.
If you're not completing a habit because you forget, you need to adjust your environment for awareness.
Example: You forget to take your vitamins daily. Solution: Buy a pill organizer and set it out next to a glass of water. Place this somewhere you go first thing in the morning-near the fridge or coffee maker.
If you're having trouble consistently completing a behavior you want to do more often, you need to adjust your environment to increase ease.
Example: You're having a hard time hitting your step goal daily in the winter. Move your treadmill up from the dark dingy basement to your room or family room right in front of the tv. 😜
If you find yourself falling into a default habit that doesn't align with your goals, you need to increase the friction of doing that behavior.
Example: You find yourself spending too much time in bed on your phone or TV and your sleep quality is suffering. Get a WiFi shutoff timer or download an app on your phone that limits access past a certain time.
In the New Year people always try to increase willpower and self control like it's a switch that just turns on or off...
We're going at it the wrong way.
Think about it...
People that seem to have MORE motivation or self control are just using strategies that require them to need LESS motivation and use LESS self control.
What would happen if you could shape your life to reach your goals and not need to use will power?
You can...if you work to change your environment.
So I'll leave you with this question...what are a couple of changes that you can make to your environment that will make doing the right thing, easier?
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