Do you put in a lot of work and effort in your career/business, relationships and life, yet have little to show for it? Are you getting discouraged with the lack of results your efforts are producing?
The Hard Way or the Easy Way?
Sometimes we do things the hard way because it is all that we know. We are conditioned from early in life by those around us and often we copy our parents, teachers, peers, role models and others in our environment. Sometimes the behaviours and patterns we copy are ineffective and sabotaging. In turn, these sabotage our success regardless of how much effort we put into our career/business, relationships and life. We and other people don’t know what we don’t know.
For example, if we grew up in an environment where the predominant beliefs and values were around scarcity, we can take on board those beliefs and values on a subconscious level. In turn, the scarcity thinking sabotages our relationship with money and our success. Yet, working on values and beliefs alone is often insufficient to create a long term change as there are over 60 individual drivers of behaviour.
Having limited ways of thinking keeps us small regardless of how much effort we put in…. one way or another they will find a way to sabotage our success for as long as they remain. That is the hard way to do career/business, relationships and life.
The easier way is to identify and let go of the subconscious patterns of sabotage at the deepest level, so that we free up our thinking and behaviour to be, do and have what we truly desire. When all the limitations disappear, there is an easier flow to achieving confidence, happiness and success.
Willpower or Natural Motivation?
Some people use willpower to motivate themselves to put in the effort. Willpower is great if you can sustain it for more than the short term. Most people can sustain willpower for only several days or weeks. Then the willpower disappears and the old habits kick in. This is because all habits reside at the subconscious level and hence, need to be addressed on a subconscious level in order for the change to last.
We all know of someone who has been on a diet or wanted to change some other habit with willpower. How long did they last on the diet, their new exercise routine, their new time management habits, etc. purely with willpower? Probably only days or weeks.
The easier alternative is to develop a natural internal motivation. No willpower is required for this. Instead, you develop a consistent internal motivation that you sustain naturally, and that keeps you motivated long term. It is natural and you find yourself automatically doing things because it is who you are.
Effort versus Focused Action
Another thing that some people miss is that effort is very different to focused action. Effort is often doing lots of things, anything and everything. It can be action for the sake of action or scattered action. Often it can be unproductive, exhausting and ineffective. This is where a lot of people burn out, lose motivation and give up. It is all too hard and too much work.
Focused action is knowing the right action to take to achieve your desired outcomes. Knowing which strategies work for your outcomes, which ones to do more of, which ones to do less of, which ones to stop, which ones to improve, which ones to keep doing. Focused action is focused on your outcomes, rather than just any action.
Focused action is mastering the “how” of communication, personal and professional relationships and success, rather than the “what”. Focused action is far more rewarding because it produces faster results, which in turn builds motivation, confidence and more focused action.
Dr. Vesna Grubacevic is an author (of the Amazon best-selling book, Stop Sabotaging Your Confidence), speaker, media commentator, and the founder and Performance Transformation Expert® with multi award-winning company, Qt. She holds a PhD, a BEc and is passionate about helping professionals and individuals to improve their confidence, emotional and mental wellbeing and success. For more free resources please visit www.qttransformation.com
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