Ah, the blessed or dreaded motivation. It can be my best friend or my worst enemy. There are days when I feel inadequate. Where I want to throw in the towel – with my eating “healthy”, my job, finances, relationships, traveling, and more.

Then I tell myself, “I just need to get motivated!” Right?

Motivation for career success, romancing my marriage, keeping up communication, friendship, working out, and even eating “healthy”… sometimes I got it, sometimes I don’t. But why?

I remember back in the day when I played volleyball in high school. We were pretty decent, almost undefeated record, conference champs, and yet sometimes you’d think we weren’t motivated if you watched us in certain matches.

One week we’d dominate the net, scrounge and dig every spike, and own the court against the #2 team in our conference. The next week, we’re playing the #12 team in the conference and we look like we could be their equals (just barely squeaking by with the win).

The motivation? There. The ability to rise above the surrounding average? Not so much. We played to the level of whatever team we were against.

Motivational speaker Jim Rohn said…

You are the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with.

Our volleyball team totally fulfilled that statement on the court in that moment. And, what I’m learning is that…

THIS AVERAGE APPLIES TO EVERYTHING…

• Eating habits
• Weight/body
• Career growth
• Thoughts
• Self-esteem
• Workout commitment
• Amount of play & pleasure
• Happiness
• Laughter
• Optimism
• Drive
• Wealth/abundance
• Spiritual life
• Creativity
• Passion

 
I didn’t realize that this has been a key factor to my levels of motivation and attainment of my desires until Rohn’s quote popped back into my life a couple weeks ago and I started paying attention to see if that really was true. For me – absolutely true.

THE NEW WAY TO “GET” MOTIVATED:

Instead of berating yourself that you aren’t motivated enough and need “X” to get motivation (or even worse, simply quit) – evaluate who you are surrounding yourself with and change your average.

CHANGE YOUR AVERAGE:

1. Identify the area(s) in your life that you are living below the bar or living the status quo and you wish you had more motivation to change. Body? Happiness? Fully living life-ness? Gratitude? Career success? Mindset? Income? Freedom?
2. Write down the 5 people you spend the most time with (co-workers, family, friends, etc.)
3. Review those 5 people and think about how they embody (or don’t embody) the areas you wrote down in #1.
4. Write down 3-5 people who fully embody the area you are pursuing and start emphasizing and nurturing THESE relationships. Send a note, a compliment, schedule a soiree together, plan a weekend trip, or simply go for a walk or tea. Change this average and let yourself become fully engaged in your life, living presently, and oozing contagious joy.

 

BOTTOM LINE:

It’s a choice.

For me I choose to be with incredibly happy, successful, and driven women… doing everything possible to step into the best version of themselves and chase their dreams. Sometimes these women are friends, sometimes they are mentors. Either way, I find the support and find my dreams.

Change your average // find & sustain your motivation.

What might changing your average open up for you?