There are two kinds of motivation:
One is External Motivation and the other is Internal Motivation
What is External motivation?
Something external to motivate you is required. Your boss complimented you. Look at what he’s done for me! He’s given me a compliment! Now I’m pumped up. This is an example of extrinsic motivation.
What is Internal motivation?
Your source of inspiration is within you. You motivate yourself by bringing the correct thoughts, emotions, and knowledge to the table.
Do you see the difference? To be externally motivated, you must place your energy level in the hands of others, since if your boss is your source of motivation, that means he or she will also be your source of demotivation.
“My manager scolded me, I have no interest in working here anymore,” you’ll say this when next time he scolds and censures you. As a result, being externally motivated is a sign of immaturity.
We were externally motivated as children, but as we grow older, we are expected to evolve emotionally.
To progress emotionally, you must cultivate your own source of motivation. To put it another way, you change your attention to become internally motivated.
Nothing will be able to dampen your spirits if you are internally motivated. We need to figure out how to harness that kind of motivating power.
How do you tap into it?
One obvious answer is:
To develop inner motivation, get a strong reason to do something. If you have a strong reason you will become inspired.
One salesperson travelled to the rural town of Nevada to sell something. He slept in a byway at night. “I’m a salesperson and I sell my products, do you think the environment is good enough to go out and sell things?” he asked the hotel manager the next morning when he awoke and find that the roads were all snow-covered and everything was white.
The hotel manager said:
“Sir, it depends on whether you work as a salesperson for a wage or on commission. If you are employed on a salary, you will be paid whether you go or not, thus unless the weather is extremely bad, you should not go.
If you work on commission, though, you have a compelling reason, a compelling WHY, to go receive your commission; you’ll find the weather is pleasant and you may go “.
As a result, this big reason becomes a source of inspiration.
One long-distance runner from Kenya named Bernard Kiplagath, was asked by reporters: “How does Kenya produce so many amazing long-distance runners”?
Kiplagath’s response was that in Kenya, on the road after every little while we have boards writing “Beware of lions”. That makes us run very fast, we have a big reason to run.
If you can provide yourself with a big reason to do something you will become inspired.
In another story, one king discovered his close servant in the palace was stealing. This hurt the king greatly because he raised him, made him competent, and gave him such an important place in his retinue of servants, and he was stealing. Such a shameless act he thought.
The king was so annoyed that he wanted to sentence his servant to death, but he decided to make a game out of it, thinking he’d have some fun while punishing his servant.
The kind said, “I’m going to sentence you to death but before that, I would like to give you a chance of reprise.
We will have a duel and if you were able to defeat me, I will forgive you. And I defeat you, you have to die.
The king thought it would be a piece of cake because he had grown up fighting with swords and had participated in numerous duels. He had also been trained in the military sciences.
So they dressed up, raised their swords, and the duel began. The king’s minister was watching the servant fight with surprising zeal, somehow he was finding ways to block the king’s sword and jabbing with such astonishing speed and ingenuity.
The servant now had a strong reason to defeat the king else he would die. And yes, the King was defeated.
So what I mean to explain here is every one of us needs to find the “WHY” in our life.
Why do you want to achieve this Goal?
A strong WHY will always keep you internally motivated otherwise we may end up with a mediocre life.
Read Also: Achieving Anything in Life by Getting Rid of Your Ego