Dawn Damon 0:00

Well, it's that time again, I'm here dawn Damon your Braveheart mentor, your girl. And I'm ready to talk to you today about something that's really going to inspire you. You ready? Yeah. I want to talk to you about motivation. Yeah, that's it. motivation. Wouldn't that be wonderful if we could take a motivating pill every morning? Wake up, inspired, ready to go full of enthusiasm? Well, you almost can, I'm going to tell you how. But we know that the best key to success is motivation. We know that in order to take the most out of life and live large and extravagant an audacious is that we have to keep on being excited about our lives. Motivation makes things happen. that old saying where there's a will there's a way but when there is no will, there is no way. So you know, people say how do you stay motivated? Well, I want to share some of those thoughts with you today. And let's just dive into this. Okay, first of all, I want to let you know that motivation comes with vision, you know, I was gonna get the word vision in there this time, I always do, I always want to talk about vision, because I'm such a believer, well, God is a believer, he's the one that told us without a vision, people perish. It all starts with vision, if you don't have a vision, you don't have a fulfilling, compelling reason for waking up in the morning. Here's how the verse goes in another version, Where there is no vision, people throw off self control. So without vision, you me, we're just going to go through life like a tumbleweed, we're going to bounce from thing to thing from idea to idea, we're going to be up one day and down the next from focus to focus. But we really don't make any dent in life. Mark Twain is the one who said this, the two most important days in your life are the day you're born, and the day you find out why you are born. So why are you here? What is your purpose? What's your signature anointing, or the unique mark that you want to leave on the world. And I'm not going to get into a discussion today about how unique you are in your identity. But I will tell you, out of the billions of people, you think about it, billions and billions of people that have been on this earth that are on this earth now, not one person has the same DNA, or the same fingerprint. Wow, come on. Now, that's pretty incredible. You really, truly are unique, but you have to see your vision, you have to see it to achieve it. And I'm not talking about with natural eyes, of course, you have to see your vision with the eyes of your heart. In fact, Jonathan Swift says this vision is the art of seeing what is invisible to others. And I like that, because when you see it, when what's invisible, if you can see it with the eyes of your heart, then you will see it with the eyes of the natural, you will see it you will manifest it. But what if I told you if I I saw this one time, and I just thought it was such a great example, what if I handed you a jigsaw puzzle with 1000 different pieces in it, and I didn't give it to you in a box, I handed it to you in a plastic bag. And I said, Here you go. This is your life, put this puzzle together.

But you had no picture on the cover of the box. You didn't know what it was. And you might work on it for a little bit. But I believe after a while, maybe very quickly, you would be frustrated and irritated, maybe even bored. Or maybe apathetic, like why bother or angry like this is impossible. But when you get the picture, then you're motivated, right? Without a picture. You will not do the puzzle you'll give up. And that's what the scripture is telling us. That's what life is without a vision, you will perish you'll throw off self control, you have no reason. So motivation comes as a result of having such a compelling vision that it wakes you up in the morning. Sometimes it keeps you up at night, you hit the floor running because you're excited about your life. Without a vision. You won't do that. But you know, you could have a great vision. But you need the second part and I'm going to share that with you today. And this word isn't nearly as fun but it's this word that starts with a D it's called discipline. Yes, if you had to choose motivation or discipline it's so awesome to have motivation but motivation does Don't show up. And so discipline will always take us further than desire discipline always Outlast motivation. And so when motivation isn't there, it's the discipline that undergirds us. The late Myles Munroe said this, find a vision that's so compelling. it imposes self discipline on you. In other words, you are so wowed and awed by what your life is supposed to be about, that it makes you want to reach goals, it causes you to develop habits that keep you on track, you use discipline to stay with your program, because moments of inspiration, they do common, it's awesome when they do, but they rarely come. Usually what happens is, activity happens first. So motivation follows activity, motivation follows your discipline, put those tennis shoes on and get outside, you know, one of the most motivated moments of my life is directly related to after I finish a workout, before I get ready to go to the gym and work out, I might be dragging, I don't really want to put on my tennis shoes. And I know that if I think it, if I spent any time in my head, wondering whether I'm going to go or not, I won't go. So I have to just move without thinking, I just have to get up, get my tennis shoes on, put my sweat pants on why I usually do it the other way around. Get out that door. Because if I stopped to think about it, I'm my brain will automatically give me so many reasons why I don't want to do it. But when I'm done, I feel so good. So empowered. I'm so motivated, I can't wait to get going with the rest of my day, I get my journal out. And I have to literally do a brain dump because I have so many ideas. There's so much creativity flowing through me. Now I have to calm myself down and just get some reading done and do some meditation and do some praying at because I just I I'm just ready to go go go, go go. So you'll never get anything done. If you rely simply on motivation. You're still obligated to do what you need to do and what you're meant to do, no matter how inspired you're feeling. So that's just how life goes. So we do we get uninspired, it happens we get tired, often in the pursuit of our goals. And that and often it will feel unexciting. So guess what, when we're battling that discouragement, maybe we're not seeing results fast enough, and we don't think it's working. That's why we need discipline, discipline, when Mojo doesn't show up. Our disciplined habits are designed to keep us on track. Now I have some habits that I do every day and I will not miss and I will not skip. And if by some chance I do, I feel the rest of my day is just off the main mental capacity, my outlook on life, it's just off, I find myself just kind of bouncing around, I often I don't eat right on those days, I don't drink enough water on those days, I find myself wanting to take a nap or a needy. I just I feel negative. And it's all because you know I've not followed through. So I hope you have good habits. I believe I have a podcast on how to develop good habits and how to get rid of negative habits. Make sure you look that up. But lean into the powerful habits that you put in place that keep you moving towards success. This is what keeps motivation, even when you don't feel like it. But see, you will reap the benefits you will reap a harvest if you don't give up. And I like Jim Rohn says this, everyone must choose one of two panes, you're going to choose one of these two things, the pain of discipline, or the pain of regret, which would you rather have, I don't want the pain of regret. I've had the pain of regret in my life. And it indeed is a pain. It is painful. And the problem with regret is that it's about something that you didn't do and you've missed that moment. You've missed that time. And time is one resource we can never get back. And when it's gone, it's gone. And so don't live your life with regret. Live with discipline. Live with a vision. Don't settle for a life of existence. Don't do it rather than a life of substance live

your dreams. You know most of us don't have a knowledge problem. Did you know that? We know what to do we know what the right thing is. Most of us know where we want to go. Some of us Don't we want, we need to get clarity on that vision that most of us know what we should be doing what we should be eating, we have an application problem, an application, we have a problem of applying what we know. We know stuff, just don't do it. And so we need consistent self discipline. So let me just give you a few things in the time that we have left together, that will help your self discipline some people, I'll tell you, you know, I know I have a lot of friends and I have children. And I can look at my one daughter, I mean, she is disciplined with a capital D, you know, she is going to do what she says she's going to do. And then you know, I have other children that they're they're more flexible, you know, it's more of a guideline, it's, I don't have to do it, I can do it. If I feel like it's Sundays I can do. And sometimes my husband and I are like that, like, if we go on an eating program, I'm disciplined. And he floats around a little bit. And then there's times where with exercise, he's so disciplined. And then for me, I can float around a little bit. So that's one of the first things that I want to share with you. If you need to build self discipline. How about getting some accountability, partner up with someone to help you. The one key that we often miss is our willingness to become vulnerable and accountable to someone and say, I give you permission to hold me accountable in this area. Will you call me and ask me how I'm doing? Will you prod me forward? If you see me doing something that I said I didn't want to do? Will you ask me the hard question, which the question could be, I asked, I tell my husband, hey, I want you to hold me accountable in this area. But I really don't want you to police me or tick me off. Right? So he asked me this. How would you like me to support you right now? And and I'll know what that means. Do you want me to talk you into sticking to your goal? Or do you want me to give you permission to go ahead and be flexible today. And both of those have roles in my life. But practice accountability, that's one way you can up your game in discipline. Another way and I do this, I love this, look at your goals every day. Without a vision, people perish. So look at your goals, have them in writing? Absolutely, you have to have them in writing a vision is something you have to see. You can't just think about it in your head, you have to see it. And so take what's in your brain and write it down on a piece of paper, and then look at it every day. remind yourself of what it is that you said that you want. And then the other thing is, know why you want it. Okay, this is your goal. So for me, if I have a goal, but I'm not really passionate about it, if my goal is simply Oh, I want to clean my closet today. But the Why is not that compelling. I won't do it. But if I say I want to clean my closet today, because I lost $100 Bill and I know it's in here. How motivated Do you think I am to clean my closet? Well, so make sure that you know what your why is? What?

How will your life change? If you reach this goal? How will you be benefited from that? If you don't, what will it cost you? How will you be hurt? How will your family be hurt if you don't reach this goal? So the other habit, or the other comment that I would have for you is to yes have habits. One of the best ways for discipline is to have habits that automatically take you there. So you don't need discipline anymore to brush your teeth Do you. But because it's a habit, you just know to do that. You might need a little more discipline to wash your face and take your makeup off at night. But maybe that's just a habit too. But when you start getting wrinkles and you're looking at your face and you start aging Oh your motivation Now you might say I am highly motivated to wash this makeup off my face. Once it becomes a habit, you don't have to think about it anymore. You don't have to feel motivated. You don't have to use discipline, it's just something you do. So make sure that you create habits that support you as you go along. Okay, so habits think of them as think of them as the cables that hold up a bridge the the cables of a bridge, your good habits, take you you're here you want to go there. These cables of a bridge bring you there, but bad habits think about bad habits of cables or bars of another kind prison bars. So salad bars, they trap you, they keep you from living your best life, they keep you from enjoying a great future and reaching your goal. And there is a story in the Bible about the Israelites. These are people that God had chosen to bring into a specific specific land, man Say that three times a specific land. And they just kept going around and around and around the same mountain and these same grooves and these same patterns. And they spent 40 years doing that. But we know that they were only 14 days away from the promised land. It was a short journey. But it became a massive, overwhelming lifetime journey, because they wouldn't just do the thing. How far away? Are you from your goal? Is it a weight loss goal, you three months away, but you'll spend 20 years being overweight? Because you don't have the self discipline, or you don't have the accountability or you're trying to do it by yourself? Or you don't have a compelling Why? Well, you know, I've worked with a lot of people and they say, well, it's hard. It's hard to eat this way. And I say, Yep, and you can pick your heart, because you're gonna have hard, it's hard to bend down and not be able to get up. It's hard not to ride the rides at the amusement park with your grandkids, or your kids. It's hard not to be able to sit in an airplane seat That's hard. It's hard not to be able to feel sexy and confident. Because you're overweight, that's hard. So choose your hard. And then if you want to build self discipline, make sure you remove the obstacles as much as you can beforehand. If you're going to start an exercise program, well make sure there's no cars parked behind you in the morning when you want to leave for the gym. Make sure that your tennis shoes didn't get left outside last night and they're wet in the rain. And I can't go and make sure that you didn't stay up late at night watching and scrolling on Facebook and eating Snickers and now you've got no energy because you've got a sugar coma. So remove those obstacles beforehand. And then the last piece of advice that I'll give you Mel Robbins made this really popular. It's been around for a while but it's practicing the countdown. And so this again it goes back to Don't overthink, just don't overthink don't have that conversation in your brain. Well, your brain is amazing. And it will offer you so many rationale. So many rationalizations about why you shouldn't do something anything. Or why you could do something why you can eat the cookie why you do deserve it, why you could buy the new shoes, how you will pay for it, your brain, it just is automatic. So practice the countdown rule, I'm not going to overthink it, I'm not going to get in my head 54321 go 54321. Go. Go. You don't hit that snooze button, it's 54321 get up 5432 hit the button. 5432 not the button, not the snooze button, hit the off or hit send mail that

resume, do it. Don't think it just do it. Put that accountability partner on alert that you've you've you've missed it, you fell or you need some help send that text 5431 do it. So motivation, we don't wait for it to come. It's wonderful when it does. But instead, we prepare for when it's not their vision that's so compelling. It forces us to keep moving and discipline the cables of a bridge that bring us to where we want to go. So that's what I have for you today. I hope you've enjoyed it. And if you did enjoy it, I'm sure that you did, make sure that you share it with someone and you can subscribe to this podcast that helps me a lot because it changes the algorithms and it puts my podcast in front of more people and that's my goal is to help more people just like you. So write a review and hit subscribe, and you'll help me out a lot. You can also visit me at dawn damon.com for my coaching. There's an application there if you want to have a session I would love to talk to you. All right, everybody. I hope you're doing your brave thing. And I'm gonna leave you like I always do. Don't forget find your brave and live your vision.