What Motivates You?

February 6, 2009


As today is an off-day from training I will keep the topic away from physical training and focus this journal on the mental side which will address something that is often overlooked during achieving goals and in everyday life.


Motivation. What exactly is it? Why is it important? Who creates or distributes it? When does it play a role?


It is something that keeps us on whatever path we may be headed towards. Whether positively or negatively influenced, it plays a vital role in our success or failure. Other words that come to mind are pressure, expectations, doubt, failure and many others. While these words are not all synonymous with motivation each can be the motivating factor for setting and achieving goals, or unfortunately the reason for disappointment.


I’ll give you some of my motivations for the often strange and unconventional decision making that certainly makes me an individual, yet just another part of society.


In middle school I was consuming numerous sodas and fairly toxic food, and after discussing this with my doctor he pretty much told me that if I didn’t change my diet I WOULD get type II diabetes. At the time I didn’t really know what diabetes was, just that it isn’t something to strive for. During this time, I was playing numerous sports per season, and probably in the best shape of my life(until now), also in the state of mind of being invincible. However I decided to change my diet and am happy for it as childhood obesity rates are skyrocketing and the obvious research is all pointing to diet and exercise as the main contributors. So that was about 9 years ago, since then my soda consumption has been limited to mixed drinks(which honestly, taste terrible, shots without chasers is how I roll), and now my nutritional habits are similar to that of well… a commune hippie. Maybe they all had it figured out, just that society wasn’t willing to accept that a bunch of unconventional types could be right. Don’t ask me, ask the government and media, actually don’t.


My motivation was a doctor who was truly concerned about my health and therefore led me on a path that kept me away from degenerative disease and towards a sustainable life.


During college, I did my fair share of binge drinking. I hope no photos surface. What I began realizing as I distanced myself from the freshman fifteen that was actually eighteen(whose counting), it began dawning on me that maybe my diet was terrible and leading me to feel lethargic and more of a waste of space than a contributing factor. My friends can tell you that I go through phases of substance non-use, and during these times my body rewarded me by feeling incredible, exercising daily, no anxiety, but due to peer pressure or boredom, or other factors I would stray from the motivating force of feeling on top of the world and dwell deep into the cave of apathy and poor self analysis. These periods were usually followed by another non-use period, where I felt incredible. Is this anyway to live a healthy and happy life? I think not, stay on the incredible side. We’ve all heard that moderation is a key to life, but when is the last time you didn’t over drink during the last 6 months? Or can honestly say that everything you’re doing for your body is beneficial. I certainly could not until recently.


I challenge each of you to look over every aspect of your lives and look for bad habits and postpone them for an entire 6 months and then determine if they are really worth continuing. I bet you’ll find something that you can do instead that is probably going to improve your life and lead to a happier and healthier life. Find the positive in stopping the negative. Life is a balancing act, be the gold medal gymnast, not the drunken bull rider.


These bad habits can include the following:


• Smoking
• Drinking
• Too little sleep
• Fast Food
• Drinking soda(stop, it’s depleting your bones of calcium, and pumping you full of acid)
• Postponing exercise until a later date(if you start today, you’ll feel better tomorrow)
• Being stressed over something, just let it go, it’s really not worth it.


You don’t have to go as extreme as cutting it off completely, but realize that everyday that you’re doing any of the above or parts of a list that isn’t mentioned, your body isn’t as happy as it could be. Self analysis is key.


To sum it up, my motivation for the last few months has been to live a sustainable life. By sustainable I am not referring to the green movement which I fully agree with, I mean that everything I do can be continued with pure happiness, without guilt, and done EVERYDAY.


Is your life sustainable?


If you’re interested in changing something for the better in your life, I and others are there to support you. One of my goals in life is to positively impact peoples’ lives. The hardest part is the first step, after that it’s just finding the motivation to continue. There’s plenty of support out there.


Have a great day,


Ryan