Tool 6/10 - Make your life easier

How to move from "have to" to "want to"

It happens often that we are so flushed with the “right” things that we should do, that we begin to lose sight of why those things are important to us.

A ‘have-to motivation is when you do something so that you avoid something negative from happening. For example, you go to the gym so that you won’t get fat. Or you eat healthy so that you don’t get nagged by your wife. 

That’s alright for a while, but making the decision to do an activity that you don’t really like is not something you can do for a long time. And you might be tempted to cheat when no one is watching. :)

A ‘want-to’ motivation is when you do an activity because it moves you in the direction of your values. You brush your teeth because you want to have healthy teeth. You go to the gym and do the effort because you value being healthy. 

Of course, we all do things in our routines because we have to. And there’s nothing wrong with that, the idea is to have more activities that you do because you want to.

Let's go:

1. Pick an activity that you want to do, but feel that it’s too hard, such as going to the gym or eating healthy;

2. Values. Think about why doing that activity is important to you - what value does it underline?

Maybe it’s about being healthy, or being professional, or being supportive of your colleagues.

3. Keep. Think about how you can keep this value alive in your mind the next time you have to do this activity.

Ex.: You can write it in your journal, or put it as a wallpaper on your phone, or just write it on a post-it and glue it to your fridge.

Next time you think about how to get your colleague or partner to do something they want try this tool with them and write to me to tell me how it went.

I answer all e-mails :)