MOTIVATION

“At some point, the pain of not doing it becomes greater than the pain of doing it.”- Steven Pressfield

Something which drives to do an act is motivation. For example, you love reading books because one day you want to be an author. So this factor of becoming an author is what is guiding you towards reading books. So this is motivation. You play cricket because one day you want to become like Sachin Tendulkar. So Sachin Tendulkar is the one who motivates you to play cricket. This is something different from an urge. Simply putting it, you drink water because you feel an urge. Water is not actually motivating you. It’s rather urging you because you do have a need. Now you are crossing a desert without a bottle of water. After crossing a mile or so you start getting an urge to drink water. After you cross another mile, the urge enhances manifolds and now you are feeling parched. After one more mile, you are completely exhausted and you cannot walk anymore and suddenly you remember that there is a little water body after another mile or so. Now, this little piece of remembrance makes you feel energized and makes you go that extra mile. Now, this is something we call motivation.

We pursue education because we have an urge to get degrees, becoming eligible for jobs. But you have aspired to become an Officer. This is the motivational factor behind your extra push for glory. You can easily opt for an easier path, a simpler one, indeed. But you did not. Because you are motivated.Because you have that extra urge in you. And it’s your motivation that has brought you to this level. And don’t let it die till you reach your goal.

“Motivation is a powerful, yet tricky beast. Sometimes it is really easy to get motivated, and you find yourself wrapped up in a whirlwind of excitement. Other times, it is nearly impossible to figure out how to motivate yourself and you’re trapped in a death spiral of procrastination.”

It’s easy to lose your focus once your motivation subsides even a bit. So it is absolutely essential to stay motivated throughout the course of your interview preparations. Now let’s have a look at how to stay motivated.

Firstly you need to plan your work very well so that at any given point of time of your preparation, you know it very well what lies next. Otherwise, your preparation becomes scratchy and even though you know the destination, without having a guide map to the destination, you fail reaching there. So relax, make a schedule of work and start working on it. “Professionals set a schedule and stick to it. Amateurs wait until they feel inspired or motivated.”

It is essential to work within the schedule you have prepared for yourself. Once you finish the shorter goal, you feel rewarded and you dare to take the voyage towards the medium-term goal. Suppose you have planned that you will complete preparing for the Constitution within a week. So you must have distributed your workload in seven linear components. Now after the second day, you discover that you have covered nearly three days of work. So this is an enterprising reward, which will keep you going till the end of the goal you set for the subject for yourself. None gets 100% motivation in the beginning. It’s only when you cross the little hurdles, you start feeling motivated. Remember, in cricket, it is always suggested to get the first run fast. Once you do so, you push for an extra run. You give yourself small targets. Once you finish them, you are automatically motivated for the bigger tasks- winning the match for the team or getting a magnificent hundred.

Gift yourself with extra energy in the morning just after getting up from the bed. Start the day in a refreshing and rejuvenating manner so that you can continue the day at your best. As already discussed, I would strongly recommend you to get up early, do a little bit of meditation to keep your thinking process clear and enjoy a little walk in the morning sunshine. Even if you had a bad dream last night, this is going to purge your soul and freshen it up for a new day, a new challenge.

You play tennis very well. Now you have been asked to play a match against a five-year-old boy. Will you feel motivated? No. Why? The challenge is too easy. Now, you have been asked to play against Rafael Nadal. Will you be motivated? No. Why? The challenge is impossible. Now you have been asked to play a match against someone more or less of your talent. Now you feel the motivation. Yes. Why? You have a fair chance of winning. Similarly, you have reached this stage of your life. You have cleared the initial hurdles of the examination. Now you are one among the equals who are appearing in the interview. You have every possibility of getting your dream job. Your challenge is neither too easy nor too difficult. Human being love challenges only when those fall within the optimal zone of difficulty. This is basically what we call Goldilocks Rule which states that humans experience peak motivation when working on tasks that are right on the edge of their current abilities. Not too hard. Not too easy. Just the right. Now, are you not feeling motivated to go the extra mile and get your dream?

Stand in front of the mirror. Have a closer look at you. Talk to yourself. Start believing that you are talking to the Officer you want to be. Make this a regular habit. Gradually the thought becomes imprinted in your subconscious mind and once that happens, you will strive even better to achieve the dream.

Once, there was an older man, who was broke, living in a tiny house and owned a beat-up car. He was living off of $99 social security checks. At 65 years of age, he decided things had to change. So he thought about what he had to offer. His friends raved about his chicken recipe. He decided that this was his best shot at making a change. He left Kentucky and traveled to different states to try to sell his recipe. He told restaurant owners that he had a mouthwatering chicken recipe. He offered the recipe to them for free, just asking for a small percentage on the items sold. Sounds like a good deal, right?

Unfortunately, the restaurants were not interested. He heard ‘NO’ over 1000 times. Even after all of those rejections, he didn’t give up. He believed his chicken recipe was something special. He got rejected 1009 times before he heard his first ‘YES’.

With that one success, Colonel Hartland Sanders changed the way the world eats chicken. Kentucky Fried Chicken, popularly known as KFC, was born. Isn’t the story really, really motivating?

Remember, never give up and always believe in yourself in spite of rejection.

Now answer the following questions in 15 minutes.

1. What has motivated you to aspire for this job?
2. How do you correlate motivation and focus?
3. What do you do to keep yourself motivated?
4. Who or what has been your biggest motivator?
5. Tell about a task you accomplished without any motivation.