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| Garrett Kasey ('20) |
People often begin a new year with plenty of motivation to
set lofty goals and achieve them. For many people, new year’s resolutions are a
great way to set personal goals, but I’d venture to say that most people never
end up reaching or accomplishing the goals they set. I have often run into this
problem as well. I don’t believe the fault in this process lies in setting New Year’s resolutions. I believe it is healthy and normal to set goals for
yourself at the beginning of each year because it offers a measurable timeline
for progress. The issue that I believe is related to the many failures is our
reliance on motivation, the switch we cannot control.
Fitness
vlogger, Nick Bare, offers a great number of insights into our human
relationship with motivation on his YouTube channel. Bare spent four years as
an officer in the United States Army, and he brings unique experience
into the fitness industry. In a recent post of Instagram, Bare claimed that it
is not enough to rely on motivation to succeed. Bare points out that
motivation ebbs and flows. Nick Bare compares motivation to a switch that is
turned on by watching motivational videos or reading inspirational books. While
these resources are great to utilize for a push toward success, the high is not
permanent. Bare’s points extend far beyond the gym. If we rely on motivation
alone, our bad days could cause us to take steps back from our goals. Whether
it is in the gym, the classroom, or the workplace, we all have days with little
to no motivation to get things done. Another issue with reliance on motivation
is that motivation cannot be taught or built. I’ve noticed that there is not a
lot of rhyme or reason to the times I am motivated or not; it seems that on the
days I feel excessively motivated that I am just lucky to wake up that way in
the morning. I have not found a process to consistently inspire myself to have
great energy and drive to succeed in whatever I am doing. I don’t believe that
motivation can be simplified into certain steps you can take to wake up and be
motivated to succeed every morning.
While I may
seem to be attacking motivation as a whole, that isn’t the point. There is a
trait that can solve many of the problems I have attributed to motivation.
Discipline is the switch that we can control consistently. While it is not an
easy process, becoming a disciplined person is one of the best things you can
do to become successful. There are countless examples of leaders in many
different fields that have disciplined habits that they attribute to their
success. Creating good habits and following them with a disciplined nature is a
great step towards achieving goals set for yourself. Being a self-disciplined
person has many benefits. The first is that whether you have the motivation to
take a step toward achieving your goals or not, you will do it regardless.
Discipline is that voice on your shoulder telling you to do it anyway. Second,
when you have created habits in your life to take care of the little things,
you have more time to spend contemplating the bigger issues. Having a habitual
routine at different parts of each day allows for more time allowed to think on
the important happenings in the day. If you set a process for how you get ready
each morning, you’ll spend less time thinking about what you are going to wear
and more time thinking about what you have to accomplish at work during the
day. This practice leads to more brainpower being used on the important
questions throughout the week.
Remember
that motivation is not an evil quality or one that we should ignore. Motivation
is a great tool to use on the road to success, but it is best used as a
supplement to discipline. Whether you are motivated to get up each morning and
do your best or not, your practiced discipline will help you wake up on the
first alarm. That can be the very first step in the day toward achieving goals
you’ve set. Practice discipline with the little things first, and achieving the
larger goals in life will surely follow.
Garrett Kasey, of Elizabethtown, Ky., is a sophomore McConnell Scholar studying economics, political science, and Spanish.