How to Stay Motivated When You Don’t See Results

How to Stay Motivated When You Don't See Results
How to Stay Motivated When You Don’t See Results

By Anubhav Srivastava (Register for his Confidence Building Workshop Here!)

I have stated in one of my past articles that you are responsible for your actions but cannot always control the results of the actions. The fact is that the effort you are putting in may not pay off in the near future or it may pay off in a very different way than you expected. Things don’t always work out the way wanted, we give it everything we got and yet it seems that the reward is only a small fraction of the effort. Things just don’t seem to be progressing swiftly enough.

We all go through times where we question whether our efforts are even worth it. We question whether it is even worth it to put in so much effort and hard work into our goals when nothing is going to work anyway. What I have personally discovered by questioning the same when things don’t work out is this: Hard Work may not always yield rewards in the same proportion to the effort put in, but if you don’t work hard you will stop getting those rewards too. Secondly, Life has a weird way of rewarding you when you least expect it, but that is only going to happen if you are putting in a determined and sustained effort towards your goal every single day.

So here are my suggestions on how to find the inspiration to keep pushing on every single day even when nothing seems to work.

 

1) Understand you can’t always be super motivated all the time.

We are humans, not machines that can perform at 100 percent efficiency all the time. To take that way from us would make us less human. You simply have to accept the fact it is close to impossible to yield superhuman output every day. If you try to do it, sooner or later you will suffer from massive burnout, maybe even develop life threatening health conditions due to the massive amounts of stress you are piling on every day.

First of all understand this. You can do the best you can but you cannot control the pace at which you get the result and it is completely okay to feel demotivated if putting in the effort does not yield result. At the same time understand this, it does not matter how slow you are moving as long as you keep moving. Commit to doing the best you can on that particular day, even if it is just taking a few steps a day towards your goal. If you are demotivated, take fewer steps, but keep moving. Never stop.

 

2) Let go of the desire for instant gratification.

For some things the time for the reward to come in will take its natural course no matter how hard you work. 9 women cannot produce a baby in one month, nor can watering a plant a hundred times a day make it a tree overnight.

Focus on building the base, focus on the things that you can do, keep the goal in the mind don’t get too focused on getting to the goal immediately. As long as you are doing the little things right, the big things will take care of themselves, eventually.

3) Get your priorities right.

Is money the sole reason that is driving you or is there something bigger that matters. Money is important, no doubt but if money is the sole reason then I would suggest it is okay if you want to move on to something else that is more financially rewarding. If money is not the sole reason and there is a bigger purpose or reason that drove you to start pursuing this in the first place, only then keep moving on.

 

4) Enjoy the present.

Are you pursuing your goal thinking that once it is accomplished only then you can be happy? Stop! Happiness is an emotional state that you can have even when you are in the worst of the situations in the eyes of the rest of the world. There are people suffering from terrible diseases who have genuinely ranked their level of happiness more than people who seem to have it all. So stop trying to look at the goal as a means to achieve happiness. Find happiness in the moment.

Don’t ruin your present by constantly worrying about the mistakes of the past or the uncertainties of the future. What has happened cannot be changed but can be learned from. What is supposed to happen will happen only at the right time. Do your best and enjoy your present, don’t make it yet another regret.

 

5) Seek inspiration from those who were able to accomplish their dream.

In the darkest time of your life remind yourself that there are countless people before you, many of them who you may now consider role models or heroes who were in the exact same situation as yours and kept pushing on. They didn’t see the light at the end of the tunnel but they believed there would be light anyway and that belief, that hope kept driving them.

I cannot promise you whether you will achieve your dream but I can promise you this, you will accomplish much more by continuing to push on and moving forward as compared to just putting everything aside and expecting fate to help you.

6) Seek inspiration from those around you.

Even though I have always had the desire to take control of my own destiny by running my own business I have always sought inspiration from those around me including those who want succeed in the corporate world. A friend of mine who had been rejected for hundreds of jobs over a course of several years, dealt with numerous financial hardships, humiliation and even labelled as unlucky was finally able to land his dream job in Dubai. His success inspired me immensely because here there was a person who did not give up on his dream and accomplished it despite great odds.

I am sure there are numerous success stories of people you know personally. See their success as something to be inspired from, not something to be jealous of.

 

7) Understand that nothing succeeds like success

Understand that motivation often comes in short bursts. Whether it happens after you watch an inspiring movie, read an inspiring book, see someone else succeed or see results in your own life, use that motivation at that particular moment to work the hardest you can. When you put in the effort you get the results. But when you don’t get results you stop putting in effort. Ironically, by lessening the efforts the results decrease further. See the vicious cycle? So use that motivation when it is at its highest to work the hardest you can towards your goal, over a period of time, it will dry up and that is okay, just alternate between phases of slow consistent effort and short bursts of great effort while motivated and you will progress towards your goal. Never stop.

 

8) Be Grateful for everything

I know I know it is hard sometimes. You wonder, why should I be grateful for anything when my efforts go unrewarded. Why should I be grateful for things when I see someone else who put in much less effort get everything so much more easily. I do not owe gratitude to anybody and especially not a higher power.

The truth is it could be much worse. There are so many things around you, maybe your family, maybe your relationships that you are taking for granted. Understand that there are people in the world who work much much much harder than you still are in a much worse situation. You are not alone. Be grateful for what you have whether or not you believe in a higher power, because it automatically shifts your thinking from dwelling negatively on things that don’t work to appreciating what you have and experiencing positive energy.

9) Celebrate the little accomplishments

It is easy to forget that you have made some tremendous progress along the way if you are only focused on the big goal. But a big goal is only accomplished through a series of steps. Celebrate each step. Unlike thousands of others who only dream you are actually doing something to fulfill that dream and every little accomplishment along the way makes you someone worthy of admiration. So start admiring yourself for what you have achieved. Without being a Narcissist that is.

 

10) Take time off and spend it with your loved ones.

The meaning of life is not to work 24/7 on your goal. What is the point of even achieving your goal if you were not able to spend time with people for whom you have been working so hard. What is the point of making money if your kids only think of you as someone who never seemed to want to spend time with them. Life is meant to be balanced. There are many aspects to life and getting a great career or profession goal is only one aspect of it. The real backbone of life is your family and your true friends. Always value them and spend time with them or time will fly and you will realize that you spent your life chasing things that did not matter as much as the people you ignored.

 

About the Author

The author of this article, Anubhav Srivastava is an author, motivational speaker and the director of Carve Your Destiny, a first of its kind inspirational documentary featuring some of the most famous personalities from diverse fields, who teach the viewers how they too can make all of their dreams come true. The movie itself has been seen on Youtube by close to 600,000 people. Anubhav has also been featured in numerous International and India Media outlets such as BBC , The Times of India, Hindustan Times, Rediff.com, Leicester Mercury and many others.

Email Anubhav Srivastava for coaching, consulting or motivational speaking queries at anubhav101@gmail.com. Facebook Profile: http://facebook.com/anubhav981

Watch Carve Your Destiny, the super inspirational movie by Anubhav Srivastava for Free at