How to Stay Motivated for Success

What is Success?

Success is a buzzword that most of use when talking about about certain aspects of our lives. Getting in to a good college and earning your degree. Landing your first big job and then getting a promotion. Buying your first home and living on your own.

We’ve all had these moments of success. Success means achieving a specific goal that you set out to do. But it really means something different for everyone. This is because our goals are different and the measurement of achieving a goal is different.

Goals and success are subjective. They only apply to the person who sets out to accomplish them. So, what success looks like for me could look completely different for you.

For instance, going to college. This could simply mean going to college and earning a degree. It could also mean going to an Ivy League school. Or it could be graduating with honors or at the top of the class. At the end of the day, a college degree is a college degree, but our measure of success is based on what’s important to us as an individual.

Another example could be getting a job. For some people, success means having a job, making a paycheck and being financially independent. Other people might mark success with getting a promotion and working your way up the corporate ladder. For others, success could mean owning your business and being your own boss.

In all of these examples, we see that success is a different outcome for each person. At the end of the day, you need to ask yourself what success means to you. When you set out to do something or set goals for yourself, it’s important to start at the end point to know what success looks like for you.

By defining success from the beginning, you can then work backwards to create actions steps for your goal. What does success look like to you? Is it about quality or quantity? Or is it about a feeling or emotion? Better yet, does it mean a stepping stone for the next goal?

You should continually ask yourself these questions so that you can stop and celebrate when you achieve something great. Even if it’s not the ultimate end goal, achieving your “micro” goals that are action steps toward that larger goal should be seen as successes along the way. That’s why it’s so important to define each task along the way so that you can track and measure what success means to you.

How to Stay Motivated for Success

Once you can define success for yourself, it’s time to start crushing your goals. Setting up your action plan and accomplishing your “micro” goals along the way is the best way to set yourself up for success, but the big questions remains, how do you stay motivated?

Here are five tips to help you stay motivated for success.

Have the Right Mindset

One of the most important places to start is with your mindset.

It’s very easy to write down goals and come up with a plan, but if you’re anything like me, there’s this whole thing called life that tends to get in the way. You may have a full time job, a home to take care of, a significant other, and maybe kids or other family that you care for. All of these things can take up our time and pull us away from our other goals.

Life is very much a balancing act, but depending on what goals you set for yourself and how much time they may take, it’s very easy to get pulled away from your action plan to focus on other important factors in life. Your mindset helps you balance your priorities.

While we all have distractions, it’s also important to remember that there’s a difference between obligations (such as working your 9 to 5 or taking care of your kids) versus procrastination. If you feel like there’s just not enough time in your day, it might be time to do an audit of where you spend your time. Do you watch a lot of TV? Do you spend hours on social media? Are you choosing to do social activities during times that you designated toward working on your action plan?

If any of these questions indicate that you’re spending time on other non-priorities, it’s time to refocus your attention on your goals. Your mindset is telling you that you don’t have enough time to devote to following your action plan. In fact, you have plenty of time, but your mind is focused on other things.

Once you’re in the right mindset of setting up time devoted especially to your action plan, you’ll see a big difference in how quickly and efficiently you can crush your goals. This will help you stay motivated for success.

Follow Other Successful People

One of the best pieces of advice I’ve ever heard was to surround yourself with people who are more successful than you. Talk to them (or read their work), watch how they act and try to emulate their action plan.

A great example of this is someone who you consider a mentor. Why do you ask someone to be a mentor? Most likely it’s because they have the job or career that you want and you’re asking them to show you the path they took to get to where they are today.

It’s the same idea in any area of life where you want to succeed. If you want to write a book, follow other authors or writers. Do they have a blog? Read it. Have they written an autobiography? Read it. Do they have a podcast or have they done media interviews? Listen to them.

By absorbing the words, advice, mistakes and wins of someone who has succeeded in an area of life that you are looking to conquer, you can learn from their steps to create a similar path. This is one of the best ways to keep your motivation up.

Track Your Goals

Tracking your goals is one of the simplest ways to stick to your action plan. Everyone is different, so tracking your goals might be different, too. Some people might like to write in a journal. Others might want to see everything in a planner or calendar. Others still might want a vision board.

Whatever your preference for tracking your goals, it is so important to keep them written down and in front of you. Not only does it help you work backward from your end goal to come up with your action plan, but it also helps you celebrate small successes along the way.

I’ve mentioned it before, it’s super important to come up with “micro” goals that add up to your bigger goal, that way you can watch your progress as you slowly build your way up. The more you see these smaller wins add up, the easier it is to stay motivated for success.

Read Books

No matter what your goals are, there are probably tons of books out there in that subject area. I personally feel that the more educated you are on a given topic, the easier it is to stay motivated to succeed.

This is because you’ll continually be able to tweak your action plan and apply new knowledge to crushing your goals. Just like we talked about following people who have the success you want, filling your mind with information about your subject area can create motivation that it is possible to find success.

I also think it’s important to read personal development books that are different from your direct goal, but that can help you in your path. For instance, if your goal is to start of blog, there are plenty of books out there strictly about starting a blog. But you might also want to read books about time management, marketing or branding. While they are in a similar subject area, they may not be exactly aligned with your end goal, but they are topics that will help you with your action steps along the way.

By becoming more educated in different areas of your goals, you will feel more confident in yourself and your abilities to work your action plan. Having this confidence will help you stay motivated for success.

Take Care of Your Health

When you are very focused on one particular area of your life, it’s very easy to neglect others, and one of the first places that usually suffers is your health.

While balancing your time is very important for crushing your goals, it’s hard to stay motivated for success if you are constantly tired, sluggish or getting sick. By keeping your body sharp by eating right and getting exercise, you will have better focus, sleep well and be better able to deal with stress.

This doesn’t mean you need to also attempt a hard-core diet or exercise regiment. All you really need are those common-sense prescriptions for everyday health. For instance, try to avoid eating too much junk food and opt for fruits and vegetables instead. Go for a thirty-minute walk every day or stick to a workout routine like yoga. Get enough sleep each night so that you can wake up feeling rested and ready to take on the day.

These little steps add up to a big difference for your health, which means you will have more energy and focus to crush your goals.

Final Thoughts

When you are setting goals for yourself, it’s very exciting at first, but sometimes life just gets in the way. If you’re starting to feel a lack of motivation for crushing your goals this year, it might be time to reevaluate how you are focusing your attention to your goals.

By taking simple steps, you can find the motivation you need to stay on track for the path to success. Taking some time each day to get in the right mindset, follow people who are already successful, track your goals, read books to continue learning and be mindful of your health, you will see a big difference in your motivation.

The more you practice these simple skills and incorporate them into your daily life, the easier it will be to stay focused and on track to conquer any goals.

These techniques have helped me stay motivated for success along my journey and I hope they will help you, too. What tips have you used to help you stay motivated for success?