How To Take Action When You Don't Feel Like Taking Action

Hey there!

I’ll be honest.  I didn’t want to sit down this morning and write a blog.  Just didn’t want to.  So many other things have been calling my name today but I realized I really want to share.  As a matter of fact, I didn’t want to do my workout either.  It made me think of something Hal Elrod (author of Miracle Morning) wrote about how to do something even when you don’t feel like it. 

There are so many times in our lives when we make a commitment to do something, but when the time comes to do it, we don’t follow through.  I made a commitment earlier in the week to write a blog today.  I made a commitment months ago to work out on certain days.  But when it came down to it this morning, I just didn’t feel like doing it.

Have you ever had that happen?  You have a goal to do something … you decided in advance to do it -- like exercise, drink water instead of a soda, or take time to plan your meals – but when the time came, you just didn’t do it.  You weren’t motivated.  You weren’t energized.  You just weren’t moved to do the thing you had planned to do.

There’s a difference between wanting to do something and feeling like doing it. 

When you want to do something, you’ve made a plan or a goal to do it.  This is not a “spur of the moment” decision.  You’ve thought this through.  You know a certain action will benefit you and take you to that life that you really want.  You know you’ll feel better and be able to shed a few pounds if you move your body more, drink more water, and eat a few more veggies … so you decide you’re going to do those things.   

Feeling like doing something is more “in the moment”.  I planned to get up and exercise, but when the time came this morning, I didn’t feel like exercising.   Any time we create a new goal, we’re generally excited about it at first, but then the newness tends to wear off.  This is when we need to dig in and produce some “grit” (as my grandmother used to call it).  But how do we do that?

When the “feel-like-it” time comes, you have two choices … either you do it … or you don’t.  That’s the bottom line. 

But how do you get yourself to do the things you want to do …

even when you don’t feel like it?

You’re in luck … I have three great tips!

1.     Take extreme ownership.  You are 100% responsible for YOU. Take responsibility for what’s rightly your responsibility.  You may feel exercise isn’t fun or eating healthy is boring or drinking water is so drab.  So I ask this question … whose responsibility is it to make exercise more fun or to make eating healthy less boring or to make drinking water less drab?   It’s to our benefit to take 100% responsibility for every single area of our life, whether it’s our health, our finances, our relationships, our career, or our spiritual life.  It’s OUR responsibility!  If we find ourselves blaming our situation on something else … the government, our spouse, our kids, the economy, our boss, the weather, or whatever it is … then it’s time to step back and examine what responsibility we’re taking for ourselves.   

I had a client whose parents both died from diabetes-related complications.   She was diagnosed with diabetes shortly before we started working together.  Instead of saying “Diabetes is genetic and I’ll never be able to live a normal life”, she decided to take responsibility and take actions so she would be healthier.  She knew her unhealthy lifestyle was contributing to her diabetes.  By the time we finished a 90-day program together, her A1C levels were back to normal without medication.  She would never have been able to do this if she blamed other people or her circumstances for her situation.

When you blame your circumstances on external factors, you give away your power and motivation to take action.  On the other hand, when you take responsibility, you have the power and motivation to make a change, and in my client’s opinion, it was a change that she believe saved her life.

And it’s important to remember … the degree of responsibility you take for your life determines the degree of the power you hold to change your life. 

2.     Turn off your thinking and turn on your actions.  Author and motivational speaker John Maxwell says “you can act your way into feeling long before you can feel your way into action.”  This is more powerful than it sounds.  This morning, when I didn’t want to do my workout, I just turned off my thinking and took one small step toward my goal.  I got out my weights and yoga matt.  And guess what?  Since nothing causes momentum more than … well … momentum, I turned on my video and before I knew it, I was finished with my workout!

When we don’t feel like taking action, what often happens is we talk ourselves out of it. 

Don’t give yourself time to talk yourself out of it.  Just do it.

You know you want to do “the thing”, right?  It’s going to move you closer to that person you want to be.  So don’t even think about it.  Just take action, even if it’s a small step.

3.     Condition your mind.  The third thing we can do is to condition our mind, over time, to think more positively.  Our mind is our most powerful tool.  But it’s the most destructive as well.  As a matter of fact, our thoughts are probably the most powerful thing that affect everything that happens to us … whether good or bad.  Our thoughts trigger emotions and feelings that influence our actions.   Are you an emotional eater or do you know one?  That’s a great example of our thoughts triggering our emotions, thus influencing our actions.

If we don’t harness our thoughts, we’ll be influenced by other people, the news, negative self-talk, and the emotions these things produce.  You want to choose the thoughts that best serve you.  If you think damaging thoughts, it will create a destructive mindset, which will create emotions that can cause you to make decisions that are not in your best interest. 

Where your thoughts go, your actions flow.

On the other hand, if we control our thoughts, no matter what’s going on around us, we’re in control of what’s going on inside us.  And the more we’re in control of what’s going on inside us, the more likely we are to take action … even if we don’t want to. 

There you have it, my friends.  The three tips that will help you take action when you really don’t want to are:  1)  take ownership of your life; 2)  when you’re starting to talk yourself out of taking action, turn your mind off; and 3) condition your mind to positive thinking.

I believe if you do these three things consistently, you’ll find yourself taking more action than you imagined.  And remember, be gentle with yourself and don’t expect to have all these actions harnessed immediately.  It will take time and that’s ok.  Just move forward one small step at a time.

If you’re feeling overwhelmed with not being able to take action, then click here to schedule a free, no-pressure call to come up with a step-by-step plan on how to move forward.

Let’s move forward together!

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