“Oh, the weather? It is going to be perfect today. Just the way I like it.” Mulla said with great confidence.

The neighbor, somewhat surprised at the response, said, “How can you be so sure?”

“Well, it is very simple. I have learned to love whatever type of weather I get for I have no control over it,” Mulla added, “but staying positive helps me feel motivated all day.”

Motivation — often, many struggle to stay motivated right till the end. It can be the difference between winning and losing, between victory and defeat, between success and failure. Motivation is an attitude, it is a habit. It can be cultivated, nurtured, boosted and instilled like all other habits. Here is how:

1. Be Positive: If you are positive you will stay motivated naturally. Everyone has their own unique way of staying positive. You need to have a little bit of self-dialogue, self-reflection to see how you can stay positive. A good way to do so is to look at the benefits of achieving your goal, to find a way to enjoy your journey. Imagine being stuck in the traffic on a highway, it is beyond your control. At that moment, you have the choice to be positive and listen to some nice music or call your friends and family (with the hands free kit on) and so forth. Or, you can be crossed and fried with all the commuters, with the roads and traffic department, with the lanes that appear to be moving faster than your own, with those who are cutting in and on and on. Being positive, however hard it may sound, is a matter of choice, a question of habit. If you decide to stay positive no one can stop you.

2. Be Disciplined: Being disciplined is, in a way, even more important than being positive. If you are disciplined, you will get the results. And as you see results, you will automatically feel more motivated. When you decide to do something, just get on with it. It is not always about liking or disliking. Let us say, you are trying to lose weight. Whether you have decided to shed five pounds or fifty is immaterial. If you follow the discipline in your diet, in your exercise, results will show through. Day in, day out, if you eat right, hit the tread mill, burn calories, tone yourself up, you will achieve your goal of losing weight. But it is not going to happen overnight. And, that leads to my final third point.

3. Be Patient: Motivation gets killed when we lose patience. If you stay course, steadily working towards your goals, you will certainly see the results. Let me go back to the example of losing weight. Let us assume you are thirty years old. It has taken you thirty years to gain this weight. And, do you expect to lose it in three days, or three weeks or even three months? Surely, you will start to see results in a matter of weeks but if you want to lose weight the healthy way, the natural way, it is going to take a little longer. When you have to do something because you have decided it, do not let your heart dictate, let your mind lead. Do not think about the whole one hour you have to spend at the gym, just take it a minute at a time.

Whenever you feel restless, remind yourself to be patient. Whenever you feel like skipping, remind yourself to be disciplined. Whenever you feel low, remind yourself that it is not about feeling good or bad, low or high that you just have to do it. Actions bring results.

As they say, if you want to be happy, be positive and be motivated, do what you love or start loving what you have to do.

Peace.

Swami