Do You Need To IGNITE Your Motivation

Do You Need To IGNITE Your Motivation

Have we ever thought that we Need To IGNITE our Motivation?  Too bad, many of us [and I'm guilty of it several times in the past] would give MOTIVATION that lip service it does NOT deserve.  Sometimes, we [wrongly] believe that MOTIVATION is as effortless as the rain [when it pours].  BUT WHAT IF THE RAIN DOES NOT POUR❓❓❓

Other than we are ill or sick, if you agree to this poster, that's detestable to say the least because with that attitude, I'll challenge the incumbent why in the first he/she ended up at the workplace [if all he/she wanted was to be HOME?  This lack of MOTIVATION can be the biggest obstacle for us to reach and achieve our goals.  When MOTIVATION is either lacking or missing, identify what's causing you to struggle because you need to GET GOING📌📌📌

How about this?  Act AS IF you are MOTIVATED?  Try it, you may be able to pull a TRICK to yourself by thinking that you're motivated to change your behavior.  Try it, there's a probability that your actions may even change your emotions.  Let's picture ourselves.  Rather than be seated on the couch all day with your pajamas, GET DRESSED & GET MOVING❗❗❗

Picture this out [if this is pure FICTION or you have seen this happening to others [if NOT to yourself]].  When you're struggling with MOTIVATION, you'll likely come up with a long list of reasons WHY you should NOT take any action.  Suddenly, here you are telling yourself 'OH THAT's HARD'.  'OH, IT WON'T BE DONE ANYWAY'.  These types of thoughts will KEEP YOU STUCK, promise⏳⏳⏳

Now, try to ARGUE THE OPPOSITE.  When you think you'll FAIL, argue with yourself all the reasons WHY you will succeed. OR when you think you CAN'T finish a task, list all the evidences [to convince yourself] that you can indeed finish that task.  If you need to be hard to yourself for you to IGNITE your motivation, go for it, dude✅✅✅

FOCUS Causes 80% of Misses [and even Mishaps]

FOCUS Causes 80% of Misses [and even Mishaps]

Failed grades in school.  Wrong output at work.  Strained relationship with spouse and/or loved ones, businesses teetering and in the brink of bankruptcy.  Driving snags hit on the way from office to work.  Or long-haul drive resulting in an accident This sampling can go on and on but again, FOCUS Causes 80% of Misses and that includes this sampling of exceptions.  Strange but all these share its commonality to a lost or weakened FOCUS💊💊💊

Oh oh oh, in our lives, many of our own problems can be traced back to our own UNDOING.  Driving as an example.  Despite all of the new safety technology in cars.  statistics from the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration [NHTSA]show that 94%  of car accidents are related to the driver.  But hold on, our thread today is not just about driving accidents being caused by lost, weakened or impaired FOCUS but we'd like to peruse the various common day-to-day problems FOCUS seems to be impacting in our daily lives💎💎💎

The 'mother of all ironies' is that even in the workplace, losing FOCUS is really NOT always caused by 'lazy dogs'.  Surely, you have come across in the workplace those workaholic colleagues who'd be multi-tasking from 800am till 500pm. those colleagues who would even skip tea-breaks, those folks who would go for their 'bladder break' only when they have pushed it way too far and they CAN'T handle it anymore.  So, this is a nightmare to discover and uncork if despite one's 'workaholism', you would end up missing your target deliverables simply because you lost FOCUS [because you ended up being spread thinly across⏳⏳⏳

So, isn't this a very exasperating realization?  That when FOCUS does NOT happen in a FOCUSED manner, this dilemma cuts across practically every facet of our daily life, be it as minute as driving or as essential as performing your daily work at the workplace.  So WHAT'S our FIX for this?  We got to realize that FOCUS does NOT entail any overhead COSTS.  Simply get FOCUSED 📌📌📌

Even figuring out as to what causes one to lose or compromise focus is, after all, a no-brainer.  This reminds of the high-end IBM CPU processors marketed as MPP's [Massive Parallel Processors] but do you know that even MPP's execute its multi-threading PER THREAD?  So, what's the common denominator of both us humans and technology?  We can only execute one task at a time.  Think about FOCUS causing 80% of misses✅✅✅

Reading The Ball Off The Ball

Reading The Ball Off The Ball

Many of us get it so wrongly.  Many [wrongly] think [until today] that we got to have that 'EYES TO THE BALL' because our whole life revolves around that ball.  They got this absolutely wrong because in life, it constantly revolves even without the ball in proximity.  In NBA basketball jargon, the best bench tacticians are so focused in Reading The Ball Off The Ball because by the time that ball gets right within you, time could be so fleeting, before you know it, it's OVER before you thought it has NOT started yet.  Those are the fatal stories that end up prematurely all in flames because they failed to Read The Ball Off The Ball✅✅✅

In the competitive world of sports, the very core of the trainings zero-in to Read The Ball Off The Ball.  Breaking this colloquialism in the simplest terms, this means that we need to be STEP AHEAD and be able to paint all the possible iterations and scenarios so that whatever scenario happens, you have your scripted action plan.  To be a STEP AHEAD does NOT need gargantuan efforts, if at all.  This is all about being proactive and pre-emptive before thing turn south💎💎💎

Off the ball means constantly plotting things out WAY BEFORE D-Day comes.  It means plotting an action plan that covers Scenario A, B and even C.  It means planning based on a list of WHAT IFs. And those WHAT IFs must revolve around the pitfalls and risks that may happen ahead of what you expect.  By Reading The Ball Off The Ball, you draw that parallelism to the great chess grandmasters who spend even an hour or more to list each possible iteration and craft a plan of action based on assumptions.  When and if a 1st assumption ends up wrongly, there must be a 2nd set of assumptions, a 3rd set and even a 4th set📌📌📌

In the world of soccer sports, 80% of their trainings are designed OFF THE BALL.  WHY?  Because in the real game, 80% of the time, the soccer player does NOT have the ball.  So, he has to run circles even to test his stamina.  In the grueling NBA games, a player can NEVER be stationary, else the coach can bring you back to the bench to warm things all over again.  start Reading The Ball Off The Ball dude because there's no other way for you to go❗❗❗

Oh yes, this is a given, that indeed, BALL IS LIFE but that's not enough for us to fathom.  We got to extend life before it gets snapped and at best, we need to pre-empt multifarious UNKNOWNS based on KNOWN assumptions. Common lesson here is that life is very IFFFFY and if you end up a step behind unfolding events in life, you could be dead in the water unless you Read The Ball Off The Ball⏳⏳⏳

That STEEP Road To Recovery

That STEEP Road To Recovery

Anyone there who can mentor us to avoid FAILURES?  No way, Jose.  The roads we're travelling are peppered with trenches and foxholes a.k.a. PITFALLS.  Sooner or later, everyone FAILS at something.  But does everyone really learn from their FAILURES?  Sadly, so many studies have shown that most people struggled to grow from mistakes and defeats.  Psychologists proved that most of us 'UNDERLEARN' from each FAILURE in our respective lives.  Talking about That STEEP Road To Recovery📌📌📌

Effectively, experts are telling us that WE tend to avoid the LESSONS in FAILURE.  Reality however is that FAILURE indeed bruises our ego. that metaphorical seat of our SELF-ESTEEM and importance.  When we FAIL, we feel threatened and that sense of threat can trigger a 'FIGHT or FLIGHT' response 'FIGHT' in the context of FAILURE looks like a wholesale dismissal of our value of the task or criticism⏳⏳⏳

Whereas, 'FLIGHT' might be the more common response to FAILURE.  When we flee FAILURE, we disengage our attention from the task that threatens our sense of ourselves as effective people.  The challenge we have at hand is removing that EGO from FAILURE as much as possible by looking at other people's failures first before you take on a task yourself.  In simpler terms, if you want to learn how to SKI or SWIM, it makes to sense to watch videos of people making mistakes before you hit the slopes or dip into the waters💎💎💎

If negative emotions are getting in the way of your understanding, experts recommend SELF-DISTANCING TECHNIQUES.  This involves thinking of your personal experience from the outside perspective of a neutral third party. Like WHY DID HE FAIL instead of WHY DID I FAIL?  Research shows that when people adopt a SELF-DISTANCED perspective while discussing a difficult event in life, they make better sense of their reactions and end up experiencing less emotional distress and display fewer psychological signs of stress.  In the long-term, they also experience reduced reactivity when remembering the same problematic event💊💊💊

Ooooooops, experts encourage us to SHARE OUR OWN FAILURE STORY.  But human nature dictates that we hide our own FAILURES [out of a sense of shame] but there are ways to turn FAILURE into SUCCESS by transforming it into a story of growth.  Topping our bucket list is to RECOGNIZE our SUCCESSES.  There are many ways to shore up our own ego. Now what comes next?  THINK BEYOND FAILURE.  Beyond that emotional challenge to our ego, FAILURE also presents a cognitive challenge, meaning that information from FAILURE can be harder to process than successful experiences.  Indeed, THAT STEEP ROAD TO RECOVERY may seem so far and unachievable.  But we got to roll with the punches, dude❗❗❗

The Odds of Winning That Giant Stuffed Panda

The Odds of Winning That Giant Stuffed Panda

Surely, everyone of us have been to either a carnival or a leisure/gaming zone offering tons of games and that includes bringing hom te the bacon [that Giant Stuffed Panda] if your sot is 'spot on'  But do we agree that The Odds of Winning That Giant Stuffed Panda is so low such that it's very likely you will run out of tokens till you 'TOP UP' and 'TOP UP' till you run out of pennies.  Surely many of us [and that includes me several times in the past] tend to be so enamored with the glittering prize at the end of the road.  Problem is the probability of winning over the prized reward was NEVER assessed.  Hence, more often we often find ourselves STUCK IN THE MUD.  No thanks to The Odds of Winning That Giant Stuffed Panda📌📌📌

I grabbed this poster because I thought this says it all.  And this tells us that it's all in our MINDSET.  While we WON'T has 0% probability of SUCCESS.  Once you WANT, that probability shoots up to 40% and once you commit by stating "I AM", that probability comes close to 100% not until you access SUCCESS.  What this tells us, we will CHART OUR COURSE, and no one else❗❗❗

What this all tells us is that the chance of SUCCESS affects the effort people put in.  And many of the things you do in life can be improved with additional effort.  In school, spending more time on a report is likely to lead to a better academic grade.  At work, you might enlist the HELP of a team member to look over a presentation to increase the chance that you'll succeed in landing a client.  Doing another workout might make you more likely to win✅✅✅

So, what FACTORS lead us to put in that EXTRA effort to engage additional resources to improve your chances of SUCCESS?  Many studies have shown that a lot of the dependencies in life are outcome-based.  And when one decides to put in more effort to increase his chances of winning, that probability of winning increases.  As an 'ICING ON THE CAKE', people of such mindset would put in MORE effort overall to win a larger prize instead of the small ones💎💎💎

The combination of results reflects that people will feel better if they win than if they DON'T [so they put in MORE effort when the chances of winning are already high] and they feel better winning a larger prize than a small prize.  Our safe conclusion here is that we often focus on the OUTCOMES of our efforts rather than on the process for achieving a goal.  So, are you still hell-bent of Winning that giant-stuffed panda❓❓❓

When ENVY Rears Its UGLY Head

When ENVY Rears Its UGLY Head

Generally, we are NOT that envious BUT When does ENVY Rears Its UGLY Head is what matters most because we need to figure out the CAUSE of this EFFECT.  And generally, what CAUSES us to ENVY others is when we start comparing our own self to others.  Nothing wrong admiring what they have, their fashion, their accessories, their car BUT be cautious if you are breaching the borderline IF/WHEN you start comparing yourself to them💎💎💎

It was Monday morning, now you're back to work and as your email InBox got updated, you received that mail notification that your friend/classmate way back university is now a Vice Pres in a global bank.  By coincidence, you were recently laid off from your last job.  Instantly, you feel RESENTFUL.  And you might start questioning things like WHY the trajectories of your friend's career is opposite yours?  Oh oh, while it's true that studies show 75% of us are indeed envious of others, let us realize that comparing ourselves to others can leave us feeling anxious and FRUSTRATED.  But that does NOT help us at all in life📌📌📌

Now let's focus how to put a STOP to this 'JEALOUSY GAME'.  Identify the triggers of ENVY.  Is it when you scroll through LINKEDIN?  Or is it when you hear your friend BRAGGING about her salary increase?  Use such observations to learn about yourself.  Then make a list of WHO and WHAT you frequently ENVY or COMPARE yourself to. Write down how it impacts you and resolve to be more VIGILANT so you can pre-empt yourself in the future⏳⏳⏳

Back in my early school life, I had a classmate who was perennially entrenched as the #1 in our grade level [across 5 to 6 sections per grade] and initially I was really ENVY because he was so consistently entrenched as our #1 from Grade 1 till we graduated Grade 6 till we went to High School.  BUT in a timely manner, I realized that I should be THANKFUL instead if I was receiving 2nd Honors [versus 1st Honors] because I was still at the top tier of our class/  So, what I did then was to FOCUS on my strengths.  I even made a list of my achievements [and I realized that record was NOT bad]❗❗❗

But hold on, there will always be that COMPETITION.  WHY?  Because you DON'T live in your own world.  And that can be helpful wherein you will view people with ENVY as allies rather than as a threat.  If you avoid people that trigger self-comparison, you may miss out on how those successful people can help you.  So, there you are, draw that inspiration from the successes of others instead of getting dragged negatively.  Think about of things you can learn from them and you can even approach them and seek their advice as to how they did it.  In the end, they can be part of your INSPIRATION.  It's NOT too late to avoid when ENVY rears its UGLY HEAD✅✅✅

Odds Are Just A Number

Odds Are Just A Number

Analytics is a huge business [In 2021, it was valued at US$ 93.08 billion and expected to grow to US$137.51 by 2026.  So, it should NOT surprise us if anywhere, we hear odds are being pegged based on analytics data.  Case in point.  In the ongoing NBA Championships, the underdog Miami Heat Team was given a 3% chance to hurdle the Milwaukee Bucks, then the same 3% chance to hurdle its next opponent, the New York Knicks and the same 3% chance to beat the Boston Celtics.  To cut the long story short, we better throw away on the window all those analytics because today, the Miami Heat plays the Denver Nuggets for the NBA Championship.  Indeed, Odds Are Just A Number❗❗❗

Though 'WHAT ARE THE ODDS' is pretty much the catchphrase of coincidences, a coincidence is NOT just something that was unlikely to happen . The overstuffed crate labeled 'coincidences' is packed with an amazing variety of experiences and yet something more than rarity compels us to group them together.  They have a similar texture, a feeling that the FABRIC of LIFE has rippled.  The question is where this feeling comes from, why we notice certain ways the threads of our lives collide💎💎💎

So, where does this leave us?  How far should we cling and embrace all those analytics?  My 2-cents is this:  Let us accept analytics based on its face value, period.  Beyond that, let us NOT leave our face to analytics.  Ask Jimmy Butler, the Miami Heat superstar.  Ask the respected Miami Heat President Pat Riley and its Fil-Am Coach Erik Spoelstra, not one within that troika and the Miami Heat organization will ever be glued at those analytics⏳⏳⏳

Swinging back to our lives, first hand I have seen people using those odds as their very reason [a.k.a. alibi] to lazily target for a goal.  Heard these one-liners:  OH NO, I HATE THAT COURSE, IT WON'T PAY MUCH.... I DON'T CARE TO STUDY HARD IN THAT SUBJECT BECAUSE THE ODDS ARE AGAINST ME.... THERE'S NOTHING I CAN DO WITH MY DWINDLING SALES NOW BECAUSE THE ODDS ARE AGAINST US📌📌📌

What's our FIX?  Oh Oh, success rarely comes without any challenges or hurdles.  It is far too common to see people succeeding after a reasonable delay.  So, what's so special about inspiring success stories?  How do we succeed when fighting against the odds?  What should we NOT do?  DON'T give up easily when the going gets tough because of that FEAR of FAILURE.  We all come across a point in our lives when we fail multiple times but I assure you, one day you will overcome the odds because ODDS ARE JUST A NUMBER✅✅✅

Why Does A TIMEOUT QUELL A RALLY?

Why Does A TIMEOUT QUELL A RALLY?

Timeouts and rallies are NOT just all about games and competitive sports.  In life, we hit crossroads when a RALLY is needed but it can only happen if a TIMEOUT gets invoked.  So, Why Does A TIMEOUT QUELL A RALLY?  Simple.  A TIMEOUT is a multi-pronged head animal which offers tons of advantages and only in exchange for you to invoke that TIMEOUT, that's all it takes📌📌📌

So, for the uninitiated in the world of competitive sports, when do we need to mount a RALLY?  That's WHEN an opportunity gets slipping away.  That's WHEN the tide has swung over to your foe.  That's WHEN you're starting to play catch-up ball.  That's WHEN your window to win gets narrower.  And to RALLY is as relevant to our life as it is to the competitive world of sports.  Heard of couples who had to go for a 'GETAWAY' from the kids to give their marriage a 'SHOT IN THE ARM'❓❓❓

Why do organizations allocate tons of budget for team building activities?  It is to foster and strengthen the bond amongst its employees.  BUT you might challenge.  Is that gargantuan budget really needed all because of the best intentions to strengthen relationships within and across teams?  The answer here is a SOLID AFFIRMATIVE.  We prefer proactive measures that reactive ones❗❗❗

Admittedly, what we're espousing now runs counter to the adage "WHY FIX THE CAR IF AIN'T BROKEN".  But our retort is this:  When managing relationships. taking a proactive stance will entail lesser efforts [and costs, if applicable] versus being reactive to repair a relationship that is either strained or damaged💎💎💎

Whether we're talking of relationships for couples, loved ones, family. at the workplace or even in the business environment, think about being proactive in managing with the relationship cycle.  If you need to INVITE your valued clients for a testimonial event, go for it.  You may fork out $$$$$ now but the dividends and returns will be unquantifiable down the road.  So, Why Does a TIMEOUT QUELL A RALLY?  You know by now✅✅✅

Stop The Bleeding

Stop The Bleeding

When do we Stop The Bleeding?  The old school of thought tells us to Stop The Bleeding when blood starts to bleed.  Or, for the more conservative [and cocky], they'll Stop The Bleeding when the bleeding goes unabated by untold proportions.  Where do we stand with these different schools of thought when we swing back to our lives?  From my battle-scarred past, I'll be strongly egging each of you to Stop The Bleeding even before the first blood oozes out.  Oh really?  Yesirrrrrs, as long the probability is there already, WHY WAIT FOR THE BLOOD to ooze out❓❓❓

In short, you don't Stop The Bleeding when you enter DANGER ZONE because way ahead of entering DANGER ZONE, we could smell blood if that's the next thing to happen because you can NEVER be a step late.  In our relationships, WHEN do you 'move your ass' [pardon the expression]?  Only WHEN your spouse/partner walks out of your home? That's TOO LITTLE TOO LATE

In our relationships with our spouse/partner and loved ones, we should be fully aware of what is NORMAL or NOT.  When things seem to breach the threshold, even assuming we are kids playing out there, when things are getting awry, let's Stop The Bleeding, let's call a truce temporarily.  Why do things go from BAD to WORSE?  It's because most of the time, we DON'T take that pre-emptive move to Stop The Bleeding when it's the best NEXT MOVE

So, why is it most of us miss to Stop The Bleeding in a timely manner?  First, we [REGRETTABLY] missed that out.  We're unaware that th Stop The Bleeding is one of our options.  Second we're aware of it but simply because of sheer over-confidence [a.k.a. cockiness] we thought there was NO NEED for it.  Third, we were so [overly] optimistic that the situation will SELF-CORRECT itself.  No, SELF-CORRECT happens in MS Office only✅✅✅

Outstanding academic performers in school get DERAILED to achieve their scholastic results because they FAIL to Stop The Bleeding.  Relationships end fatally because couples/partners FAIL to Stop The Bleeding.  Performance at the work place FAILS to get back on trach because the employee [and sometimes together with his manager] FAIL to Stop The Bleeding.  And some enterprise business eventually fold up because they FAIL to Stop The Bleeding.  Even our Mother Earth has gone from bad to worse because we all did FAIL to Stop The Bleeding when this was long overdue decades back❗❗❗

Can You Still Control?

Can You Still Control?

Everyone of us just went through the gauntlet, that harrowing Covid pandemic and the most difficult part of it was that UNCERTAINTY that was looming all over us for more than two years.  But there's this study that states that that UNCERTAINTY unlocks a desire from within us to CONTROL what we can. So,  Can you still control❓❓❓

So HOW do we navigate through those UNCERTAINTIES [oooooops, even after the Covid pandemic ended, let's admit that UNCERTAINTIES remain in life]?  When we're anxious, we're likely to IMAGINE the worst-case scenarios BUT we gotta remind ourselves that the worst-case scenarios is only one of many possible outcomes.  It can be helpful to think about the BEST-CASE scenario and the MOST-REALISTIC scenario, which falls somewhere between the BEST and the WORST.  Now, let's dissect.  WHY do we crave for CERTAINTY?  Simple. The way you view things affects how you feel💎💎💎

Going back to the recent pandemic, IF we knew when the virus would die out, we'd feel better.  If we knew for sure that when it died out, we'd be okay, with a job and a roof over our heads and food to eat and we'd feel better.  NOT knowing leads to UNCERTAINTY and once we experience that, we often try to reduce our discomfort by trying to take CONTROL.  BUT there's just not much more that we can do other than sheltering in place, limiting our exposure to other people.  Unfortunately, most of us CAN'T reduce our risk to ZERO.  So it's imperative to accept that we CAN'T always take 100% CONTROL❕❕❕

Instead, re-look things from two vantage points, namely, those things that MATTER and those things that you can CONTROL.  And when you plot those circled areas in juxtaposition, they overlay area surfaces out and that becomes your FOCUS AREA.  Note that there are many things that matter but are way beyond your CONTROL, hence that's not even within your radar or telescopic view.  To cap this all, always know where and when CAN YOU CONTROL✅✅✅

Be damn sure though that when you blurt out 'EVERYTHING IS OK', that really is the case INSIDE-OUT.  Because the common pitfall where we end up stalled is that, based on human nature, we are often in DENIAL.  We refuse to take a BP even when we feel our blood pressure is spiking.  We refuse to rest and take a break even if our energy is zapped.  Worst, we end up lured to controlling.  But CAN YOU STILL CONTROL❓❓❓