Self-motivation is crucial to pursuing important goals in our lives. But making a change, such as committing to a new project or dream, takes perseverance, and many of us struggle to stay motivated over time.
So, how can we stay on task without losing our motivational drive? As an educational researcher and content writer, I would take a two-step approach to answer this question. Let’s first try to understand what self-motivation is and why it’s important. This will then help us to see how we can motivate ourselves to work towards our goals over long periods of time.
Self-motivation is the capacity to get yourself to take action to accomplish tasks that you see as important for your future. It’s the drive to keep working towards your goals, even when it feels challenging. However, maintaining self-motivation requires self-discipline. In other words, it’s not enough to try to stay motivated. You also need to feel obligated to achieve necessary tasks and be determined to complete them.
But there is much more to self-motivation than trying to will yourself into taking action and being persistent. To learn more about the psychology of self-motivation, it helps to consider some other factors that affect our motivation.
Keep reading if you want to learn more about this topic and explore ways to become more self-motivated.
Self-Motivation and Its Link to Personal Growth
According to emotional-intelligence expert Daniel Goleman, we need to have four mental attitudes to stay self-motivated [1]. First, we need to develop a personal drive to reach our goals. Second, we need to commit to ourselves (or someone else) to achieve our goals even in the face of obstacles. Third, we need to take the initiative and be open to opportunities that may improve our lives. And fourth, we need to develop an optimistic mindset to pursue our dreams regardless of the difficulties we may face.
But why is this so important for our personal growth? To answer this question, we first need to understand that there are two main types of motivation: extrinsic and intrinsic.
