If
you struggle to motivate yourself in the morning, here's a really
quick exercise you can do in a just a few minutes which is guaranteed
to get you feeling positive,
happy and optimistic about your day.
I call it the shower
strategy, and it utilises some simple NLP
and Visualization
practices to get you feeling good vibes in a matter of
minutes.
Naturally, I use this in the shower, but feel free to try it when
commuting to work, doing your shopping or any other low-concentration
task.
This is visualization for people who can't find the time to visualise.
(And yes, the picture of the woman showering is a brazen bribe to get
you to continue reading.)
Here's What To Do:
Take
some deep breaths. The slower and deeper, the better. Spend a
moment or two concentrating on filling your lungs and then slowly
exhaling the used air. All we are aiming for here is a sense of
presence and relaxation. You'll know when you get there, because your
mind won't be racing quite as fast as it usually does, and you won't be
panicked about the coming day. You don't have to be in a state of Zen
Bliss before moving on, just a little less erratic than usual!
Get
Grateful. Next, you want to generate positive feelings for
people / things / achievements / stuff you already have in your life.
Sometimes this is easy, sometimes not, depending on what mood you woke
up in.
Try talking yourself into feeling gratitude for the other person /
thing; for example "Dude - I am really grateful for my flatmate. He
puts up with a lot of my crap, tidies up, brings me home a chocolate
bar from work... he's got my back".
Or - "I'm really grateful for my job. It's crap sometimes, but I get to
be myself at work, I have my own discretion and responsibility, I earn
enough money to do what I want, and my colleagues love me".
Just try to spin things
in a positive light - "reframing" your
experience until you can see all the good in your situation. This
should get you feeling positive, but if not you can do a little bit of
NLP to spice things up a bit too.
What you want to do is create mini-movies in your head by calling up
memories which represent your spoken
words - and then make them as sensory rich as possible.
This means making
the colours bright and vivid, hearing the exact sounds you heard,
feeling what you felt, and essentially trying to transport yourself
back in time to experience the memory again.
So, for example, I'd think of coming home to my flat and seeing my flat
mate had tidied up (again!) I'd replay the sounds I could hear, and
"look around" in my memory, noticing as much detail as possible. I'd
see myself saying thanks to him, and notice how grateful I felt inside.
In short, you should want to relive any grateful memories as vividly as
you can.
This will get you feeling super-grateful and positive inside. Try it
and
you'll see just how powerful this can be, in literally 30-45 seconds.
Yesterday
was awesome. Next, take a minute or two to replay in your mind
only the good things that happened to you yesterday.
Even if you had a horrific day of doom, there's a good chance you will
find one or two redeeming features where you made progress; grew as a
person; handled a challenge well; met someone new; cooked a healthy
dinner - anything that made you proud.
Using the same NLP trick as above, relive these positive memories,
being sure to make them as vivid as possible. See through your own
eyes, see what you saw, hear what you heard, feel what you felt.
By now you'll be feeling seriously good vibes, and feeling optimistic
and confident in your abilities. Next, we plan the coming day.
Today
will be awesome too. Now, run through a mental image of your
upcoming day going well. (note - you don't have to imagine it will be
perfect, "good" will do!)
Again, try to make the mind-movie as sensory rich as possible (this
will be easier as you've just done it with "real" memories a couple of
times)
See things going your way. Know what you are going to do with your day.
See yourself performing at close to the best of your abilities. Give
yourself some love!
The
Big Dream. I finish my shower strategy with a quick minute or
two or visualizing my biggest goals and my dream future. It's a great
way to get motivated for the day ahead.
Simply imagine that all your goals had been accomplished. What do you
do with your day? Where do you live? What does it feel like to have
made your dreams a reality?
Again, try to use NLP to make these pictures as vivid as possible.
Really enjoy seeing yourself having achieved all you want to achieve.
Get
Out. That's it! Jump out of the shower and go have an awesome
day. Once you've practiced this a few times, you'll be able to do the
entire exercise in 2-3 minutes - and the benefits to you will be worth
a lot more than that.
So, that's my shower
strategy. Deep breath, be grateful, remember what went right yesterday,
imagine today going well, see your dream future, get out = one happy,
motivated bunny, ready for the day and world domination.
Good luck!
PS - Another great
daily practice I recommend is reading / listening to Philosophers
Notes. Each day I get a 20 minute overview of one of the top 100
success books of all time. It's concentrated wisdom, for around 50
cents a day. Boom! You can read my review or watch a video I made
if this sounds interesting to you.
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you enjoyed this article, please do share it:
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If
you struggle to motivate yourself in the morning, here's a really
quick exercise you can do in a just a few minutes which is guaranteed
to get 
Just try to spin things
in a positive light - "reframing" your
experience until you can see all the good in your situation. This
should get you feeling positive, but if not you can do a little bit of
NLP to spice things up a bit too. 
The
Big Dream