Intro

You're listening to episode number 23 of the Transform Your Life from the Inside Out podcast. In this episode you're going to learn what to do when you don't have enough motivation to start new things, or to get the outcomes that you want. I know this applies to just about every single person listening to this podcast, is that we can't find the motivation or we can't stay motivated. So stay tuned, because you're going to learn how to get out of that vicious trap of self sabotage. Hi, I'm Jim Fortin, and you're about to start transforming your life from the inside out. With this podcast, I'm widely considered the leader in subconscious transformation. And I've coached super achievers all around the world for over 25 years. Here, you're going to find no rah-rah motivation and no HYPE, because this podcast is a combination of brain science, transformational psychology, and ancient wisdom all rolled into one to take your life to levels you have never thought possible. If you're wanting a lot more in life to feel better, to heal, to have peace of mind, to feel powerful and alive, and to bring more abundance and prosperity into your life, then this podcast is for you because you're going to start learning how to master your mind and evolve your consciousness. And when you do that, anything you want then becomes possible for you. I'm glad you're here.

Commitment is Far Better Than Motivation

You know, what's the word that you hear so many people talking about? I mean, for crying out loud, we even have motivational speakers. I mean, have you ever thought about that? You know, what is the purpose, the longterm purpose of motivational speakers? Well, motivation is that huge word that millions of people talk about, but yet few people understand and they also don't know how to, how to sustain motivation. If you're battling, staying motivated at working out or a new desire and behavior or something that you want to create in life, then whatever you do, listen to this entire episode. Because when you actually try to stay motivated, you're starting in the wrong place psychologically. And that's why it wears off very, very quickly.
Okay. I want to start with a behavior and a metaphor that pretty much everyone listening can understand, and that is working out. Because we can see that, you know, that's an external behavior. And pretty much, everyone of you listening, I mean even if you're motivated at doing that, than take what you're going to learn here and use it in a different area of your life where you're not finding yourself to be motivated. But you know, working out, you know the old numbers that you know, come the third week of January, something like 92% of people have already stopped working out when they made a new year's resolution to go to the gym. And you know, the old song and dance, you know, you've got the good intentions and you're all excited and you want to do it and you say, well, this time's going to be different. And then you start out and you know, statistics demonstrate two to three weeks later, you're right back to your old behaviors again. Well the question is, which we're going to talk about in this episode is, why does this happen? And what do you do instead? Here's the reason that you fail, which I said just a minute or so and go, is that you're starting in the wrong place psychologically. And you can be thinking, well, you know, Jim, how can I be thinking about being motivated? And how is that the wrong place to start? Well, let me ask you this. Ponder this. What sustains motivation? Because see, what many people do, and by the way, this the old phrase by Jim Rohn a phenomenal man. He passed away a few years back. But Jim Rohn used to say, and by the way, I'm not calling you or anyone listening an idiot, but Jim Rohn used to say that, “If you motivate an idiot, you've got nothing more than a motivated idiot.” And like I said, I'm not calling you an idiot, but you know, some people can actually sustain the motivation, but it wears off pretty quickly. But motivation is external. So the question I'm asking you is what sustains your motivation? As you're pondering that, let me share with you, um, we're, we're going to go a couple, a couple of levels deep here. What sustains motivation for most people when they don't want to stay motivated is this one thing, and that is, and by the way, this one thing is something that probably most of you have a challenge with and being transparent.
I used to have a challenge with that as well, so I completely get it. That one thing that sustains motivation is commitment. Let me explain what I mean. So let's go back to working out. So you say, you know what, I'm going to get in shape. You know, summer's rolling around and I want to look good in my new bikini, or you know, I'm taking family pictures or I'm getting married, I'm going to Hawaii on vacation, I want to look good on the beach, whatever it is. So you tell yourself that you're going to start working out. Then what happens is you start the process of working out and then week number one, you know what? You're all hyped up about it. Week number two, for some reason, for many of you and into week three, many of you aren't seeing the results that you want fast enough. Then what happens is when people don't see the results that they want fast enough, what they do is they stop working out and then they go right back into their old patterns again, right? I know that you probable probably understand that cycle. Well, here is the difference and I'm talking about when we start working out. If you don't have the motivation or you have a fair amount of motivation or to whatever degree your motivation is, but for some reason you do get yourself started. What happens is when the motivation wears off, as I just said, we quit. That's where commitment has to come in. Because when you stay committed to working out, even if you don't want to do it, what happens is eventually and generally pretty quickly, you start getting results and now that you're getting results, what happens? Uh, and you've gotten the results as a result of being committed.
Now what happens is it's easier to stay motivated because you're getting the results and the results and the results actually, you know, sustain the motivation. But notice the bridge from you know, being tepid with your, with your motivation or having a hard time with it. The bridge from there to staying motivated is commitment. Here's something that I want you to understand is that commitment is the bridge between where you are and where you want to be. And then if we actually look into that even deeper self integrity yourself. Integrity is the foundation of commitment. And by the way, self integrity is this. Um, and you know, I've done this for a lot of years and people fall into statistics and categories and patterns. Self integrity is doing what you say you're going to do when you say you're going to do it. And talking about numbers just now, what I know is that 90% of you will say, you know what? When I commit to other people, I follow through. But when I commit to myself, I only follow through were like 70% of the time. And those are pretty much numbers that I have just seen for years and years coming out of all of my transformational groups. So let me give you a metaphor for commitment. So right now you're at point A and you want to go to point B. Now let's imagine a bridge, and I've given this metaphor before, but let's imagine and by the way, repetition is the mother of all learning, so let's say that you know what you were appointed and you want to go to point B. And from point A to point B is a bridge. Well that bridge is made out of concrete, and the concrete actually has a foundation inside of it which is the rebar, so the bridge and the concrete are the commitment and the self integrity is the rebar.
Also, I'm not going to talk a whole lot about self integrity in this episode because I know that I'll create entire episodes on you know, staying committed, being committed and on self integrity. A little later because I'm going to go a different direction here in just a moment. But I wanted to lay this foundation for you at this point is that when you're not motivated, the bridge that you need to get you where you want to go to the outcomes you want is commitment until the motivation becomes self sustaining. And then obviously it's self sustaining, but it's the commitment that helped it become self sustaining. In my transformational coaching program, we do a whole week on commitment and many people say, and it's, it's, it's pretty much universal. Many people will say, wow, I never realized that. I've never been committed to anything in life. And the reality is that everyone is committed to something right now. Even if you're not getting the results that you want, life, you are committed to whatever it is that you're doing, even if you're not getting the results that you want in life. What I tell people is one of the most powerful things that you can do is you can actually become committed to being committed. But a lot of people say they're not committed. And I want you to understand that you're fully committed to a lot of things, too many things in life. And if you're not getting the results that you want and you're upset with yourself, it's because you're committed to something else.
Some other psychological strategy or behavior that's actually not getting you the outcomes that you want, but you know what I definitely want you to understand is that you are committed to something, if you're in phenomenal shape and you eat well, guess what? You're committed to working out and eating well and staying in shape. If you're a hundred pounds overweight, guess what? As long as it's not actually neurological brain chemistry or whatever, and if it's, you know, specifically behavior, you're committed, even if you're lying on the couch everyday eating cheetos and Doritos and Hohos and Ding dongs and that's what you do every day, you are committed to that. So I want you to recognize that yes, you're deeply committed to a lot of stuff. You just have to look at what am I committed to and is it getting me the outcomes and results that I want. Just a minute ago I said that we're going to go, you know, a little bit different direction. I wasn't going to spend a whole lot of time on commitment in this episode or on self integrity, but I want to go deeper. Here's something that you probably haven't heard before and you know what's interesting is, I haven't really heard anybody say this, but when you look at it, it's true what you're committed to right now as you're listening to this, what you are committed to is your habits. But see, you don't call those commitments. You just call them habits. And I know what's interesting is that you know what habits are fundamental because everything you have in your life, and I mean everything, everything you have for everything you don't have is a reflection of your habits. Yet, very few people are really in depth talking about, you know, the brain process and reptilian brain and how it creates habits and sustains habits. And we are quite literally the product of our habits. I saw something on Facebook, it was a meme and it said something that, oh, I don't know what it was.
It says you won't get in life what you want, you'll get your habits. But what's missing there is you don't get in life what you want, you get your brain based reptilian subconscious habits. And that's what this whole podcast is about, is transforming from the inside out. And I want to start ingraining it, and I want you to start thinking from what are my unconscious paradigms, what are my unconscious habits, and what are my brain-based habits? Also, you know, like I said, I'm not gonna talk too much about habits here because I want to lay this out conceptually for you first. But if you go back and you search the earlier episodes, I believe it's one of it's, you know, episode four or five or six or something like that, there is a more comprehensive episode on brain-based habits and how to actually start creating habits and, and, and creating habits that work for you. Let me point something else out here very quickly is people personalize things. So let's say for example, you know, we're talking about working out and let's say that you're one of those people and you fall in the 92% category, and you start working out and then guess what? A few weeks later you're back to your old patterns again. When I say personalized, what I mean by that is many people say, you know what? Oh my gosh, you know, I'm back in that cycle again. And I said I was going to do it. And I was all motivated for a couple of weeks and then fell off track and something came up and I'm back into my old patterns again, and my blue jeans don't fit anymore, and I'm eating junk food again. And then people personalize that and they say, well, that must mean that I am lazy, or I have no discipline, or I just can't follow through.
And then many times, actually people create beliefs off from this evidence, not even recognizing it's not about them. When I'm going to say here about habits and I've set in the habit episode, is that your habits, 95% of what you do is research demonstrated. It's actually completely brain-based your brain. Make sure decisions for you, your reptilian part of the brain actually is the seat of the brain, are the part of the brain, the oldest part of the brain where habits come from. These are survival mechanisms. And the reason we create habits is just imagine if you had to learn to ride a bike every time you got on the bike. This is why we learn things and they become habitual and they become unconscious and they become automatic. So what we want to look at here is that people beat them selves up for not, you know, for not being motivated or not staying motivated or not being committed. And it's nothing more than reptilian brain habits. So instead of focusing on your motivation or even focusing on your commitment, what I instead want you to focus on as this, I want you to ask yourself, what is it that I want to create? And then where I want you to look next is we're going to kind of scoot them over to the side a little bit with the motivation and the commitment. What I want you to look at next is I want you to ask yourself this, what habit could I start? And can commit to that habit? And you know what, when I start that habit, that habit alone will help get me the outcome that I want. I'm gonna give you an example in my own life about how you can use this. So I'm very proactive with my health. Um, you may or may not know, I don't know how many episodes you've listened to, but my brother in law is a shaman. Shamans are healers. And, and for many years I have been very, very proactive with which, I don't even know why they call it alternative healing. I mean, it should be primary healing, but healing ourselves naturally and holistically. So I use the machine, um, and I'm not gonna go into, but I guess I'll explain a little bit here. Basically it's a board of electrodes, but it's not, it's made out of plastic and everything, but it's full of electrodes,
and it actually is like electromagnetic acupuncture. And for me, acupuncture has been amazing in my life in terms of health and wellness. And even actually, if you've never tried acupuncture, I'd definitely suggest you try it. I mean, there's a reason it's been around 3000 years. For me, it's been like amazing. But anyway, I have something that does electromagnetic acupuncture. And candidly, it's a little bit of work to set this thing up and then you have to lie on it and you're on it for like 43 minutes, depending on the program you're on. I'm going to be candid. It's not entirely comfortable, but yet to health benefits are phenomenal. So I told myself, this was about three weeks ago, and I have this unit, it's about 1500 bucks. So, I mean I don't want to waste money and I'm like, okay, I need to start using this and I need to do it on a daily basis. But because of the hassle it is to pull out and set up and get comfortable and then lie on it and all the electrodes, I just, I wasn't doing it. So I know that you can relate to that in some area of your life. There's something that you really know you need to be doing but you're not doing. So let's go there with it, and you use that metaphor. So what I did is I said, you know what I, the benefits of that thing that I researched or overwhelming, I am going to do it. And not only that, I'm going to commit to doing it even though I wasn't motivated to do it, but I know, I know that I needed to do it. I commit to doing it. And then what I did, which I talked about in the habit program and that episode is I said, okay, every day at a certain time. And I set my phone alarm by it every day at a certain time. I, no matter what's going on, no matter if you know I've got, you know, anything, doesn't matter. What I'm going to do is I'm committing that I will get on that thing every single day period, and I guess weeks three and a half now.
And the first week was kinda like, you know, this little self talk. We have some times like, wow, okay, well this is the pain in the rear end and blah blah blah, but I need to do this now. It's like clockwork. Why? Because I have habituated the behavior and I don't even need to stay committed to it anymore and I don't need to stay committed and don't even need motivation because it's becoming a habit. See, whatever you have as a habit, you don't need motivation for it. Whether it's actually going to work out or it's lying on the couch. I mean, if you're in the habit of lying on the couch, you don't need motivation for that. If you're in the habit of going to the gym, most likely because it feels good because it releases endorphins. You go to the gym. So what I did is I took something that I consider it was relatively small. I mean it's just a matter of time and getting on it and everything, but I actually just habituated the activity of it. And now guess what? I look forward to it. Whereas I've had this thing now for I guess a year and I wasn't using it. Why? Because I wasn't motivated. Why? Because I wasn't committed. Why? Because there wasn't in the habit. Now I'm in the habit and the motivation and the commitment come easily. So that's what I want to suggest in this episode is, I want you to look at, I want you to look at what you want to create and I want to actually stop focusing on the motivation or the commitment for a moment. And I want you to ask yourself what small commitment and keep it small. And the reason I say keep it small is because we actually tried to go big is what we do when we, we have things that we really want to change.
Let's say we've got a, you know, a big thing we want a chance, like our health while imagine trying to turn around on a cruise ship on a dime. It doesn't happen. It takes time. How much time? That's entirely a matter of your personal motivation. But the way that I look at it is I used to want to tackle 47 things. I'm going to eat right, I'm going to exercise, I'm going to use my rebounder, I'm gonna sit in my infrared sauna. I'm going to take all my supplements, I'm going to do all these things for my health. And then it was hard to keep up because as overloading myself. So that's why I say, let's just take this really easy. There is an app you can get. Um, I use iPhone, I don't know about Androids, but I'm sure you probably can. It's, it's a free app and it's called commit to three. And basically what you do, because many of you need to learn how to have commitment. Most of us don't have commitment. Well, like I said, we're committed to everything, but we're not committed. You know, to the outcomes that we want is get this app, it's called commit to three. It's free and pick three small things every day to commit to the APP will remind you. The reason I want you to do this is because they want you to learn how to actually start being and staying committed to things. Because then once you stay committed to something, then it becomes habitual. Then you don't need the motivation because you're operating from brain-based habit, the reptilian brain habit. I also want you to pick really small things because it's easier to start small things than in this big things. You know, a couple of examples here, let's say that you look at your kitchen and it's a mess and you've got to clean the kitchen. Maybe it's Thanksgiving or something, I don't know. But you, you probably been there before where you're like, wow, that kitchen is a mess. I don't even want to go in there. And then you say, well okay, well let me just clean a little bit. And then once you start cleaning, you start, you know you keep cleaning them before you know what you're done.
There was also a book, I believe it was a book actually. I went to look for it on Amazon before I recorded this. I couldn't find it. I didn't look that long, but it wasn't there immediately. But I think the book was called one pushup and the whole point of the book is, what I'm sharing with you now is that don't think about your entire workout routine. Let's say you're working out at home. Many people dread their routines and then what they do is they get in their self talk and it makes it harder for them to work out. Then they start feeling about their self talk and their feelings actually, you know, take them off track. So the whole book is about, you know what, don't commit to 100 pushups or 20 or however many do one. Because see, once you do one, it's an easy to do two Why? Because you already down there, you're already doing it. It's like cleaning the kitchen. Once you get started, you're like, well, you know, heck, I'm already doing it. Why don't I just keep cleaning the kitchen? And before you know it, you're done. Okay, so this episode, the entire episode is about obviously what to do when you're not motivated, but you want to be. So then what many of you do? As I said, you start in the wrong place. I'm going to motivate myself and you try to use your will and it doesn't work. So then we want to look at, okay, well you know what, I might not be motivated but I'm going to actually stay committed to the outcome that I want.
I'm going to break it down into very small pieces, very small commitments, and I'm going to commit to those. And then you're going to actually, you can set an alarm on your phone. I mean use your phone for something other than you know than than, than surfing the internet or are talking, but set an alarm on your phone and you can also by habit apps, which I've mentioned in other places before, and then actually commit to doing whatever it is that you're going to do and do it every single day. I want to give you a word of advice here also is, whatever you commit to doing and you really, really want this to become a habit at some point, do not give yourself an out. Create what I call an unbreakable standard. Now that I'm using this healing device that I told you about, it's an unbreakable standard for me. There is not a day that goes by that I miss and actually now it's become such a habit. I don't even think about, well, okay, I got to set it up and all Ryan I got to do. I don't think of any of that. I just do it because it's habit. But when I started this, I said, no matter what, this is going to become an unbreakable standard and I will do this every single day. Well now it's habit and my brain is just like your brain. My reptilian brain is just like your brain. Obviously we think different things, but our brains process and the same way. So your transformational takeaway is this is that your motivation is sustained, it's driven from your commitments, and then your commitments are driven by your habits. So what you want to do to be repetitive here and again, repetition is the mother of all learning is pick some small micro habit.
Let me explain that for a moment, is I break habits in what I call macro habits and micro habits. A macro macro habit could be working out, like let's say you know you go to the gym, but a micro habit is that you need to pack your gym back every night. What happens many times is people don't manage their micro habits. They will say, you know what, I'm going gonna pack my gym back later. They get up in the morning. Now they don't have any clean clothes and they say, well, because I don't have my gym bag, therefore I can't go to the gym. So they don't do the macro habit because the micro habit has not happened. So what I tell people to do was work on the micro habits because they will sustain the macro habits. So micro habit relative to the gym could be, you could say, you know what is every night before I go to bed, what I commit to is I am going to have my gym bag packed and it's going to be in the back of my car. So when I get ready to go tomorrow, my gym bags are already in the car. Notice how now you no longer have that as an excuse to not do the macro habit which is going to the gym. Okay, that wraps up this episode and the next episode, it's a Q and A. And I'm going to answer Rebecca's question. Her question is this, and I know for a fact this applies to at least 80% of you listening right now. Her question is this, “do you think possible to be truly happy when married to someone who isn't?” Because I know I see it all the time, the relationships, one person's growing and another is not, and I'm going to talk about in the next step is so what happens and what you can do and it's going to also require you to take a deep look at yourself and your fears. So I'll catch you over on that episode. Thanks for listening and I'll catch you later. Make it a great day. Bye Bye.

Conclusion

Thank you for listening to this entire podcast. If you're the kind of person who likes to help others, then share this with your friends and family. You know, if you found value, they will too. So please share via your social media channels. Also, if you have questions, I'm here to assist. You can email me questions to support@jimforton.com and I may even use your question for a future podcast episode. Also, if you want transformational content like this daily connect with me on Instagram. My Instagram name is, I am gym for 10 finally, I do have a personal request. I believe that we're all here to help others and to grow and evolve ourselves. Together. You and I, let's help more people. If you would please leave a review on iTunes and a good one. By the way, I'd be grateful and through your assistance together we can transform more lives. Thanks for listening.