What is Your Motivation?

There are many powerful forces that shape your life and how it unfolds, and two of those are motivation and validation. Motivation is the driving force behind human behavior that causes you to act in ways that help you achieve your goals. It’s the process that starts, guides, and keeps you doing goal-oriented behaviors.  Validation is the process of acknowledging and accepting your own or someone else’s thoughts, feelings, behaviors, accomplishments, and identity. When you combine motivation and validation, you will be unstoppable. In today’s episode of Your Personal Power Pod we look at how your motivation and validation are impacting your life.


We want to hear from you, whether it’s your stories about how self-esteem and personal power affect your life, or topics you’d like us to address in future episodes. 

We’d love for you to review our podcast. Do this on your streaming service or visit www.yourpersonalpowerpod.com , click Contact and drop us an email. 

You can also find us on Instagram and YouTube at Your Personal Power Pod.

Also, if you’d like to make changes in your personal or business life, spending time with a coach can make all the difference.  Sandy is offering a free consultation, so contact her at sandy@insidejobscoach.com and put COACHING in the subject line to schedule a free call.

Thank you for listening to Your Personal Power Pod.  We look forward to hearing from you.

And, until next time, find your power and change your life!

Transcript

  Welcome to your personal power pod, a podcast about aligning yourself with the life you want. And here are your hosts, Sandy Abel and Shannon Young. 

Another beautiful day. How are you today? 

I'm great, thanks. How are you, Sandy? Happy almost fall to you. 

Yes, we've had gorgeous, gorgeous weather the last few days. It's been in the low 80s and sunshine and white puffy clouds and I just love it all. 

Oh, except for the freak thunderstorm on Saturday,  we should say that we're in Southern Oregon and we do understand that not everybody has spectacular weather and not everybody in Oregon has spectacular weather because a good portion of us have smoke right now, which is summertime on the West coast, but yes, choosing to see the beauty is what we are all about.

Absolutely. I'm stoked about today's topic. You call it, what is your why? 

Uh huh. 

I call it, what is your motivation? And they're basically the same thing. It's why you do what you do. 

That seems like a really big question. Is it as big as it feels like? 

Probably, because all these are. There are many powerful forces that shape your life and how it unfolds.

Two of those are your motivation and your validation. Your motivation is the driving force behind the human behavior that causes you to act in ways that help you achieve your goals. It's the process that starts, guides, and keeps you doing goal oriented behaviors. And validation is the process of acknowledging and accepting your own or someone else's thoughts, feelings, or needs.

Behaviors, accomplishments, identity, et cetera. And when you combine motivation and validation, you will be unstoppable. Today, we're going to look at those things. 

What is motivation? 

Like you say, what is your why? It's the reason for the decisions you're making or the actions you're taking, which often creates a rush of energy or a drive to achieve and you focus on the goals.

It's the force that makes you take action and move ahead. 

So I'm confused a little because. It seems to me like there are times when motivation isn't necessarily the thing that makes you move forward. It can be the thing that keeps you stuck. 

Oh, explain that to me. 

If your motivation is to stay feeling safe and in the familiar, then maybe you're making choices to sabotage yourself.

That is true, and that is a short term motivation. If you have a longer term motivation that you want to actually accomplish something, you have to balance those. 

So this is deciding, I want to move forward, what motivates me to move forward? 

Yes. 

Okay, so it's what compels you to get out of bed in the morning, to overcome obstacles, to tackle things that are hard, and move towards something instead of staying where you are.

Exactly. At least that's what we're talking about today, is the motivation that moves you ahead. And it's not a one size fits all concept, because it can be fueled by different sources and take on various forms, like you just said. 

Oh, interesting. So there are different types. 

Yes, there's intrinsic and extrinsic.

Uh huh.  Intrinsic motivation comes from within you. It's when you're driven by internal rewards, like personal growth or just a passion for something. You want a sense of accomplishment. It comes from inside of you. For example, if you're learning a new language because you love the process of mastering something new, that's intrinsic motivation.

I think we probably all know somebody like this who just seems to know what they want and just quietly move towards it. Yes. They don't allow outside influences to sway them. 

Exactly. A lot of very successful people, especially inventors and that kind of thing, they just know where they're going. They know what they're doing.

Their motivation is to move ahead and be successful in whatever it is they're doing. And if they don't have instant success, they're still motivated enough. To keep going. And that comes from within. 

So then there must be one that comes from without. 

That's extrinsic motivation. 

Okay. 

Which is driven by external forces like rewards or recognition from others or lots of money or fame, that kind of thing.

Examples of extrinsic motivation are getting a promotion at work or receiving praise for a job well done or having other people notice and appreciate you. 

So I would think it would be important to balance those two because if you put all of your hopes and dreams and the way you feel ultimately in other people's hands, then it's out of your control.

Exactly. So it's good to acknowledge your extrinsic motivation, but you also definitely have to have intrinsic. It has to come from inside of you to keep you moving. Often nowadays, well and always, there are people who are going to be critical. There are people who are going to tell you that you're wasting your time or making a fool of yourself or why are you bothering or even if you get this done, it won't be very valuable.

And if you're looking for their motivation from outside to keep you going, you're not going to go, you're going to be stuck. 

Yeah. That's giving your power away. 

What about you? What is your motivation? What keeps you going? What's your why? 

For me, I think it all comes back to my core values. One of which is fun.

I want to have fun in my life. Yes. It has to be fun for me. And I don't necessarily mean like knee slapping party kind of fun, but I need to get some kind of joy from it. It needs to 

make you smile. 

It needs to make me smile somewhere like internally, externally. And then authenticity, it takes entirely too much energy to be somebody other than who I actually am.

I make decisions based on where I feel most like me. How about you? 

Yes, absolutely. Those two things and all of my core values, honesty, loyalty, being responsible, reliable, all those things. Also my driving force with things like doing the podcast and writing books and my coaching and all that. My motivation is to support and empower people.

If somebody can discover how awesome they are from our time together, that's just the hugest motivation there is. I just love that because I want them to love themselves. 

What a beautiful gift you give everybody. 

Oh, aren't you sweet? Well, so do you. You do the same thing. But that is a huge motivation. And I noticed that neither one of us said money or fame or fortune  in that. 

And our bank accounts might reflect that.  

Although we're both doing fine. We have roofs over our heads. We have food. We're warm and safe. It would be fun to have a yacht, but I don't need one. I like what I'm doing and that is the validation for what I'm doing. 

I would love to have a pool and I know you wanted a pool for a long time and would probably appreciate having one and having a boat would be amazing.

But when it gets right down to it for both of us, I think the reason we would want those things is because then we would fill them with the people that we love. And so really it wouldn't be about the boat or the pool. It would be about spending time with the people we love. 

Exactly. 

That's where the motivation comes from.

You can do that without having the boat or the pool. So it's a tool, but it's not imperative. 

Exactly. And a lot of people want fame because they're looking for validation and they're not getting it internally. 

We hear that word a lot. What is validation? 

It's the recognition and affirmation that your actions or feelings or identity are good and positive and that other people like and respect them.

That what you think and feel are legitimate. 

Yeah. Well, and are appreciated and respected by other people or by yourself. 

Oh, that's a big one. 

You got to have internal validation. 

Cause it comes down to the fact that everybody wants to feel like they've been seen, heard, and valued. 

Absolutely. We all want that.

From the day we're born, we need to feel that we are loved and valued and seen and heard. Once we start talking, or even when you're a baby and you start crying, you're crying because you're hungry or you're wet or whatever, and you want to be heard. Those are huge human needs, and when those are validated, it makes such a difference.

So it would seem to me that there would have to be, as with motivation, two kinds. Validation that comes from inside and validation that comes from outside. 

Absolutely. There's external validation, which comes from other people, whether it's a compliment from a friend. We love external validation on our podcast.

We love it when our listeners send us an email or a text and say, Hey, we love that episode and this is why, and it was so great. And that's really fun because that's what it's all about, is trying to support and empower people. And that validation that it's working is really strong and makes us smile.

You might get a praise from your boss or a hug from your family member. something externally from somebody else that lets you know that what you're doing and who you are is appreciated and validated. 

This is why listening skills are so important, because you can't validate somebody else if you don't listen to them.

Absolutely. That is so huge. Yes. If all you do is talk, And you can't wait for your turn to jump in and say your piece. The people you're talking with or to or at are not feeling validated at all because you're not seeing and hearing them. You're just taking over. External validation can be really nice.

It can boost your confidence, make you feel appreciated. But if you rely too heavily on it, you can become dependent on it and that can cause problems if you're not getting enough. 

Yeah. You have to be able to validate yourself. 

I've known people who live for external validation. They are always performing, or always doing something that they think will get the attention, the positive attention of other people.

So they can feel that they are seen and heard because they're not doing it internally. 

And that's crazy making! 

Because you can't be you a hundred percent of the time. You can't be incredibly awesome running around looking for people to say, Oh, wow, you're cool all the time. And I think a lot of people who are famous need that.

And it's really sad that if they don't get the external validation that they're looking for, they feel empty. 

That's such a Dangerous place to be because I had a minuscule amount of fame when I was working in broadcast news, and people could be wonderful and it would feel really good when they would say, you are so good at what you do and we watch you every night and that kind of thing.

Yes. 

But the amount of awful mail I got was equal, if not more so, just because people are unhappy and they take it out on other people. And so reading emails about how somebody doesn't like the shape of my face. or my clothes or my delivery, you know, things you can't change. At a certain point, if you're gonna put a whole lot of value on external feedback, then you have to kind of accept all of the external feedback.

And that's not healthy. You have to learn to be like, I'll take the good where it comes. I will pay attention to the negative. If somebody has a point, if I'm mispronouncing words all over the place, maybe I should learn to pronounce towns the right way. 

And that's constructive criticism, hopefully constructive criticism, which we all need to learn to accept.

Right. But just criticism because they don't like your face. 

I'm not going to change my nose, sorry. 

That is their problem, not yours. And that's where internal validation comes from, which is the recognition and acceptance of yourself from within. We talk about this a lot. It's your self esteem and claiming your personal power and saying, you know, I am a lovable, valuable, capable, competent person.

Even if that person doesn't like my nose, I really don't care.  

Yeah, if you're good with you, it kind of doesn't matter if other people aren't good with you, unless they're people you really care about having a relationship with and then maybe evaluate whether they have a point. 

Exactly. 

If we're talking about knowing our worth and being at peace with who we are, I think some people can say that they've accomplished that, but I know a lot of people who have not accomplished that.

Is internal validation something you can create in and of itself, or is it part of a larger self esteem package? 

Well, I think it all goes together. If you have positive self esteem, you will validate yourself. You will know that you're a valuable human being just as you are, even though you're not perfect and maybe you need to learn to pronounce words differently or something.

You're still a lovable, valuable human being, and that is internal validation. When you cultivate internal validation, you become less reliant on others for your sense of self worth. And that can be incredibly empowering. And it starts with self awareness. Take the time to honestly reflect on your actions and achievements and who you are as a person.

Practice self compassion. Give yourself the credit you deserve. Remember that while external validation is nice, it shouldn't be the sole source of your motivation or your self esteem, because it's just one part. Yes, it's nice, but if other people around you are not seeing and valuing you, it's not worth it.

You can still see and value yourself and be quite fine. 

Sometimes it's cause and effect. If you're not being valued by others, maybe it's because you don't value yourself. We pick up on it when somebody doesn't care about themselves. 

Absolutely. Hugely important point. 

If you don't hold the world accountable for the way it treats you, then you're culpable if you're not treated well.

Yes, you've got to respect yourself and you have to, as we've talked about, set boundaries and expect other people to treat you with respect. 

And if 

they don't, value yourself enough to walk away. 

For me, it sometimes feels like waiting for inspiration to strike. 

Yes, sometimes it is. 

Sometimes you have to act even when you don't feel like acting.

So how do we get motivated, stay motivated, and continue to feel validated? 

First of all, you gotta set clear goals. What do you want to happen? It's like when we decided to do a podcast. We wanted to be able to reach out to people. The goal was to support and empower people. And we thought about, well, what's the best way to do that?

Well, these days, everybody does a podcast. And so maybe that will be a good vehicle to accomplish our goal. And we defined what we wanted to achieve and why it mattered to us. And then you have to have a clear sense of purpose, so you keep your motivation strong, especially when challenges arrive. And then you got to create an action plan.

Oh!  

Which is, you just list each small step in the order you need to take them, and keep it manageable as you move ahead. And that's what we did with the podcast. It's like, okay, we want to do this thing. How do we do it? And we did some research and we found a platform to record on and we figured out what kind of equipment we needed and we went and bought that.

We broke it down. Big goals can be really overwhelming. There are steps to get there. You can't just have instantly a podcast, so you break them into smaller manageable tasks and then each small step is a win. Appreciate yourself for that. It's like, Oh yay, we found Zencaster. They will host our podcast.

That's cool. 

We found Kelly, our editor. 

Oh my gosh, and she's awesome. Kelly, we love you. She makes it sound like we know what we're doing.  So each step gets you to where you're going, and you have to have the motivation to move ahead. 

And I think here between steps two and three that create a plan and break it down, a sub point.

Would be if you don't know, find help, it's not expected that you know how to do everything, but somebody out there knows how to do it. And so whether that's finding a coach who can help you put together that plan or finding people to help you do the things you don't know how to do or want to do, like editing audio, it's okay to go find people who can help you.

Absolutely. It usually takes a team. There are things that you can do by yourself. It's often more powerful and more effective if you find like minded people with the skills that you don't have. And you're willing to acknowledge that you don't have those skills and somebody else is really good at that.

You bring them onto your team. And then you got to celebrate your wins. When we found Kelly, he was like, Yay! Oh my goodness!  She is awesome!  Now we can do this thing! And you don't have to wait for others to acknowledge your achievements, you celebrate them yourself. 

And express appreciation for the people who are helping you.

Oh, always. Appreciation is huge. 

Which is part of positivity. Focus on the good. Things are gonna go wrong, it's part of the process. Focusing on what's going right and the people who are giving you energy and support will help propel you. 

Yes. And be proud of yourself. 

Yeah. 

Remember that your inner child is taking this journey with you.

And he or she needs appreciation and support just like you do. When you accomplish things, when you do set a goal and take the step and make it happen, celebrate yourself. Recognize and reward your efforts. For some people, it helps to be mindful. That sounds like a woo woo term, but all mindfulness means is that you focus on the present moment 

and 

find things to appreciate about it.

Doing this can help you stay connected to your motivation and internal validation and maintain a healthy balance so you can better appreciate yourself and your progress and find the joy in all that you're doing. 

Is it possible to maintain a certain level of motivation or is it natural that it will wax and wane?

I think that it depends on what it is you're doing, but I think it probably ebbs and flows because it's really hard to always be up or always be down. driven. There are times when you just have to sit down and take a breath and say, I'm still motivated and I'm still going to do this thing, but right now I'm going to go for a walk or I'm going to have lunch.

You have to balance your motivation. I think you stay motivated. Your overall feeling is, I'm going to make this happen. The little steps, your motivation to accomplish them might ebb and flow. 

I know when I was first becoming a dog owner many moons ago, I didn't know how to be a great human to a dog. I mean, I knew I loved her.

I didn't know how to train her very well. She was stronger than I was. And that was frustrating. And.  I found myself frustrated a lot. One day it hit me, this dog is not going to be around for your entire life. You'll have her if you're lucky for a decade and a half. Do you want her to have lived a full life dealing with your frustration?

And the answer was no. So anytime I would get really frustrated, I would remember she's only here for a short time. 

Right. 

And do you want her to have a life of love or a life of frustration? It took a while for me to figure out how to be the human for her that I wanted to be. But once I got it, I got it.

That's beautiful. And your motivation was to give her a beautiful life. 

Yes. 

And that didn't ebb and flow. Right. Even if you got frustrated with her occasionally, the motivation was the same. 

Yes. 

The bottom line is motivation and validation are personal journeys. There's no right or wrong way to experience them, but finding a balance that works for you is key to living a fulfilling life.

Remember that your worth isn't defined by external recognition. It's defined by the value you place on yourself and the goals you set. Keep setting and achieving your goals, keep growing, and most importantly, keep believing in yourself and your capabilities. 

Thanks, Mama. 

And thank you, Shannon. And thank you so much to our listeners.

We love taking this personal PowerPod journey with you. It's very fun to hear from you. And you are our motivation.  

Yes. And if you need validating, we'll give it to you. Because you're amazing. 

Absolutely. 

So if you want to have conversations with us, reach out. We'd love to chat with you. We like hearing your stories about self esteem and personal power.

We like it when you share ideas for future podcasts. We like it when you just talk to us and tell us what you're going through and what you need and how you're growing and how you're finding value in yourself and your life. We also love it when you review our podcast. So if you want to do that, you can do so wherever you stream, or you can just talk to us directly.

Visit YourPersonalPowerPod.  com. Click contact and drop us an email. You can also visit us on YouTube. You can share the podcast with your friends and family so they can join in on all the fun and personal growth. If you're trying to get motivated and move forward, get in touch with Sandy at sandy at insidejobscoach.

com. As always, we love hearing from you. We look forward to hearing from you and we hope that you're finding your power and changing your life.