A few weeks ago, a client asked me, “How do you stay motivated?”
The question confused me because I don’t think about motivation at all. I do what I love to do because I love it; I don’t need to “motivate” myself like a monkey who only works for bananas.
But I wasn’t always like this. There was a day when motivation was everything.
Even though I was on fire to create a business, it felt hard. I was stressed and pushing myself to exhaustion. Back then, I needed all the motivation I could get.
My greatest motivation was FEAR.
I scared myself into making money every month. I bullied myself into rigorous exercise so I didn’t get weak and fat.
Even my Morning Success Ritual of meditation, journaling and yoga was driven by the fear of feeling bad if I didn’t follow through on my commitment.
I used every hack and trick available to boost my productivity. I learned how to delegate, eliminate and outsource ruthlessly.
I worked so hard that my brain wouldn’t shut off.
To work longer hours, I laced my coffee and morning smoothie with heaping tablespoons of raw cacao. It didn’t matter that it made me hyper and gave me body odor because some raw food guru called it a “superfood.”
I loved playing and having fun, but it looked like that had no place in business. Work was supposed to be HARD and I was the workhorse to prove it.
I thought changing my career would solve my work stress, but switching from the DJ business to the information product business didn’t make it go away.
I hired a coach to help, and uncovered a belief driving all this hustle and strain:
I have to work hard to prove myself.
Not only was I working hard in my business, I made things even more complicated, just so that I could prove myself by working harder. It was never ending.
My coach challenged me to take on the Australian phrase, “Too easy!” as my new motto, and dubbed me Stephanie “Too Easy” Benedetto.
I began asked for ease and flow. And life delivered.
I noticed something interesting:
Motivation comes from the outside. It requires a reward or punishment to compel you to do something.
But there’s another way to create that’s much more fun. Inspiration.
Inspiration comes from within. You don’t need an external driver because doing the thing is a reward in itself.
Here’s a little story I wrote inspired by my journey from Hard Work to Work-as-Play.
Burning the Hamster Wheel
Once there was a woman who worked really, really hard.
She complained about everything that went wrong.
She “tried” to do better and failed.
She waited for something or someone to come along to finally make her happy.
She made New Year’s Resolutions and broke them by January 15th.
She felt TRAPPED. Always doing, always going, and never getting anywhere.
So the Universe gave her a gift.
The woman woke up one morning and looked in the mirror to find that she was a hamster.
Naturally, she was quite shocked. She screamed and cried and shook her hamster fists at the sky.
The woman had no idea how to change it
“What can I do differently?” she screamed.
She’d do anything to not be a hamster.
The image of a sick, exhausted puppy flashed through her mind. Then a dying elephant, pulling itself along the beach.
It occurred to her that perhaps she needed to STOP doing. And that she could ask a better question.
“What can I BE to create a different life?” she asked.
The woman felt a cool breeze. It was something she could follow. It was something she could breathe.
She inhaled deeply.
It occurred to her that she could be happy. Right now.
She could be creative and excited. She could be full of life and energy and making a difference.
In fact, it seemed that she could BE all the things she’d been DOING so hard to become — without doing anything at all.
“I wonder what would happen if I be this today?”
Her belly filled with warmth and she felt curious for the first time in a long, long time.
“What happiness, creativity and excitement can I be today?” she asked.
The hamster woman bought coffee for her coworkers and listened to the weird kid who worked in the copy room.
She got up from her desk to stretch whenever she felt like it and took a few moments to stare out the window and daydream.
Whenever she noticed herself getting stuck on the hamster wheel of doing, she stopped to ask, “What happiness, creativity and excitement could I be here?”
The day flew by.
She smiled 2,572 times, laughed 893 times and chortled twice.
Despite all the stretching, talking, listening and daydreaming, the woman completed her daily tasks in record time.
The woman got home and knew it was time to clean house.
She gathered up all her assumptions, judgements, expectations and abandoned resolutions.
She swept up the lies about what was possible and all her beliefs about what wasn’t, and dragged them outside.
The pile stacked higher than the roof of her house. The woman doused it with gasoline and lit it on fire.
“What can I be now?” she asked, watching it burn.
The answer came clear and strong:
Anything. Everything. Just ask.
So she did.
Her life changed instantly again and again with every be-ing she chose to be. And she was never a hamster again.
***
I discovered that anything can be play, and playing in the business of transformation is my specialty.
These days, I still spend a lot of time and energy at work. I hit new projects like a hurricane and churn out content like a geyser.
But none of it feels hard, or even like work. It’s just what I love to do.
And when I’m done with work, my mind can rest, because I’m no longer driven by fear to produce or die.
My dream is that everyone rediscovers the power of play to create a life and business that fulfills their deepest desires and sets the world on fire.
It’s what we’re up to in the IMPACT program.
When you hang out with the IMPACT Creators for any length of time, don’t be surprised if you find yourself lightening up, taking yourself less seriously…and getting more done in a day than you have in years.
As one member reported:
“As soon as I signed up I felt transformational magic entering my bones! The permission to slow down and play – opened new tabs in my brain. I listened and practiced what Steph offered and modelled. And I moved more forward in 4 weeks than in 4 years!!!” – Sally Ann
Experience the difference for yourself.
https://www.theawakenedbusiness.com/impactinvite
Yours in love and play,
Steph
