It's Tuesday at 2:00pm! (PST Time: I live and work from Southern California)
Greetings to you!
Each week I send out a short leadership blog that's called "Tuesday at 2:00pm". The purpose of this is simply to provide a brief thought on leadership that you can read and think about in just a few minutes. I send it out every week at 2:00pm (PST) and encourage you to make an appointment with yourself to pause and think about the thing I'm writing about.
Russ...
LEADERSHIP QUOTE:
"You don't have to be great to start, but you have to start to be great." Zig Ziglar
What does this stir up? Either write me HERE or comment at the end of the blog post HERE.
A LITTLE BIT DEEPER:
This month I want to explore MOTIVATION a little deeper by looking at some quotes and simply drawing some personal application.
I love this description I found of the 2 kinds of motivation:
INTRINSIC MOTIVATION is simply doing something because it's inherently satisfying or interesting. It's something I really want to do.
EXTRINSIC MOTIVATION is simply doing something to earn a reward or to avoid punishment. It's something that I earn or avoid for the action.
The word MOTIVATION comes from the Latin movere, meaning "to move", which is really the core idea: Motivation is what moves you to act.
I remember at a young age, maybe 7 or 8 years of age, I saw an ad in a magazine I was looking at (Highlights Magazine) and it was an ad for selling seeds (flower & vegetable) door to door. The ad simply said that if I sold enough seeds, I would qualify for a prize, and they had some pictures of kids playing with some toys like a big squirt gun, a basketball, and some spring/bouncy shoes. (Yes, you heard that right: spring shoes)
I got permission from my parents to order the seed packets, and when they arrived I was so excited to sell them. Of course, this was in the early 70's, so multilevel marketing was just being perfected by the Tupperware Company, so I had to rely on my family, my neighbors, and anyone else I could convince to buy these seed packets. I hit the road (well, the 3 streets around my house).
The goal, sell enough seeds to qualify for the spring shoe prize, and I was motivated to accomplish that. I sold, I marketed, I rang doorbells, and I'm sure my mom purchased more seeds than she could ever use from her young entrepreneur son, and I hit the target! It's a little fuzzy as to how long it took, but I did it.
The day arrived, and the spring shoes were delivered and I put them on and bounced down my street only to realize that they weren't near as cool as I thought they'd be (according to my friends on the street) and they actually didn't work real well, so a few bouncy trips around the neighborhood and my seed selling business was closed.
I saw. I conquered. I bounced. The end.
Isn't it funny when you reflect back on things that have motivated you at some point in your life? Looking back it's easy to ask why that motivation worked, but when you're in the middle of it, it's all you can think about.
I'm sure I dreamed about spring shoes for weeks, hoping that it would become an olympic sport that I could compete in!
Zig Ziglar's quote above is very basic, very true, and somewhat profound, but it doesn't answer the question of MOTIVATION. What would drive us to start something? What is our WHY?
Think back on your childhood. Can you remember a "motivation story" like mine? I'd love to hear it.
DEEPER STILL:
You've heard me quote and talk about Simon Sineks work with his book Start with Why, and he breaks it down very simply by saying that "great leaders and organizations inspire action by starting with purpose." The "WHY" has to come before the "WHAT" and this is what drives us forward, what compels us to start or to act.
One of the exercises he recommends is called the "Why Ladder". Start with what you're doing, then keep asking "why" until you hit something that feels emotionally true rather than just logical. He goes on to explain that often the last layer of "why" is your real motivation - the thing that will keep you going when the work gets tedious.
What about this one... "The Failure Test". Ask yourself: "If this project fails completely - no recognition, no payoff - would I still be glad I did it?" If the honest answer is yes, you've found a purpose sturdy enough to survive setbacks. If the answer is no, it tells you the project may be more about the outcome than the process, which means your motivation is fragile land outcome-dependent.
Aaron McClung, the CEO of AM Agency, in his book called Activating Purpose, shares that "93% of leaders have tried to embed purpose into their operations, yet only a fraction see tangible results, because without a system, purpose remains dormant." He goes on to say: "Most companies write a purpose statement, put it on the wall, and stop there - purpose talked about isn't the same as purpose activated."
His answer to motivation is purpose.
Before you try to figure out your motivation, spend some time exploring PURPOSE. They are deeply connected and when you understand clearly your WHY, the ability to drive towards that is fueled by purpose.
Things I'm Reading, Listening To and Watching This Week:
Activating Purpose by Aaron McClung
Start with Why by Simon Sinek and his Ted Talk, Start With Why, a worthwhile 18 minute presentation.
Was prompted this week to find a song, and ended up listening to this full Essentials Collection: Men at Work Essentials on Apple. What a great journey through some wonderful songs.
This podcast from Harbor Ministries is always timely, but this episode sharing Lamentations 3 entitled Active Waiting was exactly what God wanted me to hear and thing about this past week. Listen to it for yourself!I
The Barnabas Group is hosting an Activating Prayer Training on August 13th here in Orange County. If you'd like to attend, send me a note and I'll get you a registration link. This is being presented by our friends at NOVO.
These are nothing like the "spring shoes" I had in the early 70's but I was surprised to see that you can find these new and improved "Kangaroo Jumping Shoes" on Amazon. If you buy these, let me know how it goes!!!