Motivators and Deterrents

Starting this journal is something I have considered over the past few years, but I never got around to doing it.  I was never able to convince myself to sit down and just do it.  Now that we are on our way, I sit back and ask myself- Why did it take so long to start, and what was holding me back?

One thing I do, not as often as I would like, is listen to motivational speakers, specifically Anthony Robbins.  He frequently talks about motivators and deterrents to explain why people do what they do.  In short, he says that people are motivated or deterred by two simple factors, their pursuit for happiness and their pursuit from pain, or in other words we are motivated by the things and ideas that we enjoy and give us pleasure, while we are demotivated, or deterred by the things that we fear will bring us pain.  Think about something in the not so distant past that we haven't done and ask ourselves, why?  The answer, if you look deep enough, is always because we fear what we are about to do will bring us pain.  We mistakenly believe that the result of not doing what we wanted will result in more pleasure than going through the initial steps of starting what we dream of doing.

So, what were my deterrents? I was already doing the basics toward saving for retirement prior to starting this journal, but I had not taken it to the next level of setting the concrete goal of early retirement, or of starting this blog.  So what was it?  Was I afraid of putting my retirement plan out to the world for others to criticise?  Was I afraid of doing something I never thought I could achieve?  I was afraid that even though I was working toward my retirement goals I would not be successful and this lack of success would cause pain.  In other words, not trying would not cause pain. 

Then came my epiphany.  If I never try, I am already failing.  I was failing at trying!!  Isn't that stupid!  I was more motivated to not start a project, in my case journaling my early retirement goals, because of my demotivational thought of not reaching my goal.  In other words I was convincing my self it would be easier to not try than to try and learn from my experience.  Even when we have motivational reminders all around us it is easy to fall into a demotivational state of mind.  On my desk at work I have quote that reads, "Those who try something and fail are much better off than those who try nothing and succeed."

So, what is holding us back?  What are our deterrents?  I'm sure they sound different with evey project we start, but if we look deep enough we will come to one conclusion, fear of pain is holding us from our goal and happiness is driving us to them.  Regardless of when you came to this conclusion, you will always get there. Again, "Those who try something and fail are much better off than those who try nothing and succeed."   If you try nothing, you have already failed.