What is motivation?

Motivation is a derivation of the word ‘motive’, which means a desire, need, or drive to do or achieve something. Hence, motivation can be described as a stimulation that drives people to achieve certain goals. Needless to say, motivation is one of the key ingredients to achieve success. Without motivation, one will have no desire or passion to succeed.
A goal-oriented person is one who has mastered the art of self-motivation.

Whether it is in your personal life or professional, it is important to be motivated so that you can achieve your full potential. While many external factors are great motivators, however, it is not clever to depend wholly on them. For true motivation, look inside you. Self-motivation works wonders and makes you self-reliant. Get a grip of your life and steer it the way you want…and in order to reach the right destination, it is essential that you keep yourself motivated!
You can tap your true potential and achieve great heights only when you are motivated for the same. So, how do you keep yourself motivated? Is having a desire in your heart and your mind on the track enough? Or do you require more than that to wake up every morning and work towards achieving your goal?

Here are a few practical tips to help you maintain an active state of mind:

• Go beyond your comfort zone: Once we are comfortable within a place or among a group of people, it becomes difficult for us to move out and explore other possibilities. For example, if you have been working at the same organization, with the same people, you will have the same interactions and same experiences every day. What new will you learn? Nothing. In order to progress, you need to have new experiences and learn. Move out of your comfort zone and make new friends. Interacting with new people lends you a new perspective, and helps you be motivated.

• Learn from your mistakes: The adage, ‘Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new’ could not have explained it better. Self-motivation, as much as it comes from confidence, also comes from wisdom. Moreover, when you try and fail, you learn from your mistakes, which is a great learning opportunity. Be open to taking risks and be ready to fail, but make sure that you take the failure as a learning experience and do no repeat the mistake.
Dreaming big will not make you successful, but working towards it will. That is the reason why it is important to have the skills to be self-motivated, and carve your path towards success.