Unstoppable Motivation: How to be consistent and disciplined | YOUR Success Path
Hi Muses! Welcome back to my channel. Does this cycle sound at all familiar to you?
You set a goal.
You develop an ambitious plan to go after said goal.
You proceed with said plan going too hard and too fast. You burn out. You don't make as much progress as you thought you would. And you go right back to the way things were before or worse.
If that sounds familiar, you're not alone. And today I'm going to teach you what to do instead to ensure you never hit that wall or rebound like that ever again.
Watch the video below, or read on for the full transcript.
Welcome to the fourth and final video in my series to help set you up for success in 2021. If you missed any of the previous videos, you can check them out here.
I'm a coach for creatives with chronic illness, depression, anxiety, and trauma. And I help them go from stuck to unstoppable without overworking themselves. So if you want to become unstoppable, subscribe to my channel and hit the bell to be notified when I post a new video every Tuesday.
Back to the topic at hand, the primary issue that causes this cycle to end in burnout and rebounding so often is the unconscious belief that sudden transformative change is possible. While it is technically possible, it's really unlikely. Expecting yourself to suddenly act and behave like a completely different person with completely different habits and routines, is unreasonable and perfectionistic, and is in fact a form of self-sabotage.
I resisted this fact for years and it only kept me stuck. I'm still in the process of grieving all of the years in my life I lost to depression and inaction, because I was inadvertently keeping myself stuck and holding myself back. And I don't want you to lose any time at all in your life to this self-sabotage, and that's the biggest why behind what I do in my coaching. So what do you do instead? I've developed a unique and powerful system that is based in what I like to call Holistic Productivity.
Holistic Productivity takes into account the fact that you're a living, breathing, human being with one wild and precious life, and you were not put here on earth to simply be productive. My system helps you balance everything in your life, maintain your self care, and ensure you keep making progress toward your goals and dreams, even on your darkest days. And that part's really important.
And the thing that ties everything in the system together?
The grace to allow yourself to take as much time as you need to change slowly. Slow and steady really does win the race. And if you don't believe me, go ahead and check out this video where I talk about my story of depression and what I call my personal groundhog's day.
We're almost to the point where I'm going to show you the steps in my system, but before we get there, I want to talk about the reason why this cycle of go, go, go, burnout, and then rebounding happens. It happens because we tend to prioritize the wrong thing when we set out to change our lives, and to go after a goal. In these kinds of cycles, we tend to prioritize achieving the goal from the get go, as opposed to starting by prioritizing establishing habits and systems to ensure we succeed.
The first priority when going after massive transformative change needs to be establishing habits and systems, instead of directly going after the goal. Yes, you can make progress towards your goal, but you need to prioritize building those habits and setting up your systems so you can succeed long term.
And you'll know you've established that habit when you trust beyond a shadow of a doubt that if you get derailed, you'll get back on track sooner rather than later. Instead of letting one day of derailment turn into two, turn into three, turn into a week, turn into a month, turn into a year or more before you get back on track. Comment below and tell me how much you trust yourself right now to get back on track after being derailed. Let's use a scale from 1 to 10, 1 being zero trust, and 10 being unconditional trust. I used to be a 1 and I was in that space for almost a decade. But now after years of hard work, I can confidently say I'm consistently a 9 or a 10 on that scale. And that means more to me than I can ever possibly convey.
Now that you understand the vital distinction of what to prioritize when going after a drastic change in your life, here are the steps in my Holistic Productivity system.
Step One: Establish Safety
You need to establish safety for yourself. This involves ensuring that your environment is safe, the people you surround yourself with are safe, and you have the mental health support you need to heal and to grow and to move forward.
If you don't have these things in place, true transformative change tends not to be possible. And if it is possible, it's really, really, really, really difficult. It's so much better to get that set up correctly from the get go to set yourself up for success.
Step Two: Make Space
Make space. You need to put in time and effort to clear the decks as it were so you have enough time, energy, and emotional capacity to actually spend on your dreams and goals.
If you're already stretched too thin, making time for what you want to do isn't going to be possible. In order to say yes to something you have to say no to something else. And so this part of the system is absolutely crucial, because if you don't make space in your life for what you want to happen, it's never going to happen.
Step Three: Design Your Compass
Design your compass. And this is something in my program that is designed to help you build a system that you can use easily and consistently to help you navigate your life on a day-to-day basis with purpose. It encompasses things like self-care, self-reflection, decision-making, finding your North Star, understanding your intuition, and having an embodied sense of what it is you want.
But most importantly, it comes down to balancing out information that comes from outside of you and information that comes from inside of you. So that way you can make truly informed decisions about how to move forward.
Step Four: Develop A Personalized System
Develop a personalized task and time management system. This is probably self-explanatory. I know in my history, I have tried gazillions of planners, apps, calendar programs; I've read so many books on productivity... But at the end of the day, I needed to take everything that I knew and build a personalized system that really works for me and the way my brain works, and that reduces friction so I use it consistently.
In my program, I'm here to help you develop that personalized system, instead of just handing you a done for you system that may or may not work for you, I am here to help you build one that actually works for you. I wish someone had helped me with this back in the day. Anyways, I digress.
Step Five: Build A Routine To Use Your System
Then step five is to actually build a routine where you use that time and task management system consistently. If you set up a system and then you don't use it, the system's not going to help you.
Your system might be perfectly fine and functional as it currently is, but if it's gathering dust, it's not helping you. So you need to think about creating your system and creating your routine to use that system consistently. And it's those two things together that makes it really powerful.
Step Six: Develop Your Roadblock Action Plan
This is where you do some upfront work to make sure that you've done some pre troubleshooting and made some pretty big decisions. Like, if this then that type decisions. So that way, if and when a roadblock comes up, you have already done a fair amount of the work to deal with it. 'Cause a lot of the times what happens when we get derailed or a roadblock or an obstacle comes up, is it's overwhelming and it shuts us down, and we have hard time getting our bearings, let alone making an informed decision about how to move forward.
And so when you do that work up front (yes, you can't predict the future, but you'd be surprised how much work you can do upfront), that way, when those obstacles do come up, you are empowered to handle them, process them, troubleshoot them, and get past them so that way you can get on with moving towards your goals.
Step Seven: Butt In Chair Time
Step seven is applying my Butt In Chair Time method to all of your work sessions. You've heard me mention it before, it's the topic of my free Masterclass that you can get access to by signing up for my mailing list. It's a combination of three mindset shifts and one simple three-step process. I developed this system and started using it three and a half years ago, and I still use it to this day.
And I am often in a place where I'm experiencing enough resistance and I am exhibiting enough procrastination, that I still use it as if I'm a beginner. Because it really is powerful, and I cannot tell you how helpful it can be to help you go from not doing something to starting doing that something, and then succeeding with it on a day-to-day basis.
Instead of thinking about the big picture, it's like, "Okay, I'm sitting at my desk. What the hell do I do to get started?" That's what Butt In Chair Time is for, and it is the secret weapon in my whole system.
Step Eight: Persist
And then step eight is persistence. Simply don't give up because if you have all of the systems in place that you need to succeed and you don't give up, success becomes inevitable, and therefore you are unstoppable.
This system is magic because once you have established safety for yourself, once you have made time and space for your goals and dreams, once you've built an effective system and designed the routines to help you use that system, you'll have everything you need to ensure that establishing the habit of putting time and effort into your goals becomes one hundred percent, beyond a shadow of a doubt, doable.
And once putting in time and effort becomes a habit for you, achieving what you put your mind to, whatever you put your mind to, becomes inevitable because you have become unstoppable.
If you're still with me, you're probably wondering, "How?!"
Because I gave you the what. I gave you the seven-step system. But the how is another matter altogether.
You've basically got two options. One, you can go it alone. You can follow me obsessive. You can find other coaches and productivity experts to help you. You can do lots of research, and you can basically trial and error your way through this system. That's what I did, because I didn't have someone like me as I am now to help me move forward faster and easier.
So it took me years and it was really hard. And there were a lot of false starts, and there was rebounding, and it was only through persistence and sheer force of will that I didn't give up, and I finally stumbled my way to habits and systems that ensure my success. I wish there had been someone to guide me, but there wasn't, there was only productivity gurus for able-bodied people and neurotypical people who were hacking their way to max productivity. And if you're asking me, basically turning themselves into robots.
That wasn't only not possible for me, I didn't want that. Because I want to live my life. I want to love my life. I want to be productive in the context of living my life. I want to be productive in the context of loving my life. So I was forced to forge my own path.
It's been a long and hard road, but holy moly has it been worth it. And I don't want anyone else to suffer through this process the way I did, which is why I've built this business. Which brings me to option two of the how: join my coaching membership Accountability Muse.
I'll guide you every step of the way, hold you accountable, and coach you through every single roadblock or ounce of resistance that comes up.
Can you do this on your own? There's no doubt. I believe in you. But if you want to go from stuck to unstoppable easier and faster, my program is right for you. And in case you're skeptical, maybe you're thinking, "So you became productive at teaching productivity, Cassie. I don't buy it. That's just like people who want to become entrepreneurs, then take all the courses and end up just becoming another business coach themselves!" So let me put your mind at ease. I've not only used this system to start and grow this coaching business over the last three years, but in that time I've also used this system to write and revise my YA fantasy novel, and I'm pretty close to being ready to shop for an agent. I've also used this system to write the script for and direct three stage productions. I've also used this system to take my trauma healing seriously, and make significant progress toward bettering my mental health and therefore my life. I've also used this system to start and grow Nerdy West Coast Swing, a unique way of teaching West Coast Swing dance online with my teaching partner Alicia Marshall.
And in case you've forgotten, I've accomplished this all while experiencing multiple chronic illnesses and invisible disabilities, severe depression and anxiety, and Complex PTSD and PTSD. And the pièce de résistance? Only four to six usable hours a day.
This system works. So if you're ready to join me so I can coach and support you, and hold you accountable, so you can transform into the person you've always wanted to be, and have the life you've always wanted to have, I'm here for you. The doors to my coaching membership open tomorrow, Wednesday, January 27th at Noon Pacific time. To get more information, see a couple of testimonials, and apply, all you have to do is go to this link.
Let's make 2021 your best year yet.
If you liked this video, please hit that like button and subscribe, and be sure to share this video with your friends. Because going after your dreams is always more fun with friends. I really hope to hear from you soon, and I can't wait to read your applications. I'll be back next week with another video. Talk to you then. Bye.