Motivation

Of all the things that coaching clients are concerned about, motivation has to take the top prize. There are things we want to do, and we know we should do them, but we just can't bring ourselves to do them. Why? Are we just weak-willed? (No: See the section on discipline for more on the topic of willpower.)

Lack of motivation is inherently a battle between multiple parts of ourselves. The Kensho Method models human behavior as though we were each not just a single person but a whole constellation of personalities. Any decision you take is more properly thought of as the result of a vote in committee. It's when the vote is not unanimous that the problems arise.

Say you want to lose weight. You know what needs to be done: Eat less, exercise more. (All the "tricks" amount to a fraction of a percent of contributing towards the end result versus the simple truism of eating less and exercising more. The tricks only help once you face up to that reality.) But eating less and exercising more does not happen. It is unappealing. Why, when you want to do that, does it not happen? It is not physically impossible or even challenging. The difficulty is purely emotional.

The conflict is between the part of you that wants the change and a part of you that has not gotten on board with the program yet. That other part of you is more interested in lying on the sofa watching cartoons and eating chocolate cake. Many people make this part into the enemy. They call its influence "resistance" and of course, the only thing to do with resistance is to overcome it through superior force.

The problem with this approach is first of all, that you may not have superior force. The other part may be stronger. And secondly, even if the force is sufficient to overcome that part--who are you fighting? Yourself. All this energy is being expended in battling against yourself. It may seem like this is the only possibility--and indeed, many people live their lives never realizing that there is an alternative. For them, life is struggle. Their only hope for results lies in the part of them that wants a long-term outcome being stronger than the part that wants instant gratification.

This is exhausting. And it is a life lived in conflict with oneself.

The Kensho Method is that achieving your goals is best done with the energy of all of your inner aspects working together. If a part of you does not want to move toward some goal, then we explore what it wants and how it has not been heard. It is amazing how once that part is acknowledged, that it can get behind your goal, and then suddenly, the part of you that would have kept you on the coach eating donuts is working towards your weight loss goal because it now knows that it is not being ignored.

When all your inner aspects are working in concert to achieve a goal, the amount of energy available to you is amazing. In Kensho Coaching we focus on that outcome.