The art of change involves three important elements: Motivation, Ability, and Trigger. By optimizing each of these elements, you take a major leap toward making your desired change a reality. If we connect the dots, we have the following game plan:
Identify a change you’d like to make.
Check the motivation attached to this change. Are you intrinsically motivated and focused on an internal reward and not just focused on something external?
Next it’s time to take a look at your ability.
Do you have the knowledge and skills you need to make this change? Are there barriers that stand in your way?
Categorize your trigger based on the other two elements and identify a relevant cue.
If you feel that you’re lacking in motivation or ability, consider holding off on this change until you’re able to boost yourself in the needed area.
However, if you’re able to connect the dots, it’s time to transform that desired change into a tangible life upgrade. But before we send you off to the races, there’s one last pit stop to make: confidence.
Confidence can bolster motivation, spur you to greater knowledge and skills, and overcome barriers. But a lack of confidence can produce the opposite effect. So we have one last consideration, which we consider No. 5 in the list above.
Are you at least 90 percent confident you can make this change a reality?
If the answer is no, think about what you can do to raise your confidence to the 90 percent mark. Maybe dig a little deeper for more motivation, spend a little extra time boosting your ability, or entertain the idea of scaling your desired change back a notch. If you don’t think you can get it there right now, that’s okay. Perhaps a more modest change will suffice for now, and you can revisit the other one later.
If the answer is yes, let’s start upgrading your life today.