Image: Lili Popper Unsplash

Motivation Starts with Knowing Your Future Self

​Kim came to coaching struggling to move forward on her new business. She had a big deadline in a few months, and she wasn’t making the progress she'd hoped for. She had a history of struggling with deadlines. She often waited until the last minute to get things done, creating an exhausting dash to the finish line. Doubt and self-judgment surfaced whenever she thought of meeting this new deadline and she felt she was going in circles. Wanting to do things differently, she reached out for support.

Together, Kim and I looked at her passion and sense of purpose for her new business. She expressed that meeting this deadline was a step toward growing her business and helping others through her work. We looked at how her ADHD and self-judgment were showing up in the situation and explored ways to boost her self-care. 

Talking through the challenges helped Kim get clear on the steps she needed to take to meet her deadline. Armed with new self-awareness, Kim turned the fuzzy parts of her big project into actionable steps. She was able to use the perspective of her “future self” as motivation for meeting smaller deadlines in the present. This set her up for success in meeting her larger goal.

How can you tap into your future self? Let’s say you have an important meeting coming up that you want to be ready for, but you haven't completed your work. Imagine yourself arriving at this meeting feeling calm and prepared. What have you done to get yourself to that place? Get specific, break it down. When can you plan to do this work before the meeting? How long will it take? Be sure to build in extra time. Put this time on your schedule and protect it. When the time comes to do these tasks, imagine your future self arriving at the meeting prepared, and use this as fuel to work on these tasks and to see them through.  The excellent cognitive behavior-based podcast A Slight Change of Plans has an episode about exactly this idea called Your Future Self Needs Your Help Today. 

Client challenges

Kim’s example shows some of the challenges clients come to coaching with:

• A lack of clarity: They know that how they are approaching something isn’t working, but aren’t sure what change to make.

• Strong self-judgment: By focusing on all their perceived past “failures,” they allow their strong judge to run away with the story.

• Lack of self-care: Ignoring self-care and the messages our bodies are giving us can send us in loops of self-doubt. 

Focus on strengths

By focusing on strengths and goals, we build in strong motivation that’s based on the things you care about.

With this new perspective you can:

• Get fired up by your goals and dreams: We always start with looking at your values and needs. These core parts of you surface frequently through our coaching and can help build the fire you need to push through challenges.

• Move forward with accurate information: You have many strengths and a long line of successes — let's uncover and celebrate them! How can we use these strengths to your advantage?

• Develop curiosity accountability:  Many clients come to coaching to be held accountable for their actions. I find it’s best to bring curiosity into our accountability. When we look at how your week went (and if your actions got the result you hoped for) we have new learning to take forward. 

  
  
  
  

My question for you: Is there a way to tap into your future self right now? How will your future self feel if you do that thing you’ve been meaning to do? How can you set your future self up for success right now?

RESOURCE:

A Slight Change of Plans podcast with Dr. Maya Shankar 

This is one of my favorite podcasts! It blends neuroscience, behavioral change, and storytelling. The episode Your Future Self Needs Your Help Today is all about using the motivation of your future self to get into action today.

Names and identifying details have been changed for privacy.

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