Today I’ve been thinking about motivation and what causes a person to want to change behaviour, and then to actually change.
We’ll be looking at motivation and also we’re going to discuss the 5 stages of change and how they relate specifically to a healthy lifestyle.
Motivation
I really like the way Jim Johnson, author of The Sixty-Second Motivator, breaks down motivation really well.
He explains it plainly; “Motivation can be thought of as how ready a person is to change”.
He goes on to say; “A highly motivated person is very ready to change”
And…
“A poorly motivated person is not that ready to change”
So simple, so true!
And the formula for motivation (all credit to Jim Johnson and his brilliant book) is even better…
CONFIDENCE + IMPORTANCE = MOTIVATION
For us this means that we must have some CONFIDENCE that we can actually succeed in our quest for health and fitness. And we must also have IMPORTANT reasons for improving our health and fitness. Guys, if we’ve got these we are totally motivated!
As a coach I increase confidence by using exercises that clients are able to complete and gradually progress until my clients are doing things they would have never thought possible. I also encourage clients to think of important reasons for improving their health and fitness, these can range from being able to wear the clothes they want, being happy with their reflection in the mirror or having more energy to play with their children and see them grow up to have their grandchildren. The most effective reasons are the ones that have the highest emotional response for you.
In summary if you want to increase your motivation for anything, you must use a strategy that increases your confidence and you must have important reasons for wanting to reach your particular goal.
The 5 stages of change
For those of us who’ve not encountered the Transtheoretical Model of Change, below is a very brief look at it and how it relates to someone who is trying to implement a healthier lifestyle. There are 5 stages…
The first stage of change is called PRE-CONTEMPLATION and an example of this could be eating fast food everyday for lunch without even giving it a second thought, or casually smoking a cigarette whilst downing your 5th pint of beer with no thought for the consequences. I’m guessing as your reading this that you’ve gone past this stage and you are now at least in CONTEMPLATION.
CONTEMPLATION is the next stage of change and this is where you’re thinking about changing behaviour. An example of this would be our friend who is now starting to consider the fact that they might actually be harming their health by eating crap every lunchtime. At this point the person becomes aware that their current behaviours are not in alignment with their values/goals, i.e as they are eating their french fries they are aware that this particular behaviour is in fact detrimental to their desired goal, which might be to become slimmer and feel healthy. This conflict in the mind is called cognitive dissonance and often is the beginning of a change in behaviour.
PREPARATION is when the person has started to actually change their behavior. An example of this is our friend who was gorging on fast food everyday. They are now thinking about healthy alternatives they can have for lunch instead but the change is by no means complete or consistent.
ACTION is when our friend has been taking salad to work consistently for a short period of time. Significant steps have been made towards a healthy lifestyle and we are on the way to our final stage of change.
MAINTENANCE is when our friend has been eating healthy foods consistently for a considerable period of time e.g 6 months plus. Therefore we can now say with confidence that this person has definitely changed their behaviour. Some experts would say this person has reached the TERMINATION stage in the process of change.
Something we need to watch out for is RELAPSE. In my opinion the way to avoid this is to have the strongest possible reasons to maintain your positive behaviour and have strategies in place that enable you to feel confident about staying on track.
The diagram below shows the Transtheoretical Model of Change
Forget the relapse bit! We’ve dealt with that, right?
It would be great if you guys could share some your experiences of motivation and behaviour change…
Tags: change, motivation, psychology
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