Motivate yourself with Enthusiasm

“Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm” – Ralph W. Emerson

In other words enthusiasm and desire are key components to being successful. Think about it, have you ever seen a sports team win and celebrate without enthusiasm

I haven’t!... On the contrary I remember years ago when I was a kid watching a basketball game at a youth center where my brother was playing that day. His team was loosing by a landslide, I mean it was a horrible beating. (If you ask me I though they should’ve forfeit the game). Yet something amazing happened in the fourth quarter, they started to rally and made a huge comeback. The crowd was into the game, the cheers hardly let the players hear the coach... everyone was going wild.

Talk about nerve racking. When that clock turn to zero and the buzzer went off, everyone jumped off the bench ran into the middle of the court and started celebrating. It was amazing!!

Suddenly someone looks at the scoreboard and yells “guys we still lost the game”. For a second everything went silent, then weird as it sounds they started cheering and celebrating again!!! It’s the first time in life (and maybe the last one) where I saw a team lose and celebrate in the middle of the court as if they achieved something or won the NBA finals.

And you know in retrospect, I think they did achieve something. They learned to never give up, to accept challenges, to have a desire to be better, they understood the game. And looking forward today a lot those kids have become successful business people, great parents, spouses and most of them are healthy and in great shape physically.

They learned that being purpose driven and passionate about what they do, and playing as a team would bind them together and that would lead to something special. Same thing happens when we apply that same line of thinking to everything else in life.

Truth be told nothing is perfect and individually we have our own challenges to deal with and to conquer; some are work related others are of a more personal manner. Some of these challenges and difficulties we can control and some we can’t. However, there are always some things and areas where we can improve.

Personally I have gone through a lot in life, business and even my sports and fitness career. But if there is something that has never changed is that I’m passionate about what I do. When I look at all the great people I have met during my life (and I’m including the good the bad and the ugly), plus all of the people I’ve been able to help be healthy, look and feel good about themselves and their bodies… And then to see how they… “YOU”… have made a difference in my life as well, as it’s been enriched by your support, your trust, your friendship in me…. How can I not be passionate and driven to be better for me and for you?

Everyday I drill into my mind those feelings and I’m constantly looking at ways to promote love for health and fitness, to help people achieve excellence, get results, thus improving the quality of their lifestyle.

Aristotle said: “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit”…

At the end it’s in your hands, you’re the one responsible for delivering excellence to your life every single day. Once you embrace that reality and start seeing changes, even if they are small in some areas… that leads to self P.R.I.D.E. = Personal Responsibility In Daily Events.

But make no mistake “success” is a work in progress and success requires commitment – and making that commitment is all the easier when we are enthusiastic about achieving it. Success itself brings its own reasons for being enthusiastic. Let’s say you have a goal in mind, fitness related, and you decide to work towards that goal. After a few weeks you notice that clothing doesn’t fits the same, maybe its more lose, you have dropped some body fat and weight, you put on a few pounds of muscle and now you look more tone and tight; even other people start noticing and you hear their comments of encouragement… Once you start seeing results everything changes, your morale improves and so does of the people around you. You become more positive, happier, you are more confident in your body and the way you look. That feeling leads to an improvement on how you feel on the inside and how you feel around those around you. Your love life gets better; your sex drive is higher and better, your focus and productivity at work gets better also. All of this leads to self P.R.I.D.E because we are doing something that inspires and makes a difference in your or somebody else life.

Being motivated and staying positive is always a struggle for everyone... even me! But when we are focus, passionate and purpose driven about life and our fitness goals we are one step ahead of the game. We are that much closer to success and excellence.

My next post will talk about how having the proper mindset will help you build enthusiasm.

Eduardo Lorenzo, NASM-CPT specializes in sports performance, injury prevention, corrective exercises, physique enhancement, Boot Camp and weight loss programs.