Don't Rely on Inspiration. Try This Instead…

Are you waiting to feel motivated or inspired to work on your side business? I totally get it—you work 9-5 (but it’s really 8 to 6) and are flat-out tired to work on anything else before or after the J.O.B.

So you wait to feel inspired to write that blog post, or reach out to a colleague for a possible collaboration, or network with your peers, or do any market research. But really, the inspiration never comes or it happens at the most inconvenient time, such as when you’re driving, or showering, or at work.

Don’t rely on inspiration to get you moving. Rely on your commitment to consistency.

Commit to showing up as you are, with the idea you got, and with the intention of being in service. For instance, this little blog post you are reading did not come from inspiration. It came from my commitment to posting twice a week. I know that doesn’t sound like a lot, but it’s all I can do at this time. I have committed to showing up twice a week and writing something useful for people who are interested in personal development.

As part of this commitment, I also send my newsletter twice a month, which happens to be a round of my posts. Sometimes I show up three times a week when I have the space to do so, but twice a week is my goal.

Should I do more? Probably. But if I waited to feel inspired or motivated I would only have a handful of my ideas and knowledge published and shared with the world. Even when I show up to my commitment, I often feel uninspired or unmotivated to write a post or produce a video. I still press on, however. I ask Life (substitute Life with God, Nature, the Universe or whatever suits you) to feed me a useful idea that I can share with others. I set my egg timer to 90 minutes, I turn on “do not disturb,” and then I write to done. When my creative session is over, I publish. Does it always go as planned? Nope. Sometimes it takes both creative sessions to create 1 blog post. But I still show up because I’m committed to being consistent.

To make this work, you have to decide in advance what your “consistency commitment” will look like. What has worked for me is to define the two extremes and the middle road.

For example, what does an aggressive commitment look like? An aggressive commitment would be showing up and posting 5 days a week.

What does an easy, bare minimum commitment look like? That would be showing up and posting 1 day a week.

What’s the middle road? That’s showing up and posting 2-3 times a week.

Take the middle road. That’s where your consistency commitment will be a stretch but doable.

Relying on inspiration is for pipe dreams. Use inspiration to guide your creative process WHEN you are already engaged in the creative process. In other words, you showed up to your “consistency commitment”—not because you’re inspired to but because you are committed to your creative project or business—and then you ask for an inspiring idea or for Inspiration/Life/God/The Universe to help the process to completion.

Aim for consistency, not inspiration or motivation. Consistency is the long game, but it’s the long game that will get you more worthwhile results. Do you think you’ll be further along and have more “hits” showing up 2-3 times a week for the next 3 years? Or if you just show up when you feel like it for the next 3 years? I think you know the answer. Rely on your commitment to consistency. Take the middle road.