Fun Ways To Stay Motivated

A few days ago I decided to dedicate the next 6 months of my life to my own personal growth. I plan on doing a couple of challenges, lots of workouts, and adding new healthier habits into my life! I am really good at setting these things up and horrendous at following through, which is where you come in! I am going to be posting my fun ways I am keeping myself motivated as well as my progress throughout the next 6 months!

I was starting 75 Hard and then I got sick, and then on top of that my dog got attacked by a neighbor dog and my full attention was on him instead of me. He is okay in case you are wondering, just a small fracture in his leg and some punctures that had to get stitched up.

I decided that for the first 75 days of my 6 month challenge I am going to do the 75 Soft in order to get into the groove of things after life decided I needed a huge curveball. I will be doing the 75 Hard starting January 1 and I am excited for that adventure!

So, onto my handy dandy motivation tools. I have been scouring the internet to find things that will help me truly become my best self, as well as reading self development books. One thing I found while reading was to reward yourself consistently for achieving your goals that you set. This is one way to keep your brain and body motivated to keep going on your journey even when you are sore and tired. Then, while I was researching things that I could use as rewards I came across this idea that I had actually used back when I was 18-19. I had created a points based fitness challenge against my then boyfriend. Now, I was going to make it as a reward system for doing tasks I might not always want to do. I will be sharing both of these here.

These are both super fun ways to keep yourself motivated, and you can easily make them into group systems. It would be really fun to do in a fitness group, as a family, with friends, the possibilities are virtually endless! For now, I’m just doing it with myself because I find I am most competitive when I am competing against myself or one other person. Lord only knows why.

Rewards for Goals

This one is a more traditional route, but still a great way to stay motivated! Set a range of goals from easy to difficult and set up corresponding rewards with the goals that you achieve. I even made a rewards log so I make sure I am actually rewarding myself when I achieve something.

For my 6 month challenge my long term goals are mostly fitness and finance related so my short term goals line up with all of those. For example, one of my long term goals is to lose 30 pounds. Therefore, I have short term goals that range from losing 5 pounds to losing 30 pounds in 5 pound increments. I also have a long term goal of saving $600. Which helped me make short term goals of saving in increments of $50. The biggest thing here is to make sure that your reward matches your goal. By this, I mean it’s probably not the best idea to reward yourself with a new TV for saving $50. That doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Neither does rewarding yourself with a cheat weekend after losing 5 lbs. If you want to continue to see improvement in yourself, make sure that your goals make sense.

Here are some of the goals and rewards I have picked for myself:

Weight loss:

5 lbs - face mask

10 lbs - paint nails

15 lbs - new phone case/pop socket

Wake up on time everyday for a week - Coffee/Redbull Spritzer from a coffee stand

Hit water goal every day for a week - take a bath

Savings:

Save $50 - At home movie night

Save $100 - Buy $5 worth of stock

Save $150 - Disney Movie Marathon

Save $200 - Play video games for an hour

Run a 10 minute mile: Put $10 towards next trip

Finish 75 Soft - New book

Finish 75 Hard - 1 new item of clothing

I tried to break down all of my goals into smaller achievable goals that I am getting properly rewarded for. A lot of my rewards aren’t expensive because I am trying to save money. If you aren’t trying to save money then you should get yourself rewards that are within your budget and motivating for you. I also made it so there are some goals that I will hit multiple times and that will help keep me motivated. If I consistently run a 10 minute mile I’m putting a good amount of money away for something that I am excited about. If I wake up on time everyday for a week I get to go and get one of my favorite things on a Friday or Saturday morning. If you always have something to look forward to, your activities will end up being more enjoyable!

Points Based Reward System

This one was so much fun to make! I love things like this, I might be weird but oh well! Like I said before, I have used something like this a while ago but in a different way. Back then I used a styrofoam board to make a huge calendar for the month. I put all of the activities that earned you points on the side and I was competing with my boyfriend at the time. When I saw this idea again while searching for rewards for part 1 of this post, I immediately thought that I can easily make this work for the current journey I am on!

I started by making a list of rewards that ranged from small to large. I then made a list of activities that will give me points. I made 4 different categories for points and for rewards. 1 point activities, 2 point activities, 3 point activities, and 5 point activities. Then, I have 50 point rewards, 100 point rewards, 500 point rewards, and 1,000 point rewards. Obviously my 1 point activities are fairly easy to achieve, and my 50 point rewards reflect that.

Here are some examples of my point system:

1 point:

30 minute workout

Hit step goal

Hit water goal

No alcohol

Read 10 pages

No junk food/sweets for the day

Take a progress picture (max 1 point per day)

2 points:

45 minute workout

No alcohol for a week

Deep clean a room in the house

3 points:

60+ minute workout

Close all 3 rings on apple watch

Deep clean entire house

Win a weekly Apple Watch Challenge

5 points:

Close all 3 rings for a full week

Burn over 1,000 calories in a day

50 Point Category:

Take a bath

Take a nap

1 hr of video games

Coloring

100 Point Category:

Paint nails

Do a face mask

Buy a new essential oil

Buy a decal for the car

500 Point Category:

New phone case/pop socket

Money towards adventures

Coffee/ Redbull spritzer

Buy flowers

Spa day

New book

Glass of wine

Sweet treat

1,000 Point category

1 thing from HomeGoods

1 item of clothing

New shoes

I also have a tracker for my points as well because, why not! I am allowing myself the option to bank my points for higher “priced” items so this way I am even more motivated to keep going! With my tracker I am able to keep track of my points I have gained from being active and hitting my goals, as well as the points I have “spent” for rewards!

As I said before it would be so easy to turn this into a rewards system for kids, or as a way to challenge your friends or your fitness group! I am so excited to use this and I have already gotten 4 points today! It helps that I am truly a child on the inside and nothing would make me happier than having a full on Disney movie marathon any day of the week! I made sure that I had something in each category that I really truly wanted. I’m obviously shooting for some stuff in that 1,000 point category but a lot of the rewards in the 500 point category and lesser categories look incredibly appealing!

I hope these little motivational tools help you on your journey, no matter what your goal is!