Episode 596 · Jun 8, 2022

How to Stack Motivation, Drive, and Purpose to Fuel Your Life

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Motivation gets a bad reputation, and for good reason: on its own, it burns out fast. In this episode of The Daily Mastermind, George Wright III breaks down why you actually need three different fuels to move your life forward, and how to know which one you need at any given moment.

Drawing on the philosophy of retired Navy SEAL David Goggins and the image of a rocket leaving the ground, George lays out a simple framework: motivation lights the spark, drive sustains the burn, and purpose feeds your soul. Understanding the difference is what keeps you from spinning your wheels and burning out.

Why You Cannot Run Your Whole Life on Motivation

We all cycle through ups and downs, periods of high energy and stretches where we feel stuck. George opens by naming that reality directly, because the first step to fueling yourself is recognizing exactly where you are right now.

Motivation is the first fuel, and it almost always comes from outside you: a song, a video, a coach, a friend, a goal, or an event. Goggins calls it the kindling, the one-hour burn that gets the fire started. The problem is that too many people try to rebuild their entire lives on it.

Too many of us are trying to reinvent our lives and create major change in ourselves with constant motivation, and this is not the point of motivation. Motivation is used to start the fire.

Used correctly, motivation gets you unstuck, breaks your pattern, and gets you moving. Just do not expect it to last.

What Drive Is and Where It Comes From

Drive is the second fuel, and unlike motivation, it comes from inside you. George describes it as Goggins's big log: the 10,000-hour burn. You cannot start a fire with the big log because it would choke out the flame, but once the kindling catches, the log is what sustains you for the long haul.

Drive is what keeps you consistent when motivation fades. It turns a spark into an obsession and keeps your energy and your mind in check day after day. To build it, you have to get outside your comfort zone and look deep inside for a vision big enough to pull you.

When the dream is big enough, the facts don't count.

When your vision is that clear, drive starts to take the place of motivation, and that is where your faith and endurance get tested and your biggest successes come from.

How to Get Clear on the Vision That Builds Your Drive

You cannot manufacture drive without clarity. George encourages you to get specific about what you want across every area of life: relationships, finances, health, fitness, nutrition, lifestyle, and contribution. The mistake most people make is waiting until they can see the entire plan before they will commit to the goal.

You do not need the whole map to start moving. You just need to be decisive, say yes, and then figure it out. Once the vision is clear, you can become obsessed with it: focused, prioritized, consistent, and relentless. That obsession is what burns the 10,000-hour log and turns repeated action into habit.

Habits will actually take over when your motivation fades.

Daily rituals you decide on and commit to will eventually drive you, long after the initial spark is gone.

Why Purpose Is the Fuel That Lasts

The third fuel is purpose, and it is different from the other two. Motivation comes from outside you and drive comes from inside you, but purpose comes from serving others. George has watched highly successful people climb the ladder only to realize it was leaning against the wrong wall.

True fulfillment shows up when you feel you are making a contribution and helping others. The path is to define your unique ability, the talents you are excellent at and passionate about, and then use them in service of real needs in the marketplace.

Purpose gives you something to lose yourself in, something people will be inspired to help you build. And because you lose track of time while doing it, it actually requires the least fuel of all.

How to Put All Three Fuels Together

Only you can decide where you are. Do you need motivation to get unstuck, drive to stay consistent, or purpose to feel fulfilled? Or are you running on autopilot without thinking about any of it? Conscious awareness is the real key.

George points to Stephen Covey's advice to begin with the end in mind. Start with purpose, back it into the daily rituals that create drive, and feed those rituals with the spark of motivation. Stack them in that order and you get sustained progress instead of short bursts followed by burnout.

Action Steps

Recognize where you are right now and name which fuel you actually need: motivation, drive, or purpose.
Use motivation only as kindling to break your pattern and get moving, not as a long-term strategy.
Get specific about the life you want across relationships, finances, health, and contribution to build real drive.
Commit to daily rituals and act in spite of your mood so habits take over when motivation fades.
Define your unique ability and find a way to serve others with it to fuel your purpose.

Wherever you are in your cycle, you have talent, you are unique, and you have something to offer your relationships, your business, and your world. Stack these three fuels and keep them in check, and you will push yourself further than motivation alone ever could. Remember, it's never too late to start living the life you were meant to live, so start doing that today.

READ THE FULL TRANSCRIPT

Good morning, Mastermind. I hope you're having a great week, and if you're not, that's okay. One of the things I've learned over time is that we all have cycles of ups and downs, motivation, lack of motivation, and it's really recognizing these times that's really, really important. We cycle through different moods and challenges and life events. You might be struggling right now, or you might be doing amazing, but the key is to recognize exactly where you are and what you need in the moment to be able to fuel and drive your behavior. That's what we're going to talk about today on the podcast. Welcome back to The Daily Mastermind. And my name is George Wright III. I'm your host with a little more inspiration, motivation, and education for your day. I hope you're having an amazing week so far. You know, I had a great workout this morning. I had some powerful thoughts I wanted to share with you today. I was listening to a David Goggins video on YouTube while I was working out. Now, I don't know if you know who David Goggins is, but he's literally the toughest guy I've ever heard of. He's a retired Navy SEAL. He's the only member of the U.S. Armed Forces that's completed SEAL training, U.S. Army Ranger School, Air Force Tactical Controller School. I mean, he's run ultra marathons. He's a best-selling author and on and on and on. But I was listening to him in order to get a little more motivation and sort of a kick in the butt. I've been sleeping in a little bit lately. It's the benefits and probably the downsides of being an entrepreneur is you can make your own schedule. But I needed to just kind of motivate myself. And I'll tell you, I've learned over the years that we all have these cycles of motivation in our life, where we're up and we're down and we're needing motivation. Sometimes we're needing something else a little deeper. But there are times when you need motivation and there are times when you need something more. And I know that we cycle through life and through our life with different moods and circumstances, careers, relationships, but the key is to recognize exactly where you are right now and what you need specifically. And this is what I was thinking about as I was listening to this video. I know that there's a distinct difference between the fuel and energy you get from personal development and the fuel you get from motivation and things that are outside you. So I guess I'd ask myself and I'd ask you this question, where are you right now? What do you need to get you moving in the right direction, moving forward in your life right now? And that's what I want to discuss with you and sort of clarify a little bit today. Let's talk about the different fuels that you can use in your life because we all need different types of fuels at different stages of our life and our business. You know, there's a difference between motivation, drive, purpose, but we need all three of those things in our life to fuel us. So it's very important to know the difference and it's very important to know when you need each type of these fuels. It's sort of like a rocket ship. I use this example of the different stages of a rocket. If you've ever seen a rocket take off, it takes an immense amount of energy to get it off the ground. And then to get into the atmosphere, it takes less energy, but it's a different stage of the rocket. And then ultimately cruising and going into space, right? It takes another type of phase, but a different amount of fuel. Most of the fuel, though, is getting off the ground. So let's start with the topic or the fuel motivation. Motivation is the first type of fuel that usually, you know, this is going to come from outside of you. Goggins calls this the kindling that you need to get things started. It's the one hour burn. If you starting a fire it a one hour burn And the reason is because it doesn last very long but it will get you started And so motivation comes from outside of you most of the time but it is the spark that you need to get going And so it might be music, it might be a video, it might be a coach, a friend, it might be some event that happens in your life. What is it that best motivates you? For me, it might be listening to a podcast, it might be doing a workout, it might be setting a goal or hitting an incentive. but you need to figure out what it is that motivates you the best. Now I'm going to give you a word of caution here because so many of us, well let me say it this way, we've got to stop trying to change our entire life with just motivation. Too many of us are trying to reinvent our lives and create major change in ourselves with constant motivation and this is not the point of motivation. Motivation is used to start the fire. It's just to create the spark. It's that one hour burn that David Goggins talks about. And this is probably why you hear thought leaders say a lot of times that motivation is crap. It's not sustainable. It's short term. But it does serve a purpose. And the purpose is to get you unstuck. It's to get you moving. It's to break your pattern. Does that make sense? But remember, it's not going to last and it'll go away and it'll leave you feeling empty and tired if that's all that you're doing to motivate and fuel yourself. That's why you need to use the motivation, this kindling to fuel a much bigger log, something that's more sustainable, a log that you can have burning long-term, a fuel that creates long-term results in your life, which brings us to the topic of drive, your drive. See, drive is that second type of fuel that usually comes from inside you. David Goggins talks about this being the big log. This is the 10,000 hour burn. Now, most people have been trying to start a big log with motivation, but that doesn't work that way. Motivation is your kindling. This is your 10,000 hour burn. This is the log that you can't start with because it would choke out your fire. It would put it out. But this is the fuel that takes your motivation and turns it into an obsession. This is where you need to go sort of from outside yourself to inside yourself to find your drive. You need to spark the light and then light that big log, but then you need to nurture your drive. You need to figure out, nurture, and build a strong desire and commitment to move your life and your business and your relationships forward. That's what will help keep you consistent with your energy every day. This is what will help you keep your mind in check every day on a constant basis. And this is what will help you, you know, your drive is what's going to help you move forward when your motivation goes away. So to do this, you need to create a bigger vision. You need to create clarity in what you want from your life. And that's going to be the ability to get outside your comfort zone because your drive or your obsession needs to come from outside your comfort zone. You've got to look deep inside and get outside your comfort zone. This is where your vision and your dreams come into play. One of my mentors would always say, when the dream is big enough, the facts don't count. When your dream is big enough, you don't just need motivation. If you can visualize and manifest the life that you want, this is where your drive starts to take place of your motivation. This is where your faith and your endurance will get tested, but it's where your biggest successes will come from. This is where you will start to live the life that you were truly meant to live. So you need to get super clear on what you want in your life if you want to create your drive and create more of this sustainable energy So what do you want your life to be like What do you want your relationships to be like? Your finances, your health, your fitness, your nutrition. What type of lifestyle do you want to live? What type of contribution do you want to make? Get specific, get detailed, start to get clear on what you want and this will help to build your drive but stop waiting until you have the entire plan to develop what you want your end goal to be so many of us are trying to we were we're afraid to set our end goal because we're trying to figure out what the plan is that'll get us there stop waiting until you can see the end of your journey to decide what you want the end to look like and remember you don't need to be totally clear on everything to get started moving on the path you just need to be decisive and you need to say yes and then figure it out but i encourage you to develop your vision because then then you can be obsessed with that life with that goal with that vision and what does obsessed mean it means focus on it every day prioritize it be consistent be relentless be driven develop your drive and learn to act like prosperity pillars we talk about all the time act in spite of your mood and this is going to start to burn that 10,000 hour log that's going to sustain you and consistently consistently create habits right so you know habits will be formed when you're consistent and habits will take you much further than motivation alone habits will actually take over when your motivation fades and you do this by being consistent and you can create daily rituals that you decide and commit to do and over time they will drive you and they will become things that will fuel your drive to keep you sustained. Now that's the second type of fuel so talking about motivation number one and talking about drive number two wouldn't be complete without a discussion about purpose. Now I've seen too many people get far in their life and business only to realize that their ladder was up against the wrong wall or that they question where their life is going. You see this with a lot of really, really successful people. And so this leads us to the topic of purpose. Purpose is the third type of fuel that you'll find the ability to create fulfillment and fuel your soul. Purpose is serving others and it's not coming just from outside. It's not coming from inside you. It's coming from the ability to serve other people and you'll create more fulfillment in your life. You know, happiness and fulfillment and true success will only come when you feel that you're making a contribution and you're helping mankind. And this is why I talk about, when we talk about finding your unique ability, it's finding your unique ability and then using it in the service of others, right? So with this type of fuel, you're going to find the ability to create more fulfillment and ultimately, you know, true and lasting happiness levels. With this type of fuel, you'll feed your motivation, your drive, and best of all, you will fuel your results in your life. So I encourage you to define your talents, the things you're excellent and passionate about, and then find a way to serve others or maybe to put it a different way, you can find the needs in the marketplace that need to be filled and then fill them with your unique talents. I think purpose ultimately will give you something to lose yourself in. It's something that you can truly devote your life to. It's something that people will be inspired to assist you with and devote their time and energy to helping you accomplish And it that type of thing that you lose track of time when you doing it And so it requires less fuel this purpose life So what does all this discussion about fuel and purpose really ultimately mean to you? Because that's the reason I brought it up. Only you can determine where you are in your life, what you need. So ask yourself what stage of your life you're in. Do you need more motivation? Are you constantly trying to motivate yourself, but you need to build and develop that drive and desire? Or are you needing a little bit of purpose in there? Are you even thinking about these things at all? Or are you just on autopilot? Because if you are, I encourage you to stop and get clear on what you need and what you're going to do today to fuel yourself at whatever level that you're at. Find a way to wrap motivation and drive and purpose all together and keep them in check. Be aware because that's the real key, conscious awareness. And be relentless. Be obsessed. Be great. Do hard things every single day. Challenge yourself every day. Don't give up. Don't settle for any life that's going to keep you from living your ultimate life. So in closing today, I just, you know, a good friend of mine, Bill Danko, who wrote The Millionaire Next Door, you know, he's said a lot lately, you know what's better than being a millionaire, George? Being a happy millionaire. and he went on to write a second book called Richer Than a Millionaire, which I highly recommend that you get a copy of. And this is so true. So one strategy I'd kind of leave you with is Stephen Covey would say, begin with the end in mind. And I think that's good advice. Start with some purpose and back it into daily rituals to create drive and desire in your life and then back it into feeding it with the spark of motivation. I think if you'll do this, You're going to find more sustained progress, more sustained energy and fuel towards your goals. You'll be like that rocket that I talked about where you'll push yourself into the atmosphere with motivation. And then you'll thrust yourself even further into space with your dreams and your desire and your drive and consistency. And then ultimately, you will accomplish some amazing things in your life fueled by purpose and passion. You're absolutely unbelievable. You have talent. You are unique. there are things that you have to offer your world your relationships your business and remember it's never too late to start living the life that you were meant to live so start doing that today i appreciate you listening i hope these are some things that will help you my name is george wright the third this has been the daily mastermind i encourage you to share this message with anyone that you know it would mean a lot to me personally and i have an amazing day we'll talk with you soon Today's podcast was brought to you by Protect Wealth Academy and the three-day asset protection and wealth creation summit. I've worked with Protect Wealth for over two decades and they are by far the longest running wealth creation and asset protection event in the nation. You know, so if you're interested in creating double digit returns, you want to significantly lower your taxes or just protect yourself from lawsuit or judgments, then you definitely want to check out their event. 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