The Inspiration Desert (How to Find Inspiration Daily)

If you searched “How to find inspiration daily” online, you could go down the rabbit hole for days. Google has tons of results on how to find inspiration daily.

But, not a lot of people are talking about how to find it within you. It’s not surprising why. For thousands of years, humans have thought that inspiration, motivation, and creativity is a force OUTSIDE of them

Greeks had the muses, Norse mythology had Óðr and modern religion has their examples, too.

No disrespect to our ancient ancestors, but I disagree on where inspiration, motivation, and creativity comes from. It’s not a force that blesses you randomly with its appearance. Its an emotion within you, that you can work on cultivating every day.

Here’s the truth, looking to inspiration daily (or motivation) is exhausting. It’s like running around the desert looking for an oasis. That’s where I’ve come up with the concept “Inspiration Desert” that we get trapped in from time to time.  

Today, we’re talking about how to find inspiration daily to take massive action on your goals. And how to not NEED to feel like you’re desperately looking for a cool glass of water in the desert, but rather, confident that you can produce it anytime you need. 

Listen to the Podcast here

Or, you can listen to Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Play, or wherever you like to get your podcasts.

Why you’ve been on an Inspiration Desert and how looking for it isn’t helpful.

When I first started coaching, I didn’t know how to handle it when it felt like I was slogging through a ton of work for little payoff. I was tired, and motivation to keep going was starting to turn into a rare occurrence. Back then, I thought about where inspiration, motivation, and creativity came from. Every time I thought of a time I felt inspired, it was right after I listened to an inspirational speech or read a self-help book.

I was convinced that if I wanted to have the motivation to stick with my goal, I needed to look for inspiration elsewhere. I thought that other people inspired me because they were smarter than me and that I wasn’t capable of coming up with great ideas.

Does this sound familiar? Maybe you’re working on a big goal in your career or starting your business, or trying to work out consistently, and you think motivation will come from something outside of you. Like a guru, a book, journal, or something like that. 

This is the Inspiration Desert, where it feels like motivation and inspiration are far and few in between, so you try to find it and when you do, you gobble it up believing it’ll be hard to find again. Like you’re in the middle of a desert, in desperate search of water and when you do find it, you drink the entire bottle and start running, trying to stretch that one bottle to find your way out of the desert. 

This is the all or nothing mindset that a lot of us fall into when we’re trying to bring our dreams to life. It’s either not take any action because of how tired or unmotivated you are, or get into a frenzy trying to change your entire life in a day and accomplish a HUGE goal in a short amount of time. 

I’m no expert at navigating the desert, but I’m pretty sure this strategy isn’t the best for when you’re in a real desert and it’s certainly not the best when it comes to your dreams and aspirations. Going into the desert with the hope that you’ll just find water along the way makes for an exhausting ride, right? Same thing with goals and trying to keep your spirits up during the grind of making it happen. 

Right now, you might be looking for inspiration in others or trying to get ideas from other places. Essentially, looking at anyone and anything other than YOU for motivation and inspiration. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not like finding inspiration in others isn’t helpful. I’m just saying it’s not sustainable. This is a surefire way to lead you to burnout, and that’s not where you want to be. But what if, you went into the desert with a way to produce your own water? What if, you had the ability to find inspiration daily within you? 

That would DRASTICALLY change your actions when you ran out of water in the desert, right? Instead of scrambling to find water and panicking — or giving up entirely –, you’d calmly do what you needed to produce it.  It’s the same thing with inspiration and motivation. You have the ability to find it within yourself whenever you need it. 

The good thing is that it’s a skill that you can practice and get better at. 

How to find inspiration daily within yourself

My go-to for inspiration has always been to find people who are wiser than me and went before me, and I still believe that. But instead of emailing a mentor or Googling about them first; I turn to myself.

I think about the future version of me. Anytime I feel stuck, or I’m not sure if I’m able to keep going, I think about that version of myself that has already achieved her goal. I do this A LOT when it comes to planning my year, but I try to continue building that relationship even when in day to day life. 

I think about how she got to where she is. I like to imagine myself sitting in the same room with her and I’m able to ask her questions like:

• How did you get to where you are?
• How did you overcome this problem?
• (and my personal favorite) What do you need me to do today to make you a reality?

You know how some successful people are interviewed and they’re almost always asked, “What would you tell your younger self?”. You can do that same thing today!

What I believe is that we have innate wisdom and if given the chance, our brains can come up with incredible ideas. But too often, we assume we’re not smart enough to figure out the next steps on our own, so we don’t bother challenging ourselves to come up with those answers. 

If you were able to challenge yourself and think about your future success, how would that change your life today?
Like, maybe you’re having trouble in your relationship, or you have self-worth issues, or you’re trying to find your passion. These all seem like really big things to work though, right? And when we come across big problems, it’s easy to shut down and say, “I don’t know what to do” and leave it at that. Or convince yourself that you’re truly stuck. But what if you challenged

yourself? What if you connected with the version of you that had those things already figured out?

They say hindsight is 20/20, and if that’s the case, then let’s use that perfect vision to our advantage today!

If you answered these questions as journal prompts every day, I KNOW that inspiration will come pouring out from you. Finding inspiration daily won’t be a problem for you. And instead of waiting for an inspirational speech or Pinterest graphic, you can have self-sustaining inspiration whenever you need it. 

What about you?

What would that future version of you look like? What do you love about her? What does she need you to think about yourself or do TODAY? Get as descriptive as you can, and who knows, maybe that version of you is the Muse that you need today!

Xo, Monica

P.S. If you’re ready to start bringing your dreams to life and finally get over the negative self-talk stopping you, then we need to chat! I’m offering a free 1-on-1 virtual call to help you define your goals, pinpoint what’s actually stopping you from getting them and what steps you NEED to take to make them a reality. I can’t wait to talk to you then!

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