This blog was written by Reem Al Assadi, Newcomer Youth Advisor of the Newcomer Leadership Development Program at YMCA.
Regardless of what drove you to step out of your comfort zone to land in a new country and start over from scratch, you definitely had lots of courage and self-motivation to do so.
However, is motivation alone always a key to make things happen?
Visualizing where we want to be and seeing it happen is crucially important, but consciously rewiring our brain to walk ourselves from point A to point Z mindfully is our ultimate key to experiencing breakthroughs and achieving goals. This is where discipline comes in. The most successful people use a combination of discipline and motivation to achieve their goals.
Discipline is often associated with self-control. When we refer to discipline in this context, we mean training ourselves to behave and work consciously and regularly, or essentially, build healthy habits.
It is said that your habits often determine the quality of your life. Humans are creatures of habit, and habit formation takes discipline. When we begin something new, like eating less sugar, we need to focus a lot of brainpower because it’s unfamiliar, and we’re learning new behaviour and accepting it.
As we continually practice this new activity, we devote less and less conscious brain activity to it, eventually becoming automatic. Studies suggest it takes 66 days to form a new habit and for this behaviour to become automatic.
To make our healthy changes last in the long run, we need to turn these from initial changes based on motivation into habits based on discipline. When deciding which healthy routines you would like to implement, it’s essentialto think about how you will enjoy this activity. If your goal is to land a new job, pick the right ambience that makes you motivated to start the search; this may mean setting small goals to build a good routine. Starting every morning with waking up early, setting your to-do list, indulging in a nicely brewed cup of coffee and a good breakfast can help you feel motivated every morning to get tick boxes off your checklist in your job search.
Undoubtedly, the list of tips can be endless when determining a healthy lifestyle. ,,. However, I will leave you with these two questions for reflection: What are things that make you feel vividly inspired and happy to reach your goals? And how can you include them in your routine?
Getting comfortable with the uncomfortable fact that you need to consciously and selectively use your time each day to create a reality you enjoy in this country is how we set ourselves up for success. Not just in your next stop in Canada, but anywhere and everywhere in the world.
