The moment I choose for you, what you bring into my life, who you are, what you can be, what you mean, who you’ve been – anything that takes me from my space to invade yours – I lose all possibility of experiencing you. I believe in magic. I will always choose vanilla cake.
“Hi everyone, thank you for calling on me, all of you for your service, and everyone for choosing to be here today. My name is Lily and I am an alcoholic and an addict. As for why this works for me? I do not know. I can say it’s because of that ‘God-sized hole in my heart’ or maybe because I have a spiritual malady. It’s so many things but I know that whatever I tried before didn’t give me the peace of mind I have right now. I cannot fathom what my life could be like otherwise, and don’t want to. I wish I could walk you through a recording of what falling asleep in 2019 looked like. Because you see I have had “so-dryety” for what, 2014-2022? And it was not a nice time in my life. It was miserable. I can’t remember all of the things I did but aside from being miserable to be around I hurt myself like never before. Nothing to cover up my inability to find peace and not knowing how to find peace where I was. I want that agenda. God should give it me. I will continue waiting. But until then I will do what makes me feel good. What makes me smile. Saying I love you. Listening. Camera off. Sometimes speaking. Saying ‘I have no idea where this is going but…’ and then ‘I’m going to go ahead and pass… would you like to share with us tonight are you available?’.
For the record, Dr. Silkworth, you called it the phenomenon of craving. It is. I have an experience and it fits and then I cannot stop because I continue to believe it’s possible to reach again when it’s not. Like an alergy? Yeah, I simply don’t react to it like other people. I don’t know what it’s like to have fun drunk. I never had a good time but I did it. A lot of it. And then added more things, substracted things, had extra amounts of that and then one day said I’ll stop and did. ‘This is an open-meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous, ‘this is closed meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous.’ ‘I am sorry if you are here to observe for your course, this is a closed meeting of AA there are 24 hour open meetings all over the world try this number this url and you can find one. We’re sorry but this is a safe space for individuals who have a desire to stop drinking and stay sober.’ ‘Well, then give yourselves, your high power, and anyone you find pertinent to your sobriety and program a hand for the chips that you do hold or are working on.’ ‘If we can have a moment of silence for the still sick and sufferring both inside and outside of the rooms, and everyone caiught in the way of this horrible disease through no fault of their own – followed by the 7th Step Prayer: My Creator, I am now willing that You should have all of me, good and bad. I pray that You now remove from me every single defect of character which stands in the way of my usefulness to you and my fellows. Grant me strength, as I go out from here, to do Your bidding. Amen.‘
It is a few days late. On June 10, 2025 Alcoholics Anonymous made 90 years of continuously “helping” people. I am not going into “saved my life” or “changed my life” or “I have a life because of AA.” It has created space, held space, in many ways. It’s been difficult, and trying, and picks at you, it even disregards the scabs because in the end they don’t matter. Here’s Dr. Bob’s Farewell Letter. “Who wouldv’t thunk it!” “Thanks to the benefits of this fellowship I have not had the desire or needed to pick up a drink today.” And there is a lot of weight behind that statement. A drink does a lot. It does so much. It does too much. “Drinking was only but a symptom. We had to get down to causes and conditions” (AAWS, 2012).
Let’s be honest for a second. How many times have you scrolled through social media, seen those perfectly curated “rise and grind” posts, and thought, “Why can’t I just be motivated like that?”
I get it. We’ve all been there, staring at our to-do lists, waiting for that magical burst of motivation to hit us like lightning. Spoiler alert: it rarely works that way.
Motivation isn’t something that just happens to you. It’s not a personality trait you’re either born with or without. It’s actually something you can create, cultivate, and control. But first, you need to understand what motivation really is.
Think of motivation like a fire. You wouldn’t just sit in front of an empty fireplace waiting for flames to appear, right? You’d gather kindling, strike a match, and tend to it. Motivation works the same way.
Start ridiculously small. I’m talking embarrassingly small. Want to exercise? Start by putting on your workout clothes. Want to write? Open a document and write one sentence. The goal isn’t to complete the task perfectly – it’s to create momentum. Success breeds success, and even tiny wins count.
Connect to your why, but make it personal. Not the generic “I want to be successful” why. The real one. The one that makes you a little uncomfortable when you think about it. Maybe it’s proving something to yourself, or creating a different life for your kids, or simply refusing to settle for mediocrity. That discomfort? That’s where real motivation lives.
Create friction for the things you don’t want to do, and remove it for the things you do. Want to eat healthier? Don’t rely on willpower – remove the junk food from your house. Want to read more? Put the book on your pillow so you see it before bed. Design your environment to work with you, not against you.
Track your progress visually. There’s something powerful about seeing your progress mapped out. Whether it’s crossing days off a calendar, filling in a habit tracker, or just writing down three things you accomplished each day – make your progress visible.
Find your motivation style. Some people are motivated by competition, others by collaboration. Some need external accountability, others thrive on internal challenges. Some are motivated by avoiding pain, others by pursuing pleasure. There’s no right or wrong way – just your way.
Here’s what most people get wrong: they think motivation should feel good all the time. They think it’s supposed to be this constant state of excitement and energy. But real motivation often feels more like determination than excitement. It’s the quiet voice that says “I’m doing this anyway” when everything else is screaming to quit.
The most motivated people I know aren’t the ones bouncing off the walls with enthusiasm. They’re the ones who show up consistently, especially when they don’t feel like it.
Start with these three things this week:
While motivation is incredibly important and absolutely something you can create, it’s not the endgame. It’s not your life’s purpose or your reason for being.
There’s something deeper, more sustainable, and more fulfilling than motivation alone. The Japanese have a word for it: Ikigai. And understanding the difference between motivation and your Ikigai might just change everything about how you approach your goals and your life.
Stay tuned – next week, I’m diving deep into why motivation isn’t your Ikigai, and what that means for creating a life that doesn’t just get you moving, but gets you moving in the right direction.
What’s your biggest motivation challenge right now? Drop a comment and let’s figure it out together.
I used to assume that what I thought must be, in some way, a reflection of reality. That my perceptions, opinions, and gut feelings had some validity simply because they existed within me. But I’ve come to see that most of what arises in my mind is just that—arising. Not from an objective, factual foundation but from a lifetime of conditioning, biases, and influences that I have absorbed without much scrutiny.
Most of my thoughts are automatic. They pop up without permission, shaped by my past experiences, the stories I’ve been told, and my adopted interpretations. But how many of those thoughts are true? How many are simply echoes of things I’ve heard or assumed rather than reflections of reality?
Even deeper, I must ask: what is “truth” anyway? So much of what I know—or instead, what I think I know—comes from human-made structures: books written by people with their own biases, cultural narratives shaped by power and historical convenience, and scientific theories that are constantly evolving. Even facts, in how we think of them, are subject to change when better tools or perspectives emerge.
If my thoughts arise from this shifting, subjective landscape, then how can I trust them?
I used to believe that my mind was a mirror of reality, reflecting things as they are. But now I see that it is more of a filter that distorts, colors, and reshapes everything it processes.
My thoughts are dark and cynical if I am in a bad mood. If I am happy, everything appears lighter and more hopeful. The same situation can feel entirely different based on my emotional state, my level of fatigue, or even what I ate that day. How can I trust my immediate thoughts when they are so easily swayed?
Even memory, something we tend to rely on as a source of truth, is deeply unreliable. Every time we recall something, we reshape it slightly, filtering it through who we are now rather than who we were then. The brain fills in gaps, alters details, and reinforces whatever narrative we already believe.
Beyond my own personal thoughts, the world I live in—the ideas I take for granted, the values I uphold, the rules I follow—are all human constructs. Money, laws, morality, social norms, identity itself… all are ideas that we, as a species, agreed upon.
I once thought knowledge was a ladder, something we climb to reach a higher, more objective understanding. But now, I see it more as a web—an interconnected mass of ideas, stories, and beliefs, none of which can ever be fully isolated from human subjectivity.
Where does that leave me if I cannot trust my thoughts? It would be easy to fall into nihilism, to say, “If nothing is certain, then nothing matters.” But instead, I see this realization as freeing.
It means I don’t have to take every thought seriously. Just because a thought arises does not mean it is true, meaningful, or worth engaging with. I can observe my mind with detachment, recognizing when it feeds me outdated beliefs, irrational fears, or baseless assumptions.
It also means I can be open to change. If my mind is not a fixed, reliable source of truth, then I do not have to be a slave to my past beliefs. I can question. I can unlearn. I can recognize that the reality I experience is not necessarily the reality and that there is always more to discover beyond my thinking.
I cannot trust my own thoughts. But maybe that’s okay. Maybe the real wisdom lies in trusting them and knowing when to let them go.
Recent Comments