Myth: Your motivation rises and falls based on things you can’t control.
Truth: Even when you can’t control the outcome, you can almost always find something to take ownership of.
In sport and performance psychology, there’s a concept called locus of control. Locus is a Latin word (these sport psychologists do love their Latin!) and it basically means place. Where is the control? Who has the control?
When the locus of control feels external (when things feel like they’re happening to us rather than chosen by us) motivation tends to drop. And understandably so.
But here is the shift that changes everything: even in situations where the outcome is not in your hands, there is almost always something that is. The way you prepare. The way you show up. The attitude you bring to the task.
Finding that something — however small — and taking ownership of it is how you bring the locus of control back inside. And internal control fuels internal motivation. Every time.
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