Finding Your Inspiration

“Don’t ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive and then go do that. Because what the world needs is people who come alive.” -Thurman

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what it means to be inspired and how that plays into your life and goals. Recently, I placed 1st in my height class at the Europa, which ended up being the second largest show in the NPC! The feeling of all my many months of hard work and sacrifice finally paying off in such an amazing way made it one of the highlights of my year. However, what many don’t know is that this accomplishment only came after the set back and personal disappointment of placing 11th at Jr. National’s in Chicago a few months earlier. I was so disappointed in myself. And yet, in the midst of feeling sad and depressed about my loss in Chicago, I decided to pick myself up and figure out what had gone wrong, but more importantly, what I could do to make it right for the Europa show. I made myself stop and think about what it was that I needed to improve on both physically, as well as mentally. How was I going to grow if I didn’t recognize where I currently was?

To start, I focused on the most obvious piece of the puzzle… what I could see. I made a few changes to my diet and incorporated new exercises into my workouts with the goal of improving the weaker areas on my body.

I then found myself focusing on the question of why all the hard work, the dieting and training didn’t go where I wanted it to, and left me in 11th place. It was then I realized I was in need of an attitude adjustment! I was continuing to ask myself a question riddled with negativity! It wasn’t just the training or the diet, I had done everything PHYSICALLY possible to lead a healthy lifestyle and reach my goals… but MENTALLY I no longer looked at what I was doing as something exciting and fun, but as a chore. I found myself having a negative attitude towards other people and myself. I lost sight of my vision and find myself going through my daily workout routine and eating habits without really enjoying them. I was very selfish and stopped being positive which had a huge effect on my life and my interactions and relationships with others.

Our attitude and mindset really do affect our body. It’s not enough just to have a goal and go through the physical motions of achieving it. We must believe in ourselves and our dreams in order to rediscover our inspiration. We all need to remember what it was that initially lead us to change our bad habits and begin our journey towards living a healthy lifestyle. I needed to remind myself of where my inspiration came from, go back to my vision board and look at what goals I had set for the future and set new goals to replace the ones I already achieved.

So, with my new goals and inspiration in mind, I changed my attitude, made amends with those that I had hurt in the process, and started towards my next goal (the Europa) with a positive outlook and a new mindset. It paid off and the reward was better than anything I could have hope for. Not only did I win my class, but more importantly, I learned something new about myself and became a better person by learning one of life’s many lessons.

In the end, I learned that sometimes it takes finding a new inspiration, changing your attitude, trying something new, asking someone you meet what their passion is, and sharing your dream with them that helps you get closer to your goals. If you help a friend get one step closer to their goal, you may find yourself re-inspired for yours. Do what makes you feel alive, and your mind and body will follow in queue. Soon you will find yourself excited about your goals, feeling good about yourself, and seeing your hard work come to fruition once again.

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