What is Your WHY?

How Are We Motivated?

Tomorrow we are celebrating my daughter’s 5th Birthday. She is the daughter I dreamed of having but when I was diagnosed with Ulcerative Colitis, that dream was shattered.

My husband and I always wanted to have four kids. I am not sure why we put so much pressure on ourselves, having one was hard enough for us, but there was still the dream of more. But sadly months after having our first child, I was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis. I remember sitting in my doctor’s office listening to all the new challenges I was facing and he said….”No more kids, you are too sick”. We pushed our family dreams aside to focus on my health and get me feeling as normal as possible. After about a year of experimenting with multiple medications, I finally was taking an injection that helped reduce my symptoms and my mind began to drift back to children. I had asked my GI doctor and the rheumatologist who administered my medication about becoming pregnant and the answer was a firm…NO! At that time, the drug was still so new that there wasn’t much history on pregnancy. And my doctor made a great point that stuck with me forever….”You may deliver a healthy baby but we don’t know the impact on that child beyond birth”.

These conversations helped me define my WHY for improving my health. I wanted to get rid of my medication, I wanted to be healthy enough to have another baby, and have the energy to be an active part of my children’s lives. This was a big enough WHY for me to get motivated and to change the
course of my life.

Do you ever ask yourself why you are doing something? It is helping you reach your goal? Does it motivate you to stay on a positive path?

Creating a WHY doesn’t need to be just for your personal life, it is great for use in your professional life as well.

Do you have a WHY that is driving you?

If you aren’t achieving a goal, is your WHY big enough?

Is your WHY positive and going to provide fulfillment?

It isn’t too late to discover your WHY!