Motivation - how do you find it?

No seriously, I'm asking - where do you find your motivation?  I struggle with this every minute of everyday.  If I don't have someone to meet for a workout, I simply won't do it.  Take this morning for example: I got up at 4:15am, made 3 giant stacks of pancakes so the kids would have breakfast when they woke up, drove into NYC (paid the damn toll), only to walk into Central Park to meet my teammates and find out my sitter had not shown up.  I then had to drive all the way back home without ever seeing any of my friends or getting any sort of work out done.  By 9am,  all of the kids were where they were going and I had nothing but free time on my hands while they were at camp.  One would think that this would be the perfect time to get that run in that I had missed a few hours ago but NO I was not going to do anything, at all!  Why?  Because I had no one to meet and could not motivate myself to go alone.  So imagine I'm all dressed in running clothes, perfect weather, no children at home and I can't seem to get myself out the door because I was alone.  I really envy people that can just get up and run out their door.

EMILY: she's so fast she's always blurry in photos!

And she's most happy with a Diet Coke!

But then came Emily - she texted me about the morning's run and I told her the whole story.  She told me to just "go now".  Excuse, excuse, blah, blah, blah, excuse.  She said, "I'm not texting you back until you go".  It worked - I got off my ass and went for a 30 minute run - all by myself....like a big girl.

So what is it that motivates some and not others?  What's the real reason you work out?   Vanity?  Bikini season?  Making your ex sorry he left?  Boredom?  Health?  Fitness?  Speed?  Do you want to beat your track record from HS?  And why do I have so much trouble just walking out the front door by myself?  If I have someone to meet or a class to take - I'm there.  Fully committed.  Something about the Mob Mentality I guess.  And like the rest of the universe, I feel AMAZING after I've worked out even the smallest amount and am always so glad I did it but that doesn't work in getting me to get started.

Please tell me your secrets.......I'll take any help I can get!