Four Uncanny Tricks For Beating Low Motivation

Let’s get real. I’ve written before about my weaknesses.

They can kill stuff I’m really excited about, if I’m not careful.

New habits? Down the drain.

Big, exciting project? Fizzles out.

Simple home repair project? Never happens.

I’m sure you can think of things in your own life that fizzle out, are regularly procrastinated, or that you just give up on.

It’s human nature.

The fact is, our motivation waxes and wanes over time.

Looking back on the last few years of my life, I can see it happen again and again.

A few years back I started lifting, kept at it for a few months, then stopped with my first minor injury. The injury got all better in a month or so, but I didn’t get back to lifting for almost a year.

And stuck with it for another few months, and then quit again for even longer.

Ugh.

What waste. I’m getting ticked off at my past self right now.

That said, I am learning some techniques for sticking with my habits, projects, and even the little tasks around the house.

First, notice the waning motivation.

It happens. It’s fine. It doesn’t mean your project or new habit is bad or wrong or not worth doing. It’s just human nature rearing it’s head.

So accept your human nature.

Second, work on your discipline.

Discipline is a muscle, and it will get stronger as you exercise it. So push yourself to ignore the waning motivation for as long as you can.

Honestly, that might be enough. Sometimes the troughs you go through are short or shallow enough that just being disciplined is enough.

Or, as your discipline gets stronger, it will be enough to carry you through deeper, longer droughts.

Third, shorten your time horizons.

A great way to keep making forward progress is to focus on a shorter amount of time.

If the thought of all you have to do on a project over the next month is so daunting you want to give up, FORGET ABOUT THE NEXT MONTH.

Look at the next day, do something simple to move forward, and enjoy the momentum. Do it a couple more times and the momentum may pull you out of your funk so you can think about the next week or month again.

Fourth, cut back.

We all have extraneous stuff in our lives. When things are going well, our motivation and drive is high, we can keep it all moving forward. We can keep the balls in the air.

But when the passion just isn’t there, cutting back is a good approach. The passion may be gone precisely because your subconscious needs you to cut back.

The trick here is to cut back on stuff that isn’t as important. Maybe it takes all your discipline to stick with five habits that you’ve developed, so you need to drop the least important sixth and seventh, for a short time, until your discipline muscles are ready for the challenge.

The muscle analogy here is key. Just as our muscles need to be exercised and then rest, we need to do the same thing with our discipline.

Exercise it. Push your self as hard and as far as you can go.

Then rest it. Cut back, give yourself a break.

But recognize why you’re doing it. It’s so that you can re-engage fully with even more strength and power the next time.

Bonus tip: Ride the Wave

Once you’ve been through a few of these waxing and waning cycles, you can notice the wave of increasing passion, drive, and motivation as it comes at you.

It’s awesome.

As it comes, you can look back and see that you handled the dip better than ever before.

That will give you confidence to reach for greater heights and tackle new and interesting projects and habits.

So ride the wave!