You’ve tried everything, from watching motivational videos on YouTube to taking screenshots of inspirational quotes on Pinterest.
You’ve consumed what feels like your hundredth snack. Plus the bathroom breaks — the carpet is worn out from all of your trips to the loo.
There’s no denying it; you just can’t get your stuff together. You’re so frustrated. The same shit is on your task list that was there last week … so annoying. You want to crush it, but you just can’t get motivated. What gives?
Take a deep breath. Stop googling “how to get motivated.” We’ll get through this together.
Lack of motivation happens to the best of us. Like a nasty cold, it sneaks up on us when it’s the least convenient time possible. Being in an unmotivated stupor leaves us feeling frustrated, perplexed, and defeated all at the same time. It’s like we’re caught in a messy love triangle — our motivated self wants us to come home, behave, and get to work while we are actively being seduced by our indifferent self into watching Netflix and chilling.
It’s tempting to try to push through — to try to channel your inner beast and get stuff done. But often that strategy doesn’t quite work. That’s because a lack of motivation is usually a signal of greater misalignment in life. Without addressing where you’re falling out of focus, your motivation will continue to suffer — requiring you to exert incredible amounts of energy to get anything done.
The fix? Well, it requires you to do something that society discourages us from doing.
STOP. JUST STOP.
When your motivation is suffering, the best thing that you can do is to completely stop. Stop trying to go after it and just give yourself what is probably a much-needed timeout. In today’s society, we’re so consumed with being busy and doing activities that we’re afraid to take a break. Often a break is exactly what we need. Give yourself some time off. Step away from the tasks, to-do lists, and goals. Get out into nature. Spend time with loved ones and family. Realize that being productive isn’t the end-all, be-all solution to life. Just be. No technology. No meetings. No tasks. Just be a being, being.
Once you’ve given yourself a break, it’s time to reassess. Most of our days are filled with meaningless, mindless tasks and stuff based on other people’s agendas. Often the drudgery of uninspiring, ridiculous things to do saps our energy and creativity. It’s time to radically rethink what you’re doing and why you’re doing it. Ask yourself these critical questions:
- What is my greater why and purpose in life?
- What do I spend 80 percent of my day doing? Are these tasks leading me to my greater why in life?
- What can I get rid of to free up my time and energy, so that most of my day is spent doing things that contribute to my greater why?
- What do I need to outright quit?
- Are there goals that I’m trying to achieve that I honestly don’t even care about anymore? (Scrap those goals now.)
- Are there people and/or environments that sap my energy? How can I spend less time with these people or remove myself from these environments?
- Am I being unrealistic in the number of things that I’m giving myself to do? Do I need to outsource and ask someone else for help?
Once you’ve reassessed, it’s time to realign. This is not the time for massive to-do lists. This is the time to ask and answer just one question:
“What is the most important thing for me to do?”
Then disrupt — find a way to break the monotony of life by doing something different. Take a different route to work, call someone you haven’t spoken with in a while, make something different for breakfast. Finding a small way to disrupt your day can reenergize you and put a bit of spring back into your step. And who knows? After battling with a bout of missing motivation, you may find that you come back bigger, stronger, and faster than ever before.
