
Hack your motivation - micrypt
http://www.bemmu.com/hack-your-motivation
======
segmondy
Lack of sustained motivation has been the bane of my existence. The only true
obstacle to everything I've ever wanted in life.

The article is cool, but not enough, when I'm not motivated, I will not do
anything in those articles, I will do other things that I shouldn't be doing.
Does the hack call for just work for 30 seconds. I won't. I'm unmotivated,
that's the problem.

The question that is quite the un-scratchable itch for me has been, how do I
sustain motivation for very long periods of time. That even if it falls, it
never dies out. I've my up and down moments, but what I've noticed is that my
down moments are almost as good at being as dead for a while.

~~~
zeidrich
I have been really focusing on my motivation and willpower lately. I used to
have a very similar scenario to what you describe.

What works for me is this: 1) Recognize that my willpower is limited, like a
muscle it can be exhausted and needs rest. 2) Recognize that when I'm listless
that it's not a moral failing, it's essentially my willpower being exhausted.
3) Never feel guilty for that feeling of listlessness, instead use it as an
opportunity to rest. 4) Pay attention to what types of rest work most
effectively. 5) Never try to override this rest unless it's seriously
important. (And not everything can be seriously important). 6) Recognize that
you don't need to feel driven to get things done. You need to do things to get
things done.

When I exhaust my will, I suck at maintaining priorities. I drive on feelings,
and unless I can work myself up into a stress-filled frenzy, I'm going to do
the things that I'm not supposed to be doing. However, if I do work myself
into a stress-frenzy, I'm going to be working erratically and inefficiently
and generally be a giant pain to be around. A lot of people live in this state
to cope with these problems. Drugs, caffeine, distractions, over-exaggeration
all help you maintain it.

When I'm working comfortably with motivation to spare, I can choose a task and
do it. I can make a plan and stick to it. I'm very efficient relatively
speaking. The most noticeable thing though is I'm a lot less emotional about
the things I'm doing. I'm not angry or irritated, but I'm also not really
excited either. That's not to say I'm not passionate or really interested, but
I'm calm. The sort of emotional outbursts are stressful, and just being under
stress drains my will.

The biggest difference I've noticed though is that when I'm able to work
myself down into that calm motivated state, I'm less affected by trepidation
and apprehension. I don't feel guilty about the things that I have been
putting off; part of that is because I've committed to not feel guilty, but a
large part is that I've got some control over my feelings. When I'm stressed
and my will is exhausted, I hate myself for the things I haven't done. When
I'm motivated I will pick something that has been cast aside for 3 weeks and
just do what needs to be done, not feeling guilty or shameful, just
continuing.

The more I can keep myself in the second state, the easier it is. I don't get
as stressed, so I'm less likely to fall back into the first state. So
ultimately, the real challenge is how to get back to the calm motivated state
when you're in the stress-frenzy state.

The simple thinking is that "I want to get stuff done" so you push yourself to
work harder and frustrate yourself that you are failing. But that generates
more stress and makes it harder. The less intuitive path is to let yourself
rest, and not let yourself get frustrated and stressed about it. Stop
procrastinating and start resting. The difference between procrastinating and
resting is really just that in the former you're worrying yourself over the
things you're not doing.

I've always had up and down moments. In my down moments I can be useless. So
instead of trying to never have down moments, I try to make the most of them
instead of struggling with them, and never spend my up moments regretting
them. Over the long term this has lead to my down moments being not as bad,
not as long, and less frequent.

~~~
fohlin
Everything in your comment really resonates with me—except I feel mostly
powerless on getting to the second state. It either happens or it doesn't.

I can easily recognize the down periods, but like segmondy, I can't (or won't)
do anything about them. In a free work environment, it's easy to rationalize
not working right now with "I'm listless, it's better in the long run to
rest." But too many of those occasions point to larges issues, such as not
really caring about the work.

I self-identify with being intrinsically driven, as well as caring about my
work. So now there's the meta-guilt of not being interested and motivated
enough. Along with the normal guilt of "why won't you just harden the F up and
do something."

Anyway, if you have written anything else along these lines, please post a
link. I'd be very interested in reading it!

~~~
ripter
Something that has helped me. I do it regardless if I want to work on it or
not.

I stopped making a choice if I work on this project. I work on the project for
an hour. Not because I want too (I might not) but because that is what I do.

When I hear those voices in my head that want to put it off, or I'm too tired,
or let's just skip it today, we can make it up tomorrow. I (struggle sometimes
to) ignore them. This isn't a question about wanting to spend that hour on the
project. There isn't a question to have. I just do it.

Once you start the voice tends to go away because I'm too busy actually doing
it.

I think this is why offices work the way they do. You are not given a choice.
You show up to work and you have 8 hours to do it. Someone even does the
planning for you! So you have nothing else to do, so it's not a choice. You
just do.

As lame as it sounds, the Nike slogan in correct. (If you look you'll see all
sorts of famous people with the same motto.) You just do it. Nothing else
matters. That's the trick. It's incredibly hard and most people won't. But if
you really want too succeed, then you will just do it.

And if not, then maybe you are beating yourself up over something that doesn't
really matter to you. It's a valid question. Do you honestly want it? Or maybe
something else is pushing you to want it, but you don't really care.

------
logn
I also like to leave a very small task undone from the previous day to help me
get jump-started the next day. So if I'm finishing programming a function and
the last line needs to return something, I'll just not write that last line
and put a //TODO instead. The next day it helps me get in the groove of
writing code after the long break.

~~~
logicallee
I've heard this phrased as always stop after some sudden progress that makes
you eager to do more - as opposed to stopping when you're stuck and giving up:

if you're stuck, then when you think of the task it will be in your mind as a
bete noire, as opposed to stopping where you've just made some progress and
are eager to continue - then it will always be in your mind as something great
to return to and make more progress.

~~~
mdm_
I always feel like I get stuck way more than I make progress. :(

------
hanula
One thing which I can highly recommend to anyone with motivation problems and
help beat the procrastination is pomodoro technique [1]. When I'm stuck or
can't make the first move to get into the work mood, I just hit the pomodoro
timer. Somehow the ticking clock gives me boost and puts me into hours of
productive work. Always! It's the only technique which works 100% in my case.
Try it out for yourself.

[1] [http://www.pomodorotechnique.com/](http://www.pomodorotechnique.com/)

~~~
potomak
I started using it when I started doing freelance work and it saved my life as
working at home is much more distraction prone than working at office.

I also built Tomatoes[1] a tool that I suggest to track working time
effectively.

[1] [http://tomato.es](http://tomato.es)

------
minimax
For me the most important thing is to start working on something first thing
in the morning before I start poking around on the Internet. If I spend an
hour checking up on Twitter, HN, Reddit, or whatever it totally kills my
productivity for the day. If I can spend just 20-30 minutes working on work
before I catch up on the day's news I have a much better time focusing on my
work throughout the rest of the day.

~~~
ridicter
This exactly the same for me. Just out of muscle memory, my reptilian brain
starts typing Reddit or Hacker News into the URL field in my browser when I'm
not paying attention. If I start my day wandering down the hacker news/reddit
rabbit hole, I never really get out.

So when I wake up in the morning, literally before I do anything else on my
computer, I turn on Self Control
([http://visitsteve.com/made/selfcontrol/](http://visitsteve.com/made/selfcontrol/)),
which blocks sites that kill my productivity.

I've recently adopted org-mode for emacs, and it has helped immensely. Task #1
everyday: Turn on Self Control for a few hours. The last task everyday: Close
all windows and make sure org-mode is greeting me when I wake up with Task #1
for the day.

~~~
minimax
We really are the same. I keep a journal in org-mode and in my .emacs I have
cron-like periodic function that switches to my journal in the middle of the
night so that it's the first thing I see when I unlock my computer in the
morning. Something like:

    
    
      (run-at-time "23:59" 86400 (lambda ()
                                  switch-to-buffer "journal.org")))

~~~
ridicter
That's an _awesome_ idea. Anything that pares down the number of decisions I
have to make to jumpstart my day...

I only picked up emacs about a month ago, investing heavily in customizing it.
It has seriously helped so much with my focus since it takes out all the
distractions/opportunities for context switching.

------
oblique63
The last point is particularly useful, and quite reminiscent of what 'The Now
Habit'[1][2] advocates. Some weeks I get so completely burned out, I have to
force myself to do nothing but 'veg out' by watching endless netflix shows
through the weekend without thinking about anything else. It's hard to allow
it at first because it feels like a ludicrous waste of time, but it becomes
surprisingly refreshing by the end of it.

[1] [http://www.amazon.com/The-Now-Habit-Overcoming-
Procrastinati...](http://www.amazon.com/The-Now-Habit-Overcoming-
Procrastination/dp/1585425524/)

[2] Here's a good video series that summarizes it's key points:
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=63Si3Gb1WSg](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=63Si3Gb1WSg)

~~~
weeber
Here is some slides about this technique, the approach seems interesting :
[http://hashref.com/summaries/TheNowHabit.pdf](http://hashref.com/summaries/TheNowHabit.pdf)
I find myself in the psychologies described.

------
asgard1024
Is there any good advice on overcoming procrastination due to social anxiety?
Things like phone calls, dealing with unknown people, etc. I have a fear that
I am not very knowledgeable about something (like law, or buying some stuff or
service) and that others will cheat me, and it causes me problems.
Interestingly, if I schedule a meeting, I am willing to handle it, but if I
won't, I will try to postpone a lot. And even if I gain more experience in one
area, it will then creep again in in another.

~~~
cliffcrosland
This may be unrelated, but if your social anxiety is caused by fear that your
social skills are inadequate, it could be helpful to recognize that the
content of what you say matters much more than your presentation. When I'm
nervous about my delivery in an upcoming, important conversation, it helps me
to remember that some of the most fascinating and accomplished people do not
always speak fluently or present well. These people include Elon Musk, Peter
Thiel, and Paul Graham, and they certainly have not been held back by any
supposed weakness in speaking style. See pg's essay, "Writing and Speaking."
[http://www.paulgraham.com/speak.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/speak.html)

------
jackschultz
I've been working on a side project which falls into the category of hacking
motivation. Streakflow[1] is based on Jerry Seinfeld's "don't break the
chain"[1] mentality that I've seen mentioned here before. It really helps when
you don't want to do something because the thought of having to start over is
worse than just doing it.

[1] [http://www.streakflow.com](http://www.streakflow.com) [2]
[http://lifehacker.com/5886128/how-seinfelds-productivity-
sec...](http://lifehacker.com/5886128/how-seinfelds-productivity-secret-fixed-
my-procrastination-problem)

------
wslh
I think the core of the motivation issue is the NOW vs longer term
achievements, so my suggestion is to push longer term achievements to the "now
court". How?

Well, think in byproducts of your current work: are you working on an
algorithm that is complex? write an article explaining it after you understand
it. Did you find an unknown development library that was very useful to your
work, share it! So I see small branches of your current work that produce many
deliveries.

Another way to solve the motivation issue is working with someone. This is the
core idea on pair-programming.

If someone is interested I have concrete examples about delivering byproducts.

~~~
graeme
What are some byproduct examples? I'm interested in doing more of this.

------
agumonkey
My latest theory[1] on doing things, when not motivated:

    
    
      - do nothing, stay stably where you are.
      - let the 'reluctance' wash off a little.
      - keep doing nothing (don't get drawn away)
      - make the smallest step toward your task
      - do nothing
      - make an additional tiny steps
      - hopefully[1] steps will get easier, and bigger
      - the momentum of overcoming the lack of motivation
        and making progress will bring a little joy
    

[1] Obviously that's only my personal anecdotal experience, based on
difficulty in doing physical exercise or learning music. Many times I didn't
feel capable, aching, frustrated... Just putting myself into situation and see
how things can go has been leading to regular surprises.

tl; dr : long warm up time.

------
arc_of_descent
A great hack which I use (still not very good at it though) is the 2 minute
technique in the GTD book. Although in the book, the author advocates it in a
different manner, I prefer to use it to stop my procrastination.

So I say to myself, let me just work on the code for 2 minutes, not more. And
believe me, 2 minutes is a long time! By the time the 2 mins is over I don't
even notice and continue coding. This also really helps me in guitar practice.
Learning a new song, or a a lick is pleasant. It's the mundane repetitive
exercises one needs to do to increase the strength and endurance of your
fingers. So again I say to myself, let me just do it for 2 minutes. Believe
me, on certain days, that 2 minutes ends up to 4-5 hours of practice.

------
cgag
[http://lesswrong.com/lw/9wr/my_algorithm_for_beating_procras...](http://lesswrong.com/lw/9wr/my_algorithm_for_beating_procrastination/)
i found this article and discussion useful

~~~
elements
Thanks for posting that. I had got about 80% of the way towards a similar
model myself, but to see one laid out and formalized like that was very
helpful.

------
rickdale
Also check out The Motivation Hacker by Nick Winter. That book is awesome and
Nick talks about going from being too nervous to order at Taco Bell to being
asked to speak at various tech and hacker conventions.

------
micrypt
A really nice read. I'd also suggest treating one's life as a debugging
session once in a while… A few choice `printf` insertions and re-running can
sometimes make a world of difference. :)

~~~
cLeEOGPw
Can you give more details and maybe examples of this?

~~~
micrypt
It's really nothing sophisticated. It's just stepping back once in a while and
looking at what's not working, trying again while changing something small and
noting what does work. Surely, you already do this at some level.

------
gothep
My five cents: Watch Iron Man. Always gets my nerd going.

------
bippi
I think this is all well and good, there are always things we procrastinate.

However, I think if you need to run your life like this... maybe look at what
you're doing, as a whole. I don't think you should have to hack your
motivation, or anything else, to get it to work.

