The Motivation Equation
It’s ironic that the first post I’m making in a long time is about motivation, considering I’ve not had any motivation to write for the past few months.
I’ve struggled with finding the best productivity system for a long time, but nothing seems to work exactly as I want it to. Oftentimes, I seem to find myself stuck when I’m faced with my daily to-do list, and I always seem to have items left over. It’s taken me a long time to find the problem, but now that I have, finishing my to-do list has become almost effortless.
The truth is, I don’t have a problem working, and I don’t have a problem motivating myself, the only problems I have are starting and finishing. I have a five-step system that’s finally working for me, and I’m feeling happier than I have in a long time because of it.
Pavlov Myself:
Almost everyone is familiar with Pavlov’s dog, and I’ve realized that I’m no different. When I don’t have a consistent routine, environment, and clear path for my day, I find myself feeling unaccomplished when the stop-clock rings at the end of the day. I have a very hard time getting started on my first task, but I’ve realized I don’t need to motivate myself to sit down and work, I just have to train my brain to go into work mode automatically.
I’m not going to lie, sometimes I wish I had a 9–5 job just so I didn’t have to think about it, but the thought that usually follows is how grateful I am for the freedom I’ve been afforded everyday of my life. I don’t believe in spending 12 hours a day working, only to go home with enough time to eat, sleep, and get up to do it all over again. The time I can actually spend on quality work is finite, and I’ve figured out that is about 6 hours a day. Here’s the simple system I use to get the most out that time.
Here’s my simple system.
- Get to work at the same time everyday. My shop used to open at 11, so some days I would go in at 9:30, some days I would go in at 10:55, and that created inconsistencies in my productivity each day. My start time is 9:45 AM everyday; now that I’ve implemented this, I feel more disciplined when it’s time to work. I don’t have to sit there stressed out about what I’m going to prioritize, knowing I’m probably going to be behind before I even get started.
- Put my music on, don’t just sit in silence. Some people may work well with no noise around them, but that’s definitely not me. I need a place to return when I start to wander off into a day-dream, almost like a totem in the movie Inception. I think of this as my way to snap back into reality.
- Sit in the same spot everyday. I used to drift around the 1200 square feet of my shop, and for some reason I had trouble getting comfortable. Now I setup my station in the same spot everyday.
These three preliminary actions make it easy to get started by taking the friction out of finding my happy place, and when I enter this environment, it’s almost like I’m entering a different world where the outside doesn’t exist.
Live By My To Do List
I used to think living by a calender, or a to do list was unhealthy and would lead to feeling stressed out all of the time if I couldn’t finish it in a day, but I’ve found that I work very well within structure. If you’re one of those people who can just wing-it, congratulations, I wish I was you, but that’s not my reality. There’s a balance between having a clear plan of action and being a machine refusing to deviate from that path. I’m working on finding that balance.
I’m not a basketball fan, but when I heard of the hot hand fallacy, it made quite a bit of sense to me.
If you’re not familiar, here’s a summary, courtesy of The Decision Lab. I’ll link the full article at the bottom of this post.
“The hot-hand fallacy describes our tendency to believe that a successful streak is likely to lead to further success. For example, if a basketball player has made three consecutive shots, we may believe he has a greater chance of making the fourth than is actually likely.” — The Decision Lab
It’s hard to explain, but it seems like once I started, it’s easy to keep punching through my to do list. I ride the momentum, and try not to let myself get distracted by Youtube, even when it’s what I’d rather be doing.
The motivation behind this change is simple: time is money, so I have to choose where I spend it wisely. Everything goes on the to do list; I don’t care if it’s something as simple as cleaning my computer screen, everything adds to that feeling of accomplishment I need to wake up everyday with the motivation to get to work.
Let’s not exclude fun time from the list. I schedule my time for solitude, relaxation, or events with my friends as well. This has made me really think about what I do with my time, and not filling l the gaps with frivolous actions.
Go To The Shop Whenever I Need To Work, Unless I Need To Be At Home To Do It
I’m officially scheduled to work at the shop four days a week, and I used to abide by that every single day. I tried to work on other projects at home on my day’s off, but that never seems to work for me.
When I’m at home, there are so many distractions. My playstation, or my gaming PC stare at me, almost as if they are calling out for me, I browse through Amazon looking for shiny things I don’t actually need, or I just find excuses to be lazy.
I’ve started going to the shop anytime there is a task that can be done outside of the house. Obviously I can’t record videos (when I actually find the motivation to do so), or take my recording gear with me to make music, but the other 90% of my tasks can be done sitting in the same spot as I would if it were Sunday — Wednesday.
My best work is done when I’m in that happy place, so I’ve stopped running from it. I embrace it, and once I did, I became a person who accomplishes their goals, not someone who goes to bed every night feeling like I fell short.
When The List Is Done, It’s Done
Here’s a very small piece of my puzzle, but it’s possibly the most important. If I finish all of my work ahead of schedule, sometimes I’ll get started on the next day, but I’ve realized it’s ok to take that time for myself if I so choose. I have a tendency to become a workaholic when I get into a productivity spree, but that always leads to burnout.
If I want to spend the extra 2 hours playing Overwatch 2, dammit I’m going to. There’s nothing wrong with being lazy, as long as I’m being lazy at the right time.
Accept Imperfection
This is a lifelong task, there’s never a moment when I get to check it off, and that makes me happy.
It’s tough for me to accept imperfection, and I could honestly go on about that for a long time, but to sum it up, it’s impossible to do everything perfectly every single day. Somedays, I’m just not in the right headspace to work as efficiently as I would like. Someday, it will be more difficult to get started than others. Somedays, I’m going to have writer's block. Somedays, I’m going to have items left on my to-do list.
If I fail to complete everything today, it’s not a failure, it just means I can get back on it tomorrow.
When I get everything done, and then I have time left over to get ahead of schedule, or additional free time I didn’t have before, the feeling of accomplishment is greater.
