Lacking Motivation? Instead Of Waiting For Inspiration To Strike, You Might Want To Try This InsteadIt's a fallacy to think we need to be inspired in order to get motivated, says Mark Manson. The real trick is to start first - and then the magic will come It’s not always possible to feel fired up. When it comes to the magic of motivation, the only thing we can actually rely on is the fact that we can’t rely on it all. Our enthusiasm levels fluctuate throughout the day, waxing and waning with our circadian rhythms. All being well, they run their natural course and we feel the fire in our bellies again. Other times our “down” spells can go on for what feels like a lifetime. We stare at blank screens, with blank minds and zero idea how to get back to that place of inspired action we had before. And this, says author Mark Manson, is where we can make a vital mistake. We wait for inspiration to come. We wait for that magical feeling, that breakthrough idea, to be “in the right frame of mind” in order to begin. The thing is, while it might very well come eventually, we potentially waste a lot of time waiting for it, he says. Manson’s advice is simple: just do something. Anything — literally. As he writes in his blog: "Action isn’t just the effect of motivation, but also the cause of it." The "Do Something" Principle Ideas don’t come just by looking at a screen. Taking action on something — even if it is unrelated — he suggests, is the missing ingredient. It’s what gives us a kick-start. The way we feel from taking action on something then motivates us to take action on other things, which then motivates us even further. The three components of Action, Inspiration and Motivation then form an endless loop (ideally), each feeding off each other. But the key to always remember, he writes, is that the action part is the catalyst. It’s always the first step. Action is what is required in order to get inspiration or motivation. Manson, a former life coach, calls this the “Do Something Principle”. It’s a simple piece of advice which he has given to his clients — and to himself — and he swears by it. So the next time you’re sitting in the proverbial waiting room and the flash of inspiration still hasn’t arrived, try taking action on something — either on the task at hand, or on literally anything else instead. You might find the wheels of your creative train will start to grease themselves.
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Why Some Things Are Best Left UndoneThe Zeigarnik Effect teaches us the value of deliberately putting things off It feels extremely satisfying coming to the end of a task, completing something, getting stuff done, particularly if it has taken a lot of work to do. The joy of facing the next day with a clean slate. While this might sound like something worth aiming for (and in certain cases it can be), it can also, paradoxically be hazardous for our productivity levels. In fact, being too proficient at getting stuff done can be the very thing that can stop us from being able to get started the next day. The Perils Of A Blank Slate Any of us who have ever suffered from creative block knows how excruciating it is to stare endlessly at a blank page (figuratively or otherwise), praying for inspiration to come flooding in. We all know that the magic never came that way. That's why some of the best advice out there for creatives who find themselves in this position is just to write/create something, anything - even if it's complete drivel. It gets the wheels turning and gives us something to work with (see Mark Manson's tip, the "Do Something Principle", and Tim Ferriss, with his "Two Crappy Pages"). The Zeigarnik Effect But there's another, arguably easier, way. It requires walking away from a creative task before it is done and, specifically, to resist the urge to complete it before we hit the hay. That incomplete task will linger in our minds and compel us to go back to it. Our brains can't help it. We need closure. This phenomenon is called The Zeigarnik Effect. Named after psychologist Bluma Zeigarnik, the concept was inspired by an observation that waiters in a restaurant had an uncanny ability to remember details about orders only up until the point that the food had been served. Once service was complete, so was any memory they had of the details of it. It led Zeigarnik to later conclude that we had a significantly higher likelihood to recall unfinished tasks (and forget completed ones), as author and psychologist Adam Grant, notes in his book, Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World: “Once a task is finished, we stop thinking about it. But when it is interrupted and left undone, it stays active in our minds." "Open Loops" These things left undone, which play on our minds, are called "Open Loops". These "loops" or incomplete tasks, cause an internal tension in our minds, where we can't stop thinking about them, as Video essayist, Will Schoder explains in the video below: "Your subconscious nags your conscious mind over and over again... It makes sense; you remember an incomplete task because your brain thinks it's important and completing that task enables you to forget about it." But that's not all it does. It also boosts our motivation to do them. Says Schoder: "[Zeigarnik ] discovered a strong relationship between that memory of an incomplete task and a desire for cognitive closure. That is, if there is an objective that we committed ourselves to pursue - an open loop - we're highly motivated to close that loop in order to escape the intrusive thoughts and feelings it causes." So having a task left undone is, by default, a kind of way round creative block and procrastination. Always make sure we have something to do and we won't ever have to face the dreaded blank slate. Strategic Procrastination There is another term for this, according Grant. He calls it "Strategic Procrastination". Strategic Procrastination is the deliberate act of putting something off to ensure it stays in our minds and that we pick it up again. It also means giving ourselves the time and space we need to potentially come up with better ideas. And it has been unwittingly applied by the likes of Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King throughout history, according to Grant. So the next you want something to get up for and you are hellbent on increasing your chances of getting in "the zone", then put it down - whatever it is you're working on. It will still be there tomorrow and you'll be thankful it is.
Things To Think About When Your "Passion" Has Become A Thankless Slog...When a passion project ceases to be one, we need to look at the expectations we have of it - and what we are willing to do for it. Passion projects can be tricky, not always in finding out what they are (although that is hard enough), but more in the actual execution of them. They require a lot of effort and all too frequently they attract little (if any) reward. They are invariably thankless tasks. We can find ourselves grafting for weeks, months, years, even, with no external validation or financial gain of any kind. Before long, what once made us invigorated will make us feel drained; what was previously a passion will become a pain; what fulfilled us will leave us feeling resentful. What can be done, then, about this inevitable side-effect of sticking with our dreams, when there appears to be no external evidence to convince us it is worth sticking at in the first place? Passion At Any Cost? There are three parts to look at here:
Let’s look at the first: 1. What Drives Us Vs What Pays The Bills There is a key difference between being intrinsically and extrinsically motivated, as much as there is a difference in being intrinsically and extrinsically rewarded. The first kind — being intrinsically driven — is creating-for-creating-sake, i.e. doing something for the love of it. We do this, regardless of reward. The second kind — being extrinsically driven — is doing something for what we will get because of it i.e, money, career progression and so on. We do this, because of the reward. How Passions Can Falter By definition, passion projects are intrinsically-driven to begin with. There was a point in time when we did this for the joy of it. But akin to the law of diminishing returns, what once thrilled us about our passion project will inevitably cease to at some point. Sometimes we can get back to that basic starting point. We can emerge from our dejected state and rediscover what it was that gripped us so much in the first place — and rekindle it. However, often the reason we can’t do this, is that we fail to notice that a new need has replaced the one that fired us up originally. And that is invariably about making money. The Downside Of Thinking Extrinsically While there is absolutely nothing wrong with desiring money for our efforts, being too driven by financial gain can paradoxically have a demotivating effect. In a 1971 study, psychologist Edward Deci found that the act of offering an external reward, (i.e. money), to an individual who was already motivated to undertake a task, had the effect of making him less motivated to do it. When the carrot of money is dangled in front of the eyes of someone who is lost in their passion, blissfully unaware of the world around them, their focus quickly shifts to the money and not the act itself. In other words, their creative libidos can tank. Which brings us to point number 2: 2. Do Passion Projects Have To Make Money? Is it a fallacy to believe we will always be financially compensated for doing what we love? And is it perfectly OK to have passion projects which don’t actually make any money at all? The answer to the 2nd question is a resounding “yes”. It’s called having a hobby. The 1st question is a bit trickier to answer. There are more self-help gurus out there than we care to count who will tell us we can make our dreams come true - and get rich doing it. Even Joseph Campbell told us to “follow our bliss”. But did he mean in order to make money? Or did he just mean ‘therein lies the path to happiness’? Ideally you want to get both but what Campbell wanted to stress was that we should not sacrifice one for the other. We shouldn’t turn our back on our passion for money. But equally if we don’t get that money, the passion is still worth having: "There’s something inside you that knows when you’re in the center, that knows when you’re on the beam or off the beam. And if you get off the beam to earn money, you’ve lost your life. And if you stay in the center and don’t get any money, you still have your bliss." Are We Being Delusional By Wanting It All? In Barbara Sher’s opinion, our dreams don’t need to make us money — and in fact few dreams actually do (contrary to what YouTube gurus tell us). She argues (here) that it is a false narrative we present ourselves when we align passion with money and use the inability to earn an income from a passion project as the reason for not doing it in the first place. Earning an income and doing something we love are invariably two separate things, no matter how much we want them to be the same, Sher says. And we are effectively shooting ourselves in the foot if we use the former to deny ourselves the latter. Because realistically, she says, we are not going to be able to easily support ourselves writing poetry all day long. Having a day-job and a side-hustle or hobby, then, is the first thing to consider at this juncture. And if that idea makes us recoil in horror, then we need to look at what we are prepared to do in the name of our passion. And this leads us to point number 3: 3. What We Are Willing To Do Mark Manson posted an interesting video recently regarding the issue of what we think we want out of our lives and the reality of actually doing it. He cites the example of him craving the ideal lifestyle of a surfer (along with the sex appeal that comes with it) but admits that the actual act of learning to surf bores him stupid. This is the reality vs the fantasy. As Manson explains in his video, we frequently look to the lives of others and think that’s what we want but we don’t actually want to do what it takes to be like them. This isn’t a flaw in us, it’s a sign that something isn’t for us. The Lives Of Others I like the idea of the lifestyle of an Instagram influencer who floats around the world looking glamorous and living in Bali off the back of multiple 6-figure sponsorship deals. The problem is, I don’t want my life documented in photographs for all to see. It’s that simple. The same goes for what we are willing to do in the name of our passion projects. If we are frustrated at the lack of success we are experiencing but are unwilling to do what it takes to make it successful, we will hit a brick wall. If we detest basic functions like marketing, promotion or networking, for example — or we don’t like the idea of actually running a business — then we need to ask ourselves a few basic questions. Basic Questions So, here is the idiot's guide to some basic — and brutal — questions we need to ask ourselves when we are feeling resentful and frustrated over our lack of success.
The answers we get at this point might tell us if our frustrations are anchored in delusion, denial or procrastination. While passion projects can begin as things that ecstatically allow us to escape reality, at some point, particularly if our needs change, we will need to face reality. If we don’t do this, we risk sabotaging an area of our lives which can bring us unbridled joy, simply by viewing it through a distorted lens.
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