If you look around you, you’ll see that some people have a lot of success and others struggle in life. Why certain person seems to turn everything they touch into gold, while others can’t finish even one project?
The answer is how motivated they are. Think of some project that you are proud of. What they have in common? You are probably proud of them because, you’ve finished them, and they are very good. You’ve probably put a lot of energy into them, because you loved the topic, and you were motivated.
Would it be nice if you could be motivated like that all the time, or whenever you want to?
The secret is to learn how you can motivate yourself.
1. Set up rewards: Let’s face it, who doesn’t like to receive a reward after putting effort on a work? Nobody. So, if you want to boost your motivation work with your mind not against it.
For example: You need to finish a 20 pages report in 4 days, but you really don’t feel like doing this. Every time, you sit at your computer to work on it you start procrastinating, and you make no progress at all. However, if you set a reward for every 5 pages that you write, you will be a lot more motivated to do it. And before you know it your report will be done.
2. Psyche yourself up: Another method that you can use is the visualization one. With that method, you need to visualize yourself doing the report. Tell yourself you can do it and then see yourself complete the report.
For example: You have to do the 20 pages report, but you don’t make progress at all and time is running out. You start to feel your stress level increasing, but the page is still blank. Instead of pushing yourself to do it, go outside or find a quiet room where you will be able to concentrate. Once you’ve found the perfect place, close your eyes and imagine yourself writing the report. Imagine that the words flow on the page, and that it’s super easy. Then imagine how great you will feel when you will bring the report to your boss. When you feel a huge boost of motivation toward this work opens your eyes and starts working on it. It’s sound, weird and inefficient if you’ve never try that, but visualization work like a charm. Even pro athlete use this almost every day.
3. Tell people you’re going to do it: This is another method that I use, and it works really well. It will be very efficient for the people who are very competitive and for the people who doesn’t like to be seen as a loser. For this method, you want to tell as many people as possible that you have a 20 pages report to do. Once you’ve tell people you will feel a pressure to do that work. You will have a boost of motivation because you don’t want other looks at you like a loser who can do what he said he was going to do.
4. Focus on the enjoyable aspect of it: This is an obvious advice that I give you. However, when we don’t feel doing something usually we don’t even find one thing that we enjoy in it. So, instead of looking at your report like it’s the worst thing in the world, try to find something that you love in it. It can be the topic of a chapter, the writing part, or the feeling of satisfaction after you’ve completed this report, etc.
5. Break it: Break you report into several small parts that way it won’t seem like the Himalayan Mountain, but more like a hill that you can climb up easily. You will run into a wall if you look at a project as one thing! However, if you break your project into several parts, it will become a lot easier to do, and you won’t feel overwhelmed.
For example: Break your report chapter by chapter. So, instead of a 20 pages report you will have 5 chapters of 5 pages to do. This makes more senses; now concentrate on the first chapter and the second one until you are done.
With those 5 tips to improve your motivation you should be able to boost your motivation, and complete every project that you have. I hope this post help you, if so don’t forget to subscribe to my RSS or by email.