Productivity Reset: 10 Things You Can Do To Regain Motivation

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10 Things You Can Do to Regain Motivation

Motivation is a hard-to-quantify aspect of psychology affecting your productivity in work, social life, and the daily tasks you do to live a good life.

Your motivation goes through cycles, but your mindset and how you work can heavily influence your drive when it starts to slip away.

Here are 10 things you can do to regain your motivation so you can be more productive. 

1. Turn Your Regular Tasks Into Goals

Goal setting is essential to getting things done. Research shows setting a clear goal instead of generalizing what you need to accomplish can help you more effectively work towards it.

Having that objective be definitive gives you a finish line you can work towards — and a feeling of accomplishment when you reach it.

The goals you set for yourself should motivate you because you want to improve. Intrinsic motivation comes from the satisfaction of following through on an idea versus what accomplishing it will get you.

Being intrinsically motivated to achieve goals will motivate you to achieve them effectively. 

2. Focus on the Big Picture

There is a reason behind everything you do — working, cooking, cleaning or relaxing. At the very least, you work to bring home a paycheck. You cook so you have something to eat and you relax to recuperate from the efforts of working and doing chores.

When you lose motivation, think about why you are doing the activity in the first place to give it intention and center yourself. What does the action do and how does it contribute to a more significant task in your life?

Instead of just thinking about how a task benefits you, you should also consider how you impact others. When you work, you provide a product or service helping other people accomplish their tasks, whether you provide food, information or entertainment. Cooking may also be feeding your family or fueling yourself to help others.

3. Don’t Overthink It

It can be easy to overthink something simple, bringing you more stress than doing the task should. Overthinking can happen when you think of how bad a job can go before you begin it.

Imposing excess pressure on yourself by overthinking can lead to chronic stress, which can cause health problems including headaches, sleep problems, and heart disease.

When you avoid that stress by moving forward with the tasks you need to complete before you overthink, you can focus more clearly on what you’re doing.

One way to prevent overthinking is to break your larger tasks down into small pieces you can take on one at a time until the job is complete.

Related Reads:
• 6 Ways You Can Practice Self-Care to Increase Productivity
• 5 Ways to Stay Focused on Your Goals

4. Maintain Your Progress

People tend to have a solid motivation to complete their goal initially, but that motivation will waver over time. You have waves throughout the day where you are mentally equipped to be productive. Sometimes, you have to force yourself back up a wave when you feel you’re headed down.

Thankfully, the journey up can be more manageable. You can shift your perspective when you reflect on what you’ve already accomplished versus what you have left to do. This can help you visualize the end of a project and motivate you to keep going.

5. Write Your Goals Down

Another way to regain your motivation is by writing your goals down. By physically writing down your goals and why you want to achieve them, you are more likely to retain them and gain motivation by remembering them.

You could also journal your goal progress as you make it, giving you documentation of your journey.

Another helpful tool for this activity could be bulletin boards – digital or physical. These platforms allow you to post or view your goals publicly, serving as a tangible reminder of what you aim to achieve. Bulletin boards also provide a way for you to visually track this progress, creating a sense of accomplishment with each goal you move towards completion.

6. Look Towards Others

As humans, it’s natural to feel influenced by the other people around us. You could be more likely to do something if you see that thing positively affecting another person.

If you find yourself losing motivation to complete your goal, try watching people who are further along or have already accomplished that goal.

When you’re getting jealous of someone who accomplished a similar goal, remember that they had to reach the same milestones you do.

7. Adjust Your Diet

Different nutrients can affect your mood and incorporating more of them into your diet can help increase your motivation.

Vitamin D and omega-3s are two essential nutrients for motivation you can find in foods such as seafood, fortified dairy products, and sardines.

These nutrients help to increase your dopamine levels — a hormone and neurotransmitter that helps with focus, motivation, memory, and a sense of reward.

8. Conquer Your Fears

Fears of failure can hold you back from working to achieve your goals. While anxiety can sometimes stop you from doing risky things, those instincts can also prevent you from doing what you love. 

Your fear can get in the way of your motivation — but conquering them can keep you from abandoning the things you want or need to do.

Ways to help conquer your fears include: 

• Practicing mindfulness.
• Studying your fear to understand it.
• Practicing deep breathing techniques.
• Imagining how you can handle your anxiety.

9. Find the Challenge

You can lose motivation quickly if you don’t feel mentally stimulated by what you need to complete. Finding a low-stress challenge within your work can help motivate you to finish your tasks.

Finding a challenge can help you set a symbolic finish line you can reach, but sometimes you’ll find yourself facing overwhelming challenges. In those cases, it’s helpful to turn your negative thoughts and energy into fuel for reaching the end of your goal.

10. Take a Break

When working towards a goal, you may want to devote 100% of your energy to it. However, that can lead to burnout, which can be harmful to your physical and mental health.

Taking a break to practice self-care now and then can help you avoid burnout by reenergizing your mind and body.

Tips for practicing self-care include: 

• Enjoying a hobby
• Spending time with loved ones
• Eating a healthy meal
• Taking a bath or shower
• Going on a walk

Clearing your mind and taking time away from your goal will help you be more productive when working towards it.

Use These Tips to Replenish Your Motivation

Motivation is something you could lose from time to time. You can combat motivation loss and be more productive with the right tools. Try out a few of these strategies when you feel like your ambition could use a little refueling.