The ONLY thing that regains your motivation…

Photo by Luis Villasmil on Unsplash

The only thing that can regain your motivation…

Sometimes it is a bit of a mystery for us, where motivation is coming from. Sometimes you feel like you have all the power to change your life in an instant. But there are these times when you felt like you can’t do anything or don’t even want to do anything at all.

This is simply what we feel, when procrastination kicks in.

But have you ever thought, why do we even procrastinate?

According to behavioral psychology research, they revealed a phenomenon called “time inconsistency,” which helps explain why procrastination seems to pull us in despite our good intentions. This time inconsistency refers to the tendency of the human brain to value immediate rewards more highly than future rewards.

This is like an internal battle for us trying to win over the other, wherein we normally focus on immediate rewards rather that the long-lasting rewards for us. That’s also the reason that we tend to give-in to short term rewards, then later on feel bad with our self.

The common misconception about motivation is that it all came from our mental toughness or willingness to do things, but it is not just the case. Motivation is not a linear sequence wherein it all came from your mind (motivation then action), but it is more of a circular cycle wherein action also feeds our motivation (action then motivation then action), that when you start working unto something you started feeling the motivation to move forward.

We understand that often times the most difficult thing to do is NOT DOING it but STARTING it. Once we cross that resistance to do something, it will be a lot easier to follow through the action.

So what can we do to peel off this resistance in starting something?

That’s the 2-minutes rule…

IDEALLY all task that we must do have this gravity or pressure to be completed, but contrary to what is happening to us, we keep on RESISTING IN STARTING it. This is a cliché for most of us, and we always encounter this on a day-to-day basis. We often procrastinate in things that we MUST DO.

We have to change how we see motivation, we need see it as something that is coming from ACTIONS rather than from WHAT YOU FEEL.

The 2-minutes rule reduces the time for your mind to react and find reasons not to do certain things but it forces you to regain the momentum and continue working unto something. By doing this, you will suddenly feel that is it a lot easier to do continue doing it rather than when you’re TRYING TO CONVINCE YOURSELF OF STARTING IT. Task becomes more fluid and easier to do. You can feel that the initial resistance to do something slowly loosens and completing something makes it seems a lot of a less effort now.

The idea of this rule is that all task can be broken down into small tasks which can be done into bits of micro tasks. This micro task should be accomplishable in 2 minutes or less. Here are some examples:

1. Reading a book? Then, just read 1 page.
2. Working out? Then, just wear your gym clothes on.
3. Writing your blog? Then, just write 1 sentence.

You have to think of it as a micro task that will only took you 2 minutes to complete and once you manage to get started and have the momentum, you can continue working on it. You will notice that after doing it for 2 minutes it is a lot easier for you to do it longer.

According to James Clear https://jamesclear.com/procrastination

There are ways that we can be more productive each day while applying the 2-minutes rule.

1. Take the action immediately

Don’t let your mind rollover some thoughts that will eventually lead to you not doing anything at all. Just do it for 2 minutes and let if flow naturally when you started feeling the sudden motivation that you created.

2. Let go of all distractions

Put your phone away from you and do whatever it takes to remove it from your sight. Often times you are already building up the motivation you need or already have it when suddenly your phone rings and then you got distracted again. This “trigger” affects your focus and tempt you to not doing anything again. Put away all these distractions and focus in doing something.

3. Do it with something you love

This may be contrary to being focus on just one thing but this helps a lot when you just wanted to work. Always bundle the things you don’t want to do with the things you want. Like if you want to watch a movie tagged it while doing some task that you are procrastinating like folding your clothes. It is like tricking your brain for doing something that you don’t want and using the watching of movie as your trigger.

Conclusion

The idea of this is to trick your mind that everything can be accomplished easily. This reduces the resistance in doing something, the 2-minutes rule removes the time for your mind to react and resist on doing something and allows you to gain the momentum that you need to finish something. Try it now and let me know how it helped you.

PS: I did this post when I feel like not doing anything today. So I guess it really works! I managed to complete it, but I’m telling you before doing the 2-minutes rule, all I want to do is lay down in my bed. Trust me, this helps a lot!