Motivation

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about motivation. For the longest time, I thought that I had to “wait” to feel motivated before I could act. As I’m finding out, it’s a sure fire way to not get much done. How often have you told yourself “I’ll wait for inspiration to strike” or “I’ll do it tomorrow” before starting anything? Before you know it, you won’t have as many “tomorrows”.

There’s an excellent book by Neil Pasricha called The Happiness Equation. In it, he says:

“… motivation doesn’t cause action. Action causes motivation.”

I’m a perfectionist at heart. This can be a good thing as it elevates the quality of my work. But it can also hold me back as I’ll delay releasing work because it’s “not quite right”.

Here’s the thing: I’ll likely be the only one who’ll fret over that small amount of detail. Trying to get to 100% perfection becomes unproductive. That extra time would be better spent starting on a new project.

Another big boost for motivation is actually finishing stuff. How many uncompleted projects do you have? Why haven’t you finished them? Only by completing projects will you truly know if you learned anything from the process. Hey, if it doesn’t turn out the way you liked, then you know what not to do next time.

Don’t wait for inspiration. Start working on something. Set a timer and don’t allow yourself to be distracted until that time is up.

Remember:
Make mistakes faster.
Finish what you start.
Doing stuff = Wanting to do more stuff.