How to Motivate Yourself to Do Anything in 2 Easy Steps

5 min readSep 17, 2020

You want to do something. But then it happens again, you get stuck in the thought spiral of “I’m not motivated enough.”, “I’m too tired.”, “it’s too difficult” or “I’m too lazy”. So how do you motivate yourself to do anything when this happens? I frequently use the following 2 steps to break out of this funk (to work on side-projects, exercise, finish errands, etc), regardless of how tired or unmotivated I am feeling.

The first step is to replace the conventional but unhelpful view of motivation with a more practical one. The second step is to start with an extremely small and easy version of what you want to do.

1. Change How You View Motivation

The Conventional View of Motivation

The widely accepted view of motivation is that “if someone is motivated enough to do something; they will do it.”

This objectively is true, a sufficient amount of motivation is required to do anything. Even banal things like drinking a glass of water or watching Netflix requires some motivation.

However, having this view has the following practical problems:

The thought of doing things that are tedious or difficult (e.g. cleaning, exercise, study) generally do not elicit motivation.
A long break can cause motivation dips which are further compounded when multiple motivations are competing for your finite time and energy.

The idea of ignoring your work, relationships, commitments, hobbies and interests is enticing but not practical — Image by Author

When motivation is low, all-too-familiar thoughts of “I’m not motivated enough to do it” or “I just need more motivation then I can do it” forms an insidious form of procrastination that locks you in the below death spiral.

The *“where did the past 5 hours go”* spiral — Image by Author

This view implicitly encourages passive motivation to get motivated enough to start. Passive motivation is motivation derived through external means such as watching inspiring videos, reading uplifting stories, receiving encouragement from others, or just simply waiting for it to increase. In my opinion, this generally does not foster feelings of achievement or satisfaction, tends to create spikes of motivation that quickly dip afterwards, and is unsustainable in the long-term.

A More Practical View of Motivation

A more realistic and helpful way of viewing motivation is as the below cycle:

A success motivation positive feedback loop — Image by Author

You do something, then that success generates motivation, which propels you to do it again, and so on. Therefore having consistent wins consistently increase your motivation to maintain this cycle.

“Motivation is something you get, from yourself, automatically, from feeling good about achieving small successes. Success has less to do with hoping and praying and strategizing than with diligently doing the right things, the right way, over and over and over. When you consistently do the right things, success is predictable. Success is inevitable. You just can’t think about it too much.”
- Jeff Haden, author of The Motivation Myth

So how do we start this cycle, especially if our motivation is currently so low?

2. Start Small

Start with a portion of the task that is so small and easy that virtually no motivation is required to start and it is practically impossible to fail.

Examples of a daunting task vs small portion of that task:

To do a 2,000-word essay, start by writing one sentence.
For a workout, start by putting on you’re your active-wear/gym clothes.
To learn a new topic, start by reading one page or watching one short video.
To clean the house, start by cleaning one table.

Your first win, regardless of its size, generates some motivation that propels you to continue.

After you start, less energy is required to continue than to stop.

What it feels like before you start — Image by Author

What it feels like after you start (aka inertia) — Image by Author

I often find that starting anything can feel like a big obstacle, but continuing afterwards is relatively easy and seamless.

In my experience, if the task is something I enjoy (e.g. coding, reading, writing), starting in any capacity quickly enables a flow state. A mental state in which a person performing an activity is fully immersed in a feeling of energized focus, full participation, and strong enjoyment in the process of the activity. Sort of like becoming a boulder rolling down a hill.

Photo by Nirmal Rajendharkumar on Unsplash

Time seems to fly when you achieve your flow state.

Whereas if the task is something I dread (e.g. schoolwork, study, exercise), starting in any capacity tends to generate motivation from the desire to finish (and not start again and delay completion). Have you ever regretted completing a project, study session or workout? I know I haven’t, regardless of the prior dread and struggle involved in the doing part.

In either case, a domino-effect of wins leads to the completion of the task.