Five Motivation Killers and How to Tackle Them

Some days motivation is just so hard to find don’t you think?

I’ve been feeling like this for while now and I’ve been trying to get out of this slump. I’ve been reading motivational posts and looking at motivational quotes and nothing. I’ve felt no motivation at all.

So, I’ve decided to take a different approach and look at what kills motivation.

Impatience

I always pride myself as being a patient person. In fact a lot of people have praised me on my patience. Many people have admired my patience and said things like ‘I wish I was as patient as you.’

Sometimes, I don’t feel patient. In fact lately I’ve been looking at my life and thinking ‘what the hell!’ How did I get so far along without achieving anywhere near as much as I had hoped to. There are so many things I wanted to do, so many things I still wanted to do. Then it creeps into me, that nasty little word, impatience. Time is running out, get it sorted now. Do it now. I can’t wait anymore, I want it now.

In a way, it’s hard to get past. I know I’m running out of time. I know I have so much still left to do. But feeling impatient isn’t going to help  me. If I run out of time I have to accept it. I have to accept that not everyone achieves everything in life. Would I go back and change it all? Well, it would be nice to be somewhere else in my life right now, but changing it would change the things I have right now, and  that’s not all bad. In fact there are so many things I wouldn’t change at all. Which brings me nicely into my next motivation killer.

Ingratitude

You know when you are told to keep a gratitude diary, or even to just write down the things you are grateful for? Well, I’ve always found this so hard. Yes, I’m grateful for my family, I’m grateful for the roof over my head, errr, I’m grateful for the sky and the sun and the stars and the moon and bloody hell, I’m so ungrateful, my life is a load of crap. Who would be grateful for legs that don’t work properly, for constant pain day and night, for arguing siblings, a partner who doesn’t understand, the shit way my life has turned out.

There it is, ingratitude, rearing it’s ugly head…that didn’t take too much digging did it!

“Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. – Melody Beattie”

Time to turn that around on it’s heals.

It’s so easy to feel ingratitude, but feeling grateful is so much nicer.

Let’s get back to writing that list. I’m not grateful for the constant pain, but I’m grateful for the doctors that listen to me complain, take all my worries on board and provide me with treatment.

I’m not grateful for arguing siblings, but when they play together they make me feel so happy. Everyone has to experience the little bad things to appreciate the good things more.

I’m not grateful that my partner doesn’t understand, how could he, would I really want him to feel the same? I am grateful for everything he does for me. He doesn’t always get it right, and sometimes he drives me up the wall, but I wouldn’t be without him. Never mind losing my legs, without him would be like losing my arms as well.

As for the way my life has turned out, well, it could have been worse. I could have still been with my ex husband (haha, sorry if you read this Dave, but it’s true, what a nightmare for us both.) I could have never had children, I might never have experienced some of the wonderful jobs I’ve had, met the lovely friends I’ve met, oh I know life could have been so much worse. With every bad thing there has been good. Nothing is ever as bad as it seems.

If you have trouble finding gratitude in life, then try this simple thing.

Write a letter, or a note, or a card to someone you care about. It could be a friend, a family member or even someone as obscure as a bus driver or shop assistant. Let them know what you are thankful for, minding your kids, helping you out, always being friendly, being someone you can talk to….anything at all, big or small. You don’t even have to give them the letter afterwards if you don’t want to, but just writing it down has given you the opportunity to express gratitude and unlocking the fullness of life.

Envy

I’ve always prided myself as not being the jealous type but sometimes envy gets to everyone. Are you on Facebook? Do you see posts of friends enjoying fabulous holidays that you know you could never afford, or someone showing off their brand new house, or baby or even kitten? Maybe, if you are a blogger, you see someone reviewing the latest gadget that you really would have loved to have reviewed, or going to the most fantastic event  that you would have loved to have attended.

Hands up! I pride myself as not being jealous, but that’s only because I would never admit it in public. The truth is, there is always someone who is going to be ‘seeming’ to be bigger and better than you. But I say seeming to be, because that’s just it. Life is what you make it and if you let envy get in the way then you are less likely to go out and make it better for yourself.

Envy is a trick, it will make you forget that the only life worth living is your own!

Being Overwhelmed

Ever felt that there is just not enough time in the day? Ever feel that you have so much to do you just don’t know where to start? Ever feel that life is passing you by and all you can think about is everything you need to do?

I know I do. I know I get overwhelmed a lot.

Being overwhelmed can take over your entire life. When I’m overwhelmed I struggle to get out of bed because I’m thinking of everything I have to do, then I get on my computer and mess around on Social Media or play silly games, read lots of pages that are interesting but not really helping me get everything done that I need to do. By the time I get to bed in the evening I’m still feeling overwhelmed and I can’t sleep because I didn’t get everything done that I needed to do that day.

How do you get over being overwhelmed? Certainly not by getting everything done, because then you’ll have a whole heap of new things to do.

It’s a case of breaking everything down. Start by making a list of what you need to get done. Then strike out everything that is not absolutely necessary. Don’t put things off , strike them off. Then think about what you really need to do first, maybe it’s a little thing that you’ve been putting off because you have so many bigger things to do. Just do it, get it out of the way.

Schedule your tasks and work your way through them at your own pace. Once you’ve cut down your list of things to do and got the little things out of the way you probably won’t feel so overwhelmed by the rest.

So, I’ve done all this, taken my own advice, but still feel overwhelmed. The next step is not to be so hard on myself. I’m not superhuman, I can only do what I can do. I’m going to stop beating myself up over what I’ve not achieved and appreciate myself for what I have.

Poor Health

Health and motivation go hand in hand. If I’m ill then my motivation to do anything at all just disappears. Last week I was so poorly for a few days and I achieved so little. This is probably why I’m so overwhelmed this week, I’m playing catch up!

Sometimes you can’t help being sick, I couldn’t help it last week. But, if you look after yourself properly then even though you can’t always beat the bugs, you can keep yourself going throughout the day.

So, just by eating better, getting as much sleep as you can and taking a little exercise you can boost your energy and your willingness to get things done. Get rid of the sluggishness and get yourself motivated instead.

I hope you’ve found this interesting or helpful. I’d love to know how you stay motivated or what kills your motivation?