Finding the will to do, to act, to create can be challenging, and that challenge is often an easy excuse to remain inactive. “I’m just not feeling motivated” you’ll say to yourself to justify another episode of a TV show, or some more scrolling on social media. This creates a cycle, and the well-worn analogy to the law of inertia applies: an object in motion tends to stay in motion, and an object at rest tends to stay at rest. The same thinking can be applied to motivation: actions tend to create further action, and inaction tends to continue inaction. The key to motivation is to get started.
Overcoming the barriers of Resistance (a concept borrowed from The War of Art by Steven Pressfield) is one of the most challenging things a creative in any field can face. The force of Resistance will use any means necessary to perpetuate the status quo and keep you from making forward progress or risking discomfort. What makes it even more challenging is that there is only one solution, and it stands in direct opposition to Resistance: action. In the doing comes the continuing.
How do you silence the inner critic? By acting against it. How do you overcome a fear of risks? By taking risks. Action leads to progress; progress leads to overcoming.
The fundamental barrier around motivation is the initial motion, the act that starts the process, which can become a lifelong struggle to overcome. The only force that can combat Resistance, if done consistently, is habit. Habit can lead to lasting momentum, resulting in fewer opportunities for the Resistance to overwhelm and interfere.
This theory, explored in Atomic Habits by James Clear, is relatively simple in nature: determine who you want to be, then build habits that will shape that identity. Each identity has actions through which it is built. If you want to be a writer, that identity implies the action of writing. It also implies a number of non-writing actions like reading, researching, upkeep of supplies, organization, work station building, finding a pathway out of writer’s block etc. Every identity has easily identifiable actions that will need to be assimilated to make it happen. To make you be the identity.
Clear advises that breaking this process down into implementation intentions and habit stacks can aid in finding motivation on the “atomic” level. If you plan each detail of how to accomplish a future task and say it out loud, it is much more likely to be completed (see this article from The American Psychologist 54 for more technical information). The more details, the better; from time and place to necessary supplies and tools. Further, if you can take pre-existing habits and stack them, it will allow momentum to continue to build. For example, if you do the dishes every night and want to build the habit of reading each day, you can take the habit of “getting up to do the dishes” and add “putting a book on your seat” to the habit, so the book is out and waiting for you when you return. Identifying how to make these actions as easy to accomplish as possible increases the chances for success.
Building habits is really building action which, in turn, builds motivation. Only forward planning can fight Resistance, and each time a habit cycle is completed, you take a step away from inaction towards consistency. Habits change the flow of inertia, moving from unconscious inaction to conscious action. As habit develops, it becomes unconscious action, which is the underlying force that combats Resistance (or unconscious inaction). There is no room for Resistance to gain footing if actions are moving underneath and around it at all times.
So, if you aren’t feeling motivated, consider who you want to be, what that identity requires, and begin working those actions into a daily process.
Only action fights inaction.
Edited by Jeremy Harr and Abigail McKay Cherry