Motivation

If you’re reading this and feeling despondent about some self-generated task, please know that you’re not alone.  There’s something calling us to do what we need to do and the fact that it has been bugging us for so long means that it simply MUST happen and we WILL get there eventually.

Some of my assignments terrify me, without any valid reason aside from my fear of failing.  My very first assignment had a horrible start.  I was in the process of researching for a contemporary article aimed at Reader’s Digest when I purchased the November issue to update myself on the market, only to discover they had published an article that very topic!

It deflated me and I hate to say I gave up for a while after that.  However, I did finish what I started.  I edited and tweaked the article for another market and submitted the outline to TES.  I’ve not heard from them, but I suspect where the problem lies, I’d not included an personal quotes in the article.  It wasn’t for lack of trying though, I had a lead and despite regularly arranging an interview, it repeatedly got cancelled for some or other reason.  I gave up again, out of frustration with this person, and submitted the article outline without her quotes.  Now it seems unavoidable that I’ll need to find another candidate to interview and quote.

 

Break down big tasks

The best way, I’ve found, to tackle some of the ‘giant’ tasks is to break them down into little ‘manageable pieces’.  Each task, although in the back of my mind, seems to keep me aware of the bigger picture as I go along – but this only works with planning.

Another good technique that worked well for a while was to have daily alarms on my mobile phone and Outlook email program.  The reminders were of ‘writing time’ slots to help me get into a routine.  Sometimes I was already in the midst of the reminded task and it felt good to dismiss the alarm.  Other times I was guilt-tripped by my own reminder into stopping whatever else I was doing to move on to the scheduled activity of researching or writing.  After a while, I found that my routines managed themselves and I’ve now discarded the reminder system for those slots.

What motivates you?