Struggling with motivation

My depression has gotten better. I just can’t seem to find any motivation. I want to be great at what I do but I just struggle to get started and actually work toward that. It’s really frustrating. Money is my biggest motivator, but it’s apparently not enough. I know I’m capable of great things, but there’s still this mental roadblock. I guess I’m asking what you all do. I don’t dislike what I do. My ‘mentor’ gave me some books to look at and I want to glean everything from them, but I have just barely cracked them open. I admit I am lazy, but is that it? Just laziness?

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Is it possible perfectionism is getting in your way? Some people get frozen because they want to start something and do it perfectly, but get overwhelmed with all the different aspects of starting something new. “I won’t get it right so why bother?”

Or maybe you’re afraid of failure? Some people can’t dive into things because they scare themselves and think they’re ultimately going to fail.

Either of these things can affect motivation. And then we beat ourselves up for being “lazy”.

You’re very wise and correct in both cases. I also have a fear of success to boot. Barring some revelation, I guess I’ll end up mimicking my undergrad results; just pretty good, not great- a solid B+.

Well that beats my undergrad C+/B- lol

I think just knowing why you are lacking motivation is a good start. So you know what you want to do and you know whats stopping you from doing it. It sounds like your problems are similar to mine. I beat myself up hard if I don’t do things, I beat myself up hard when I don’t do them right, and then I scare myself and think I will never get them right and this is the path I’m always going to be on. But beating ourselves solves nothing and I’ve finally started on working on the things that are stopping me from doing what I want. In my case anxiety and depression and lack of self confidence.

I have heard people being afraid of success before as well, why is that in your case?

Tough to say. I think it may be that if I were to succeed, there would be nothing to fear and part of me uses it as a twisted comfort.

Ah gotcha. That’s pretty common too, especially if you’ve been fearful all your life. It’s the familiar and even if you hate it, part of you might be accustomed to this fear and scared of what would happen if its gone, like you described. I wouldn’t say it’s twisted though, just complicated like all these mental health issues we are having.