How many times have you lost your motivation for a project or a business? As people and entrepreneurs, we all go through times where we seem to lose our drive and passion for something that we once enjoyed or at least were good at doing.
The Anatomy of Lost Motivation
Before we get into what to do when you’ve lost your motivation, let’s look at the meaning of the word motivation.
Motivation – the reason or reasons for acting in a particular way or pursuing a goal or sequence of actions.
So what is it that can cause you to stop taking action towards your goals or to complete the actions needed to finish a project?
There are a number of things that can cause you to hold yourself back and stop pursuing things.
- Failures and losses can stack up
- Backlogs of incomplete tasks or actions can overwhelm you
- Loss of goals or purposes
How to Get Your Motivation Back
You may have noticed in the previous section that I said that while there are causes or catalysts, ultimately it is you that holds yourself back.
It is important to note that it is you that withdraws from taking action. But this also means that you are in control and have the power to regain your motivation.
So let’s get into it …
The Accumulation of Failures
The first cause of loss of motivation is the accumulation of failures or losses. These need not be big failures just lots of them. In business and in life we all have to deal with failure. Sometimes these failures just stack up and it seems that no matter what we do we just keep failing.
It may be that you are the only one who even thinks it is a failure.
For example, an artist may have spent weeks on a particular work and to all others, the work seems phenomenal but to the artist, it is just not quite right or up to their usual standard.
This over time and across several pieces of art can stack up and seem like a long line of failures. The next thing the artist throws down their brushes and feeling miserable gives up on painting.
This scenario can play out in almost any setting from art to sports to building a business.
So how do you handle this?
The correct approach is certainly not to give up.
What is needed is to look at what you were trying to achieve in the first place. Then find a time when your actions were going right and you were winning. What went wrong, what changed?
Often if you can find what went wrong and look at it anew, you can find a solution or a different approach.
The other thing to do is to look at your wins. What did you do well?
Reliving a few of your wins is often enough to give you the boost you need to tackle your project or tasks with renewed motivation. It can also help you tackle those tasks you failed at and the moment you turn just one of those failures into a success you will immediately increase your sense of motivation
Handling Backlogs
It happens to us all, especially entrepreneurs who are having to wear multiple hats, you work and work and work and some things just don’t seem to get done.
When backlogs and unfinished project steps stack up it can lead to a sense of lost motivation. The amount of attention that gets stuck on these backlogs will also make carrying on with other tasks that much harder and you can feel somewhat overwhelmed.
Giving up is certainly not the answer and will only increase your frustrations and worries and make you more miserable.
What you must do is take action.
This requires you to do two things …
- First you need to setaside some time every day to work on your backlogs even if it is just an hour.
- Next you need to be able to confront the backlog which means you must be willing to stand up and face the problem.
The moment you take action you will start to feel just a little bit better as you will now be more at cause of the problem rather than at effect of it.
As long as you keep to your scheduled hour the backlog will shrink and become easier to handle and thus you will enjoy higher motivation.
What to Do When You Have Lost Your Goals or Purposes
Unfortunately, sometimes life happens and things change and you lose your motivation. As an entrepreneur and business owner, you will know what persistent lockdowns can do to your goals and purposes and you may even have been in the unfortunate position of losing your business.
This then would certainly lead to a loss of your goals and put a damper on your motivation to persist.
The obvious solution would be to get new goals and new purposes but sometimes this does not just happen instantly.
When this is the case what do you do?
You get busy with anything you can!
You will find that by engaging in any activity that gets you productive again you will start to feel better.
Do a spring clean, paint a room, plant something in your garden, make a list of people you have not been in touch with for years and get back in touch.
All of these things can give you a sense of production which will put you in a better frame of mind and help get you motivated again.
One Final Thought
Remember, it is impossible to truly lose your motivation. Motivation is something from within, you provide your own drive, your own passion and your own interest in life and doing things.
Nothing in life is inherently interesting or motivating or even inspirational. It is you who generates the attitude or feeling and thus you are the one who is in control.
So decide to be motivated or interested or inspired and play the game. Win or lose you will be better off than anyone sitting on the sidelines.
