Shall I really write today? Ok, but I’ll do it only for five minutes.

This was exactly my thinking when I was typing today’s post. I was unmotivated like I wasn’t unmotivated in a long time. Maybe it has to do with the fact that I was pretty idle today and in the evening I was just still tired from all the Easter food madness and the exhaustion from the days past. And there was a bit of conflict today I needed to address. In short: There are a lot of things that kept me from mustering motivation for a blog post and I would rather dive into some gaming or binge watching.

Well, I guess I will do some of that still later on, but two things made ma open up the lid of my laptop after all:

1. My habit tracker
2. The motivation to “only write for 5 minutes”.

And there you have it. It is both part of the process of motivating myself with small things to come into a flow process or a hyperfocus.

The key, I realized (long ago, yes, but…), was and is is simply tricking my brain into a short lived process in expectation of a quick reward for my dopamine system, and then, once the gear teeth find grip and the whole machine starts working I don’t need to think of a thousand tricks to keep the process going. Maybe it is already the state of realization and habitualization I am in (at least concerning my daily habits in my habit tracker) that I can actually easily overcome the first obstacles to get me going, but that is not the important takeaway.

The important takeaway is that I have the insight (which I have laid down here and in my diary to look it up anytime, so even if the learning curve doesn’t grant me intuitive access, I can always read of my success as proof it works) that with tasks and habits that have a routine, it’s easier to motivate myself and that I then will override the resistance by simply telling myself to do it only “5 minutes”.

So, in the end it’s about routine and repetition to give me the secure feeling that “doing it for 5 minutes” is easily transforming into “I can make it, no problem.”

It will be interesting how this is going to work with other things ahead on the way which seem to be impossible, because the starting obstacle is so big.

Until next time, take one step at a time and keep up the faith in yourself.