How to Motivate Yourself When You Have No Motivation (But You Still Want the Best Things Life Has to Offer)!

The five-minute clock

Make the first action small enough to begin

Nina opens her original piece by admitting she is using a motivation technique to write it. Try the same experiment. Name one action you could finish before the urge to avoid it has time to negotiate.

Original article by Nina, UCLA MA, author and former teaching fellow at Harvard University

Starting interval05:00Open the draft. Write one sentence.

The five-minute clock

Hesitate

Set a lower starting line

Replace “finish my essay” with “open the document and write the sentence I keep deleting.” A useful first action has an observable end. If you cannot tell when it is over, make it smaller.

From The Ivy Institute’s advising records

A small edit can be the whole assignment

In one email comparing personal-statement drafts, our counselor recommended keeping the version the student preferred and making a few specific refinements. Starting over would have created another full revision close to a deadline. For a five-minute session, identify the smallest change that would answer a real reader’s question. Stop when you can point to it on the page.

EducationUSA recommends planning ahead and tracking deadlines on a calendar. EducationUSA on planning an application.

Nina’s original notes

I'm actually using one of my motivation techniques as I write this post. I don't want to do what I'm supposed to do today, so I'm "flipping the days". Why don't I want to do today's tasks? I don't want to. Sometimes, we just don't want to. Do I still want the results that the things I'm supposed to do today promise? You bet, but how can I get the goodies without the work?

Continue with keeping an internship field log.

begin

Give the obstacle a name

Maybe the hard part is choosing among topics, facing a blank page or showing the draft to someone else. Each calls for a different move. Two deliberately rough alternatives can get you past a decision that a timer alone cannot solve.

Give tomorrow a starting sentence

Leave one unfinished instruction on your desk: “When I reopen this draft, find the sentence where I chose to stay.” You have already decided how the next session begins.

If five minutes still feels too large

Make the first action opening the file and putting the cursor beside that sentence. You can decide what comes next after the file is open.

Nina’s original notes

I've had both fear of failure and fear of success, but something stronger motivates me at a much deeper level.

Continue with managing decision-day uncertainty.

leave a clue

Leave tomorrow a clue

When the short work period ends, leave one instruction at the top of the document. “Explain why I went back the next day” is a more inviting start than a blank screen. Stopping after the small action still counts.

Nina’s original notes

I write my tasks every day, and when I do each one, I give them a physical checkmark. I love looking at my calendar and those checkmarks. Reaching beyond yourself is hard. Most people don't do it because it's so hard.

Don't beat yourself up. Accept that it's scary to go beyond your perception of what you've always been and what you are today. The unknown is scary, but it's where change and excitement live. It's where you get to tell others who you are rather than them telling you. If all else fails, flip the days.

Continue with choosing a personal statement prompt.

Choose a starting move

Where do you get stuck?

Blank page Too many options Fear of feedback

An action you can finish in five minutesWhere to resume tomorrow

For individual feedback, review the Institute’s advising team or bring your question to a consultation.