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Ben Halpern
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How do you handle days where you just aren't motivated?

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Elizabeth Jenerson

I go with it...
If I can afford it I switch my calendar to be a day to move SOMETHING along.

Unmotivated days for me = way less creativity so the order of the day is tasks that will move something along but not don't require a whole lot of thought.

Sometimes clock-punching happens. 😑

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Ben Halpern

Sometimes clock-punching happens

Are you comfortable leaving early on those days (meaning is this allowed or encouraged at your place of work?)

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onecuteliz profile image
Elizabeth Jenerson • Edited

It's absolutely not encouraged at work. 😖
That's why I gotta shift around the ole calendar to look busy (unfortunately) but being honest to myself that my work will not be inspirational THAT day 💁🏾

But when I have my own company (you have to talk it into existence 😁) I will allow folks to skip out so long as they are available for their coworkers - answer questions or attend meetings.

I find de-motivation is a symptom of boredom or frustration or physiological issues (lack of sleep). Get your stuff together and give me your A game.

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Alex Lohr

I love to commute by bike in any weather. Starting every work day this way is a good way to be fresh and motivated.

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Damien Cosset • Edited

Usually, my regimen involves getting mad at myself and keep procrastinating until the day is over.

So, yeah, I can't quite handle that... I mean, I'm supposed to be working now, not posting here...

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Josh Ihejiamaizu

I ignore the typical schedule and drag myself through the day's activities until things get interesting and the work-week mode returns.

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Patrick God • Edited

Well...

;)

The keys mentioned in the article are:

  • Remember your goals
  • Just take the risks
  • Document your results.

Especially documenting your results can give you a big boost in my experience.

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Grumpy

I do two things:

First, I start with a really little (less than 30 minutes) task that I've wanted to do for a while. This usually means automating something I do a lot, or creating a handy TextExpander snippet, etc. Just a little treat to jump start my day.

Second, I spend a few minutes sketching out a list of what I want to get done that day. My biggest drag when I'm not motivated is that I take longer making design decisions, or deciding what to work on next. So I get that out of the way up front, and can just work my way down the list for the rest of the day.

Big picture, I try to keep an eye on my general motivation level, and figure out why I'm not motivated. Sometimes what gets me motivated again is actually adding a couple of tasks to my plate, if they're the right tasks. (Ex: I'm more motivated if I get to fix a bunch of regressions and refactor the code or add tests to address the underlying reason why we had so many regressions.)

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aurel kurtula • Edited

I'm like @damcosset

But I read a post where someone said they they could not concentrate for a long time. But instead of trying to "fix" themselves they embraced it.

They'd work for a bit one project A, then read some internet feeds, then work on project A or project B, then play some video games.

I have started to embrace that.

Now it's just a case of starting more then one project so that when I'm board of one I can jump to another.

I haven't figured it out yet but I used to be like that cartoon, I might "hate today" and so procrastinate all day. Instead now I procrastinate because I want a brake and then get back to being productive

Edit -- And this way, at the end of the day I feel good, in comparison to procrastinating or dragging my feet all day, it used to guilty and old (I can't fully explain the cringe worthy feeling)

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Shalvah

A similar thing here. Recently discovered my concentration was becoming tougher, so I embraced the distractions. Sometimes I'd have Twitter and other random stuff open in a few tabs. I'd work a bit, and when I start to lose focus, switch to Twitter. Kinda helps keep my mind fresh.

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Jess Lee

In regards specifically to Mondays... avoiding the NYC commute and working from home helps 😊

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Espoir Murhabazi

I open stackoverflow , looking for answered questions about my favorites tools , try to answer somes and when i see an upvote notification, i feel energized and motivated !

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John Luke Garofalo

I read way too many articles on dev.to :)

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Ethan

Me:

  1. Open up dev.to
  2. Open about 5 links in a new tab
  3. Read each post
  4. Go down and read every single comment in each post
  5. Open up some more posts
  6. Repeat for a few hours 🔁