Get Off Your Butt: How to Get Motivated When You’re in a Slump | Hacker News Reader

Get Off Your Butt: How to Get Motivated When You’re in a Slump

zenhabits.net

92 pointsrblion18 comments

Exercise. It gives you energy and takes your mind of things for a while. We're not meant to sit on our buts in front of a screen all day. I know it's hard when you're tired and overworked, but it's indispensible.

Also, sleep and eat well.

I totally agree with you. After spending a couple of hours on a project, I go on a treadmill for 30 min to clear my head and focus on something else.

It really allows me to refocus my energy toward the project again after the workout.

Working out allows me to work more efficiently and keeps the body healthy, needed in every programmers life.

Really though to start exercising, but after a week or so it becomes energizing.

Exercise is feeling like crap for a half hour, to feel great the rest of the day.

I really second that.

It doesn't have to be really physical: for me simple things such as walking in the nature for a while help a lot.

I also started yoga last year, and it has changed dramatically how I feel (no more back/neck pain, more focused etc). I'm actually increasing yoga to 2.5 hours per week now.

I disagree with you. If I liked the idea of doing pointless, repetitive manual labor, getting sweaty, having my entire body hurt and then do it all over again the next day, I wouldn't have spent so much time getting a degree.

Wow, I've never seen a comment so adverse to exercise. It's been scientifically proven that exercise is good for mental health in addition to physical health.

There's no way you can be serious.

I am serious.

I also don't doubt for a moment that exercise is healthy for the body, just like spinach, which I also hate.

But hey if you got some idea about how to make it more fun, I am open for suggestions - I have no desire to die early.

What kind of exercise have you tried?

I'm more into weight lifting, myself. It's not at all tedious.

If you think exercise is a pointless and repetitive manual labour. Try doing martial arts.

It is fun, sweaty and requires you to think on your feet. You need strategy to defeat an opponent before sparring. You need to think immediately on how to counter an attack or how to attack. You need to use leverage against a bigger opponent. You need to seize that small advantage you have to convert it to something bigger.

All of these train your mindset for entrepreneurship. Planning a strategy, changing you game plan, using leverage against bigger opponents. Having your body hurts trains you to take a beating. Losing a fight gives you feedback on how to improve if you are open to learning

Point 9 ("Realize that there's an ebb and flow") is definitely something to remember. Even when I'm really motivated on a project, the motivation never seems to last for longer than weeks. I guess knowing that this happens to every body, and thus knowing to simply ride out the troughs (so to speak) is the best way forward.

A quote I like which sums this point up is: "People often say that motivation doesn't last. Well, neither does bathing - that's why we recommended it daily."

6. Commit publicly.

Gave me an idea.

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2131849

Wasn't there research published sometime last year showing the opposite to be true? (When you tell other people your goal) or what you are doing/going to do, you internalize "I'm doing it" and then ... don't!).

I know for me it's true -- I'm much more likely to get the things completed that I haven't told others that I'm working on.

Yup, it was Derek Silvers in a TED talk.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHopJHSlVo4

Well worth watching. This one is < 4 minutes. Cites his sources.

Blog post mentioned at the end, with links to sources and related materials: http://sivers.org/zipit

i've been trying to pull out a smarty pants comment relating this article to the robot on Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, without success, i feel saaad beer

edit:

the point was that having a few beers helps, with a good friend. sometimes it's a sign of exhaustion/burnout and a change of scenery really helps

A similar article that basically boils it down to one step: http://rejectiontherapy.com/awaken-your-motivation-in-one-ea...

Now that I have a notebook that I use to keep track of experiments I want to try on myself, I can skim this article, add a half dozen sentences to various parts of my notebook, and actually have a decent chance of trying out the advice that it provides.

I think something about having this intermediate phase between reading self-help advice and first trying it out helps me out a lot.

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