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Comment by ecounysis | Hacker News Reader

JFDI

As pithy as that seems, it really is the best way to overcome procrastination. Just do it. Just do something that moves you closer to your goals. Pick just one little thing and get it done. Then pick something else and get it done. Once you've started getting momentum (even just a little bit of momentum), pick the most important thing and get it done, then rinse and repeat.

It's going to sound like I'm trying to plug my newest app (http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/unbroken-chain/id415158247?mt...), and I suppose I am, but that's one of the reasons that I wrote it: to help me make sure that I am moving closer to my goals each and every day.

Just do it.

How? How do I do it? Things just don't play out by themselves. What mindset do I need to have in order to do the things that move me closer to my goal? Just do it could answer anything. It doesn't provide any details or make me anymore motivated (despite what Nike may think).

Wow. OK, then... You have enough gumption to ask how to get motivation and to argue about it, but not to do anything that will get you closer to your goals.

Forget the "just do it" part, if that so upsets you, about what I said and read the rest. For me the only way to get motivated is to progress on something, that's the "pick one little thing and get it done" part.

If that doesn't work for you, so be it - We all work differently. Use the anger that you directed at me to get motivated.

I apologize for the tone - I didn't mean to come across so nasty. I simply wanted to hear more about your ideas, past the "just do it" part. Sure, we all think and work differently, but what works for one may also work for another. That's why I originally posted this question.

I did read past the "just do it" part and I see what you're saying about progressing on the work. However, I'd like to know what you (or anyone else) does to get started. How do we get that initial burst of motivation?

Again, I'm sorry about the way I reacted.

No worries.

We all have different things that work for us. You have your count mnemonic, to misuse the term. For me it really is as simple as finding something, anything that I can get done. One example: I needed to update the sales copy on one of my landing pages, but for some reason didn't want to get started. What did I do? I started by changing the background color of the site. Something easy that took just a couple of minutes, then when I'd finished testing that and found it to be an improvement, I moved to changing the headline on the page and eventually the whole sales copy.

I find that one of the most enjoyable procrastination activities is to plan out the thing that I'm supposed to be doing. I have something I know I should do, but I can't make myself do it. So instead, I sit down and break down the big task into a number of little tasks. That keeps my procrastination demons happy because I'm not actually doing the task. Except I am, because at the end I have a list of (hopefully) much easier tasks to do. If necessary I do that recursively - break down my new list of easy tasks. Eventually it gets silly - the next task is so simple I could do it very quickly without thinking. So I do it. And then often I find that once I've done the first thing, it's easy to carry on with the second, third,... that's the momentum thing kicking in. Sometimes things don't start flowing after doing the first task. At that point I put it to one side to do another time.

No matter what psychological tricks you may employ, in the end it will always come down to just getting it done.

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