Something that has helped me a lot with motivation is figuring out how to calm down my nervous system, for example, with a good massage, a yoga class that encourages holding poses for longer periods of time (Iyengar-style), meditation, and reading offline. It's really easy to be "on" all the time, even when you are not feeling particularly motivated — for example, being on the internet is often over-stimulating and leads me to feel a lot of fatigue and a lack of motivation. There is no one solution. I would be wary, however, of pushing myself into doing something just because it's impressive or exciting. Acting from a place of centeredness is always more fruitful. There is no one solution. Best of luck to you.
Ask HN: How do you deal with loss of motivation?
21–30 of 184 posts
Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with loss of motivation?
#22Sounds tricky. I would recommended you look into Stoicism: Epictetus, Seneca, Marcus Aurelius, Boethius, etc.
I'm not saying you shouldn't keep seeking something, but the aforementioned might help you to decouple your happiness from it.
Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with loss of motivation?
#23For the depressive affect I consume St. John's Wort and L-Carnitine and I use a sun lamp.
For the creative side, I ensure that I work at least 15 minutes a day on a creative project outside of work hours.
At work, I strive to improve the overall quality of my environment.
Remember that if you dress well and act confidently, people become remarkably deferential (i.e. even though your role may not technically have any decision-making power, if you are confident and reliable, people may start to look to you for your opinion on decisions, and so on).
Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with loss of motivation?
#24L-carnitine for "sourceless" depression
Otherwise you need to rethink your career choices. Good luck man!
Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with loss of motivation?
#25For the depressive affect I consume St. John's Wort and L-Carnitine and I use a sun lamp. For the creative side, I ensure that I work at least 15 minutes a day on a creative project outside of work hours. At work, I strive to improve the overall quality of my environment. Remember that if you dress well and act confidently, people become remarkably deferential (i.e. even though your role may not technically have any…
Just a general PSA for anyone considering St. John's wort: it can interact with SSRIs and other prescription medication. The same also applies to 5-HTP.
Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with loss of motivation?
#26I take some time off and go scuba diving.
That's the best advice anyone could offer, I second this.
Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with loss of motivation?
#27Satisfaction isn't found in money. Focus on helping others and you will find true joy.
Hello, Thank you for the comment. I have tried being altruistic,but I ended up on the receiving end. I now presume that everyone is selfish and will not think for a second they get better deal. Hunt or be hunted - Frank Underwood
It's probably best, for your own personal happiness, to not base your life motto on a fictional anti-hero.
Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with loss of motivation?
#28What you are learning is that money does not buy you happiness. Clearly you accepted a job you really did not want for the security and the salary.
I can think of 3 options in your case. 1)keep your job and find fulfillment doing something else on the weekends and free time such as hitting a hobbie hard. 2)Keep your job and figure out how to get to the top. This option means you'll have to become a master at social skills. Learning more techie stuff will not help you. Top decision makers are NOT the most technology savvy but they are the best at managing people and getting the most out of the team. 3) Start finding the job you want. It might be less money or not as safe but at least it's something you enjoy.
"I need to find something with purpose,big money, and satisfaction."
That's what we all want but you won't get it unless you are willing to take some big chances. So decide what to do and do it. You can't start at the top but you can get there and find all 3. You might fail but there's a possibility of hitting it big. If you go this route make sure you make a plan and decide now how to deal with adversity.
Good Luck!
Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with loss of motivation?
#29>I need to find something with purpose,big money, and satisfaction.
Consider giving up the big money requirement and your options will open up significantly. At companies like Google and Facebook where you get the good pay, there are very few roles that get to work on the super interesting problems so they are hard to get. Most likely you will end up working on data migration tools, front end interfaces for existing systems, account life cycle tooling, etc that may be interesting at first, but they aren't that satisfactory in the long run because you'll realize you're a very small cog that can be easily replaced.
If you give up big money and join a startup (even mid sized), your impact can be a lot more tangible and satisfying. Programming for government/industry research can also be pretty satisfying but the pay is much lower (e.g. I worked for an academic consortium on HPC networks and really felt like I was improving tooling for cutting edge science).
Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with loss of motivation?
#30[deleted]