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Ask HN: How do you deal with loss of motivation?

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Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with loss of motivation?

#51

Post by watwut »

Consider it learning experience - for that leadership role you want. What it is that demotivated you, exactly? What you leaders could do to take better advantage of your skills and ambitions, to make you more productive and as result more happier? Is it just you being demotivated or other people too? How does it affects performance?

What will you do differently once you are leader to avoid similar demotivation of talent? Leadership is not just decision making, it is also dealing with issues like this. They won't tell you, so self awareness now will go long way later.

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with loss of motivation?

#52

Post by praxulus »

hueving wrote: post #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…

If you're willing to give up slightly more money, you could join an organization like Code.org or another well-run organization pursuing some kind of social good. These places are absolutely brimming with purpose and satisfaction.

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with loss of motivation?

#53

Post by sauronlord »

What kind of helpless self pity is this crap?

"I wanted a leadership position at THEIR company..." (fixed that for you)

It's not YOUR company, but THEIRS.

Incorporate your own company (couple hundred bucks) and list yourself as "President" on your linkedin.

Put together a bullshit website about your consulting services.

Start acting like a leader in your own affairs.

Mind YOUR OWN business.

-----

Money solves almost all problems. For the remaining issues time and good health covers everything. I challenge anyone to show a convincing argument to the contrary.

Better get to $300k/year asap and let the other chumps have their "leadership position"

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with loss of motivation?

#54

Post by watwut »

dandersh wrote: post #32

You're not motivated because you did not get what you wanted (leadership position) and you identify yourself as being superior to those whom are in your position (dumb, working on useless things). Motivate yourself by either pulling up those around you or leave for what you really want to do.

It also pays off to double check whether they are actually dumb, or whether it is just ressentment talking. Are thay really stupid or rather less experienced or maybe they just have different opinions? If it is disagreement, then it is much effective to argue instead of teach. (I have met a few dudes who confused disagreement with stupidity. )

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with loss of motivation?

#55

Post by golergka »

First thing you should do when you find yourself in a hole is stop digging.

If you feel a loss of motivation, the worst thing you could do is feel guilty about it. Feel like you're somehow bad or inferior because everyone around you seems to have this drive to move forward and you don't.

It's completely OK to not feel particularly motivated. Your job is not your life; sometimes it's fine to just work 9 to 5 and put only the effort required, nothing extra. Spend your nice salary on things that you like. Excersize because you like it, not because you have to. Do something else with your time. Meet friends. Watch TV shows. Don't care about wasting your time, just enjoy wasting it.

And please, when you see the people with "TED speaker", "self-motivated", "energetic" image, take it with a grain of salt. This happens to everyone, it's OK.

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with loss of motivation?

#56

Post by atomk »

leoh wrote: post #21

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 l…

Thanks for this!

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with loss of motivation?

#59

Post by magiconair »

If you have the luxury to pick your job then the most important thing IMO is that you find something which interests you since you will derive your motivation from that. Everything else is secondary.

If you're doing something that doesn't interest you then it doesn't matter how good the other benefits are since you constantly have to use energy to motivate yourself. Then you won't produce something you're proud of which helps neither you or the company.

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