Ask HN: How to do that you need to do but not motivated at all?

What Removal of choice in practice looks like is going to the gym in the morning isn't a choice, it's just what I have to do. In the same way that going to work on the weekdays isn't a choice, it's what you have to do.

As for removing small obstacles, getting to the gym early in the morning is hard. When you wake up early it is extremely tempting to stay in the comfort of you bed or scroll social media while you have your coffee, or [insert easy dopamine hit here]. I have my gym bag packed, my coffee machine set so all I have to do is hit the brew button, my whey/creatine powder is in the mixer bottle, and (recently) I've cleaned the snow off my car, in the evening. This is so when I wake up weak willed, it's as easy as I can possibly make it to follow through on my intention.

For baby steps, when instituting a new habit from motivation, make it easy, like really really easy. The gym habit is a new one for me this year. I started building it by simply setting the intention that I would show up to the gym for a couple minutes. No pressure to work out, no pressure to get fit, the only requirement on myself was that I spend 2 minutes at the gym on my 'workout' days. This helped build and lock in a routine and notice the small obstacles that I needed to overcome to get to the gym. As the habit of going got locked in, it became trivially easy to be like well I guess while I'm here I'll do some curls.

1) Know myself. So much can be unpacked here, but this boils down to a couple broad categories. First, I need to be realistic with myself about what I am capable of, what tends to distract me, what my needs are, etc. Second, I have to be in tune with myself in the moment. Am I drifting? What do I need to do right now to stay on track?

2) Have a plan. This isn't so much a commitment to "prep" for each day as it is being willing to learn and employ strategies that I can combine with #1 to meet my needs and accommodate for my weaknesses. Sometimes this means having a way to limit noise around me. Sometimes it means ready access to coffee or a snack. Sometimes it means turning off email/chats/etc. Sometimes (ironically) it means taking a break.

3) Have a "why". I am the sole income-earning in a family of 6, so the "why" for me is pretty strong. If I don't make it happen, we all suffer. I have to be careful, though. Workaholism isn't that much better than being a chronic procrastinator in terms of its ill effects on my life/health.

4) Eliminate distractions. Sometimes this means using one of my strategies to find a quiet place. Sometimes it means going and doing that chore my wife keeps bugging me about so I can just focus on my work.

5) Don't white-knuckle it. In other words, don't be religious about work. Usually when I'm feeling burned out or unmotivated it's because my mind and body are being deprived of something. It's better for me to understand what that is (even if it means taking a day off) than to keep pushing myself. That just leads to more burn-out. It's important to have grace with myself so I don't just feel guilt and shame when I need a time-out. Feelings of shame often perpetuate procrastination anyway.

6) Make healthy choices. This is touched on in several of the other points, but it's important enough to be its own bullet. Sometimes it takes effort just to know what the healthy choice is. Having someone who can help you (like a spouse or close friend) is huge here. This also covers everything from sleep to eating to other things you consume, screen time, social time, etc.

In my own life, lack of motivation and my mental health are closely connected. I could write on this subject for a long time, mostly because I've spent a lot of time studying the nature of mental health and addiction in order to help myself. Hopefully this helps someone else add to their own regimen.

1. Just Get Started. One common cause of procrastinating is avoiding negative thoughts. "This will be too complicated", "This will take too long", "I'll have to make all kinds of compromises on the design", etc. If you Just Get Started then you'll likely find out it isn't as bad as you thought.

2. How You Feel Doesn't Matter. Procrastination often continues because you're waiting until you feel like doing it. We lie to ourselves, "I'm going to goof off now, but wake up at 5 am and I'll feel like doing it then". Then 5 am comes around and you feel even less like working on it. We need to stop fooling ourselves that we will feel like it at some point.

3. Pomodoro Technique. This works pretty well for me. I'll do 4 sets of 25 minutes of focused time separated by 5 minute sets of whatever I want time. When I think, "Wow I have a lot of work to do, I have to focus for the next 8 hours" I just dread it. Instead if I reframe it as, "I just need to focus for the next 25 minutes" I often blow right past the timer because I get so interested in the work.