Saturday, December 16, 2006

Lucky Ones Burn
How do you guys and gals motivate yourselves to do things that you actually want to do but for some reason never get done? (I hope that question was phrased confusingly enough for you!)

This is, of course, mostly writing-related for me, but it could really apply to any creative activity where there is no real recourse for being a lazy bastard and not doing anything, other than your imagination slowly rotting away, leaving your body a soulless husk of vegetable matter (possibly corn).

I guess the main problem with me and motivation is that I need something chasing me in order to get motivated. For example, I'm not a procrastinator when it comes to schoolwork (no, seriously); if I've got a deadline for some project or essay or whatever, then I'll work as quickly as I can to get that finished, especially if it's part of a group project. That's good enough for stuff I absolutely need to get done, because when I put my mind to it I'm a pretty hard worker and I do a good job with most things, but that honestly means jack shit for things I want to do on my own time, where I am the only person on my ass to get anything done.

I want to get away from the mindset that I need some goal or deadline set by another person to motivate me to start something and get it finished. It honestly bugs the shit out of me at this point. I know that I want to do things, and I pound it into my head every single day that, yes, today is the day that I will get something done, but by the time I actually get around to anything, it's really late, and my attitude is basically, "WTF, where did the day go? Ah, fuck this, I'm tired; I'll get it done tomorrow." Repeat ad nauseum.

(Another problem related to that is that I feel as though I've locked myself into a daily routine that's tough to get out of. Too often I find myself going through the day on autopilot. I don't like it.)

It's frustrating, to say the least. I love writing; I get the most joy out of my life from writing, whether it's a short story a simple blog post or whatever. The simply joy I get from it should be enough of a motivator, but I've found that, for me, that's not the way it works until I really get into things, until I'm really moving along with something and can preserve that momentum to use whenever I want. But I can't get that momentum unless I get started, and I feel like I can't get started without that momentum. Circles, circles, circles.

So, once again, I come back to the question I posed in the beginning: What do you do to motivate yourself? I know that there won't be some magical, catch-all thing that will work wonders on me, but anything that you guys and gals do for this sort of thing that might stand even a slight chance of doing something for me would be greatly appreciated. I'm sick of stewing in this mental rut I've been in for God knows how long and I want out more than anything in the world.

P.S. I'm obsessed with If Thine Enemy Hunger by Jucifer. It's definitely some of the best work they've done (and I might even think it's the best once the "zomg it's new and shiny" feeling wears off after a while), and I wouldn't be surprised if Jucifer ended up becoming my #1 most listened-to band on Last.fm because of this album.
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