Unlikely Things You Can Do to Get Moving Again
When people feel stuck, they usually search for obvious solutions.
Get motivated.
Set goals.
Read a book.
Listen to a podcast.
Make a plan.
Those are all worthwhile. But sometimes the fastest way to regain momentum is by doing something that doesn’t appear to have anything to do with the problem at all.
Only a first step leads to effective action. .
Here are a few unlikely ways to get yourself going again.
Take a different route home.
Drive a different street. Walk a different trail. Enter the grocery store through the opposite entrance. Tiny changes interrupt autopilot and remind your brain that change is normal rather than threatening.
Rearrange your workspace. Or your car.
You don’t have to renovate your office. Move your monitor. Change your chair. Clear your desk.
Add a plant. Small environmental changes often produce surprisingly large mental changes.
Teach someone something.
Explaining an idea forces you to organize your own thinking. It reminds you how much you’ve learned and often reveals what you should do next yourself.
Identify something beneficial that you’ve been avoiding, and do it for five minutes.
Not until it’s finished. Just for five minutes.
Reluctance hates beginnings. Once you’re moving, continuing becomes dramatically easier.
Wear something different.
It sounds trivial, but people often behave differently when they see themselves differently. A new jacket, a favorite pair of shoes, or simply dressing as the person you’re becoming instead of the person you’ve been can subtly influence confidence and behavior.
Visit somewhere you’ve never been. It opens up new neural pathways and increases mental vigor and bandwidth.
A different coffee shop. A nearby town. A museum. A library. A park.
Novelty stimulates curiosity, and curiosity frequently awakens motivation.
Write down twenty possibilities.
Not three.
The first five are usually obvious. The next five require effort. Somewhere between numbers eleven and twenty, your thinking often becomes creative because your brain has exhausted the easy answers.
Help someone else.
Momentum is contagious. So is generosity.
When we contribute to someone else’s progress, we often rediscover our own.
Change the question.
Instead of asking, “Why can’t I get started?”
Ask, “What would make getting started easier?”
Or ask, “What’s the smallest meaningful action I could take in the next ten minutes?”
Better questions produce better answers.
Become a work in progress again.
Many people stop growing because they unconsciously begin protecting the person they’ve already become.
Instead, give yourself permission to evolve.
See yourself as unfinished in the best possible way – someone actively becoming wiser, stronger, more capable, and more interesting with every deliberate step.
You don’t always need a dramatic breakthrough.
Often, you simply need a different beginning.
The surprising truth is that momentum rarely arrives before action. More often, action creates momentum.
So if you’ve been waiting to feel inspired before you move, consider reversing the equation.
Move convincingly.
Inspiration has a remarkable habit of catching up with people who are already in motion.
Best in Small Doses: If you want your life to change, don’t always change the destination. Sometimes changing the first step is all it takes.
