Why am I so distracted and unmotivated?

Why am I so distracted and unmotivated? Being unmotivated in life can be sad and frustrating. If you are feeling stuck or a lack of motivation, you are not alone. We all suffer from a lack of motivation at some point of time in life. But there is good news though. You can overcome your lack of motivation and distraction and become passionate again. In this article, we will find reasons that explain why you might have no motivation, then specify and execute strategies to help you stop being distracted and unmotivated so you can move on in life. (Why am I so distracted and unmotivated?)

What is motivation:

While there are different definitions of motivation, in simplest words, motivation can be described as your desire to do something is greater than any desire not to do it. The feeling of not doing something can arise from passion, excitement, discomfort, frustration, or dissatisfaction.

Reasons why you are distracted and unmotivated (Why am I so distracted and unmotivated?)

Feeling unmotivated can be pushed by a wide variety of reasons, but generally, it is an emotional state that is often associated with being stuck. You struggle to take action in life and feel like you are failing to do anything. When you feel distracted and unmotivated, it is normally caused by the following reasons: 

Lack of purpose

You may be feeling unmotivated because you do not know what you want to do in life. When you do not know where you want to move ahead in life, it is almost impossible to pick a road that will take you there. While not having something to aim for, or goals to reach, you will feel there is no reason to get up and do anything. Motivation comes when you know why you want to do something. Ask yourself if you have a meaningful connection to your work. If not, you may have to review what you are doing. 

Lack of routine

You may be surprised to know that not having routines is a common reason for feeling unmotivated. Routine help in making habits and habits get where you need to go whether you feel like it or not. Once you get yourself moving and doing something, it is more comfortable to simply keep going. Rather than waiting to feel motivated to do something, take action instead. Most people believe that motivation causes action when the opposite is true: actions develop motivation.

You have set unrealistic goals

Setting unrealistic goals for yourself is an ordinary cause of feeling unmotivated. When the bar to achieve any goal is set high that you internally do not believe you can achieve a goal, or you feel how large it is, it gets difficult to get started. Motivation comes from setting goals that make you push yourself, without being out of reach.

Lack of focus

Jumping from one task to another keeps you in an endless state of never getting anything done. While doing a task, your notification may buzz, your email dings, or you feel the temptation to scroll through social media for just a few minutes. When you lack focus, it can lead to feeling as if you are not good enough for the given task, which makes you more distracted and unmotivated and prevents you from moving ahead. Motivation comes from achieving goals, and that is the easiest thing to do when you stay focused on one thing at a time.  

Self-doubt

A lack of motivation is usually caused because you do not believe in yourself and your abilities to do anything. When you are loaded with self-doubts, it gets difficult to start a task because you have already decided it would not turn out well and you do not want to face that failure. You accept what you tell yourself. If you tell yourself you will fail, you will. If you tell yourself you are good at doing something, you instantly feel motivated and begin doing it.

Surrounding environment

Your environment can make you feel either motivated or unmotivated. The place you work in can drain your energy and make you feel sad, or it can energize and motivate you. Negative people and our surroundings play a bigger role in motivation and success than you will realize. Likewise, if you are dealing with negative people all day, you may struggle to finish or even start your work.

All the things that cause us to struggle with distraction and motivation can be managed with simple strategies. Let us look at ways to get your inner drive back. 

What to do when you are distracted and unmotivated:

Connect to your why

Motivation is tied to your reason why. One of the most important things you can do to help yourself with demotivation is to ask yourself what the larger picture is. What it is that you desire in life? Having a strong reason for why you are doing something is a powerful motivating force.

One such reason can be financial or your reason why could be as simple as wanting to nourish your family.

Create daily routines 

Create a routine for yourself to create a habit. Once you have a habit solidly set, it is nearly impossible to get stuck in an unmotivated state for a long. You can think about habits that you already have in your life. Make habits using routines to help push you through the unmotivated times. Creative people are famous for using this technique successfully. Since motivation comes from action, the establishment of such habits will continuously keep you moving forward through clear actions.

Since motivation comes from action, building different habits will continuously keep you moving ahead with the help of specific actions. Start with small steps and build from there. Putting too much expectation on yourself at the start is simply setting yourself up for failure, this is what people do with New Year’s resolutions. Understand that nothing happens immediately. You need to specify routines that will build you towards what you are reaching for.

Imagine the long-term outcomes

When your motivation involves longer-term goals and aspirations, it is easy to lose sight of those in the day-to-day mundane. When you find yourself unmotivated, try to think about those long-term outcomes. Motivation generally comes back fast when you think about the bigger picture. What is it you are working for? Why is it important? How will you feel once you achieve that? Sometimes that is all you need an answer for and start moving ahead again. Remember, whatever you think about yourself is true, so try to obtain the habit of reminding yourself of what you are good at. Once you focus on the good and positive instead of the negative, you will help yourself be more motivated to move forward.

Set goals

If your long-term goals do not get you excited, you might need to revisit them. Goals that are too easy to achieve are boring and do not help us stay motivated to move toward them. On the other hand, goals that are too difficult can be frustrating, and cause us to give up because of a lack of confidence in our ability to reach them. Hence, it is better to find a mid-way and feel motivated once you achieve them. 

Kill distractions

Certainly, you know that multitasking is not a good thing. The more you try to do at once, the less progress you will make. Distractions are born from multitasking. Whether it be social media, email, chat, and messaging tools, all distract us throughout the day. It is almost impossible to make substantial progress with something when you are distracted every few minutes. And when you fail to make much progress, you start feeling unmotivated to try starting over after each distraction. Most of these tools become a reason for procrastination because it is more relaxing to mindlessly scroll when we are not motivated to work. The best way to kill such distractions is to put your phone on silent mode and assure yourself that you will pick up the phone only after finishing the task. 

Take time for yourself

Just as it is necessary to schedule work, it is also necessary to take time for yourself. Having a balance between your work and your personal life is a necessary strategy to deal with feeling unmotivated. When you constantly try to get everything done, you risk extreme burnout and depression. Your body and mind need frequent breaks. Take time to relax, enjoy a hobby, and have fun every day.

Also, take care of your health and remember to eat healthy. When you are not feeling well physically, it impacts your emotional and mental health. You may be surprised to know that just moving your body helps move your mind. You do not have to go to the gym to receive this benefit. Simply stand up, walk around the office, and go outside for fresh air. These physical movements often help in clearing your mind and get it encouraged you to go back to work.

Optimize your environment

Finally, create an environment for yourself that makes you feel good. Everyone is different in this respect, so experiment with what works for you. 

You can adopt the following ways to optimize your environment

Remove clutter 

Clutter around you is often diverting and creates a mental weight that can make it challenging to concentrate well. Create an organization in and around your workspace and release clutter to help create a quiet, happy workspace.

Rearrange furniture

Sometimes you can simply rearrange the furniture around your environment to make it feel more helpful to your work style, and other times it helps to change it completely. 

Lighting 

Most people are more motivated and productive when they have natural light around. If the light is too harsh, it can be diverting and draining. Likewise, some people simply wish to sleep if there is not enough light in their work area.

Getting unstuck (Why am I so distracted and unmotivated?)

If you are also dealing with distraction and lack of motivation, don’t defeat yourself. It is simply part of life. Just like anything else, motivation flows depending on a broad variety of possibilities. Work to identify exactly what is causing you to feel stuck and then execute the various strategies we talked about above. 

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