Are you having a hard time getting motivated? Know what you want to do, but it’s a challenge kicking yourself in the butt to get up and do it?

You’re being haunted by the un-motivation demon. Fortunately, there are 5 ways to slay it.

You could be making attempts to get out there and do what you’re setting out to do. And even begin to get results here or there. But your surroundings, circumstances, and negative or lazy forces around you constantly hold you back. They pull you back to where you started. And you get discouraged or convince yourself you can’t do it.

That’s the un-motivation demon at work.

And if you want to turn your dreams into reality, your quest is to slay the un-motivation demon.

You can get motivated – and stay motivated. You can turn your dreams into reality. And it’s not as hard as you think.

It just requires an initial effort to change your environment into a positive one. Once you’ve turned these things into a habit, your new proactive environment will be auto-motivating – you’ll have a hard time not getting motivated.

5 Ways to Slay the Un-Motivation Demon

1. Ditch Friends That Hold You Back: Spend less time with friends that just want to “hang out” and not talk about taking steps towards your dream or ideal lifestyle, making more money, etc. Especially stop being around those that say you can’t do something.During college, I had some friends that I just hung out with. I had ambitious and adventurous ideas on business and non-9-to-5 lifestyle, but I didn’t have anyone to talk to. And the idea of entrepreneurship evoked responses of “get real” or “yeah right.” So for years I wouldn’t be motivated, and even doubting myself sometimes. But when I started finding new people‚Äîones that motivated and inspired me‚ÄîI begun spending less time with the aforementioned friends. And it made all the difference: the discouraging talks began to be replaced with a can-do attitude.To slay the un-motivation demon, you need to have people ask you “why not” rather than “why.”So where do you find those people? You’ll meet them when you…

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Image courtesy of Laffy4k at Flickr

Is creativity something that can be tapped? If you are anything like me, creativity can seem elusive; something that comes in waves or that is unpredictable. But we can learn to be creative – like anything it is a process. There are things we can do to harness this power and unleash it:

Release perfectionism

Perfectionism is the biggest killer of creativity. Notice when you are approaching a task and have ‘am I doing it right’ or ‘will it be good enough’ thoughts and do it anyway! Start practicing doing things even when you don’t know if you can do them perfectly or how they will turn out.

Have fun

In our society we are often taught that we should have a goal or an aim and an outcome to an activity in order for it to be successful. Creativity isn’t linear. Start doing purely things for the enjoyment factor.

Practice

Practice being creative often! You don’t necessarily have to show others your creations, but the act of making creativity a ritual will help your brain get used to being creative and keep the flow going.

Be present

Being present and living in the moment helps us to get in touch with our creative side. We need time and space to let our creativity pour forth. Try and be aware of how present you are being every day.

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The most important person behind each of your decisions has to be yourself. Your health and attitude are what give you the ability to perceive everything else around you. Often times, we initially make our decisions based on how someone else will react, or how fitting the decisions are to society’s standards, but society would not be visually available if you couldn’t see it, or audible if you couldn’t hear it.

This is a reminder to put yourself first in a big way. Although it may be a big way compared to what you were doing before, it is probably not big enough compared to how relevant your presence is in the world.

Conversation Example

With all the hesitation that you may face when going up to someone in a public setting, conference, or party, most of that hesitation doesn’t take into account that, if it was not for your senses and perception, the person would not be there for you to make conversation with. You’re a puzzle piece in the interaction just as much as they are a puzzle piece in the interaction. When we assume that our presence is not meant as part of an event, we lose the majority of our socializing energy, and get stuck in a mental circular loop of doubt or questioning.

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Before you open another door, follow this three-step process:  Stop. Pause. Enter. It might take an extra 10 seconds, but doing this will help you become more conscious of your objectives and help you connect with your spouse, children, boss, mother-in-law, or whomever.

If you’re like me, you have a thousand things you’re thinking about and commitments you’re juggling. You’re probably bouncing from one thing to another, trying to keep it all together. You might feel overwhelmed, overworked, and mentally exhausted. You also might spend a good deal of your mental energy focused on the future — wondering how you should reply to that email from your nosy colleague, thinking about your grocery list, or even daydreaming about your upcoming vacation.

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“Into The Bloom” courtesy of PopArtMachine

I’m sure you’ve noticed that a lot gets said about productivity – not just here on Pick the Brain, but around the web. We’re always keen to squeeze a little bit more out of our day, fighting against all the interruptions and distractions of modern life.

It’s easy to end up struggling much harder than you need to, though, by trying to be productive in the wrong ways, at the wrong times. Working with your body clock and your natural peaks and troughs of energy lets you maximize your productivity all day long … rather than struggling through several miserable hours by sheer willpower, only to end up too tired and tetchy to carry on working.

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You own the code. This code is not a secret and it doesn’t have to be broken or translated in order to understand its meaning. All you have to do is to make the choice to enter the code into any aspect of your life to begin receiving what you want.

Whether it’s improving relationships, losing weight, finding success at work, or making more money, the code is applicable to all areas of life and uses the exact same logic. The code isn’t hidden in a secret vault; it can be found in clear sight when we choose to look for it and then use it.

Getting Past Go

Perhaps the biggest obstacle to getting what you want is to just get going. Sometimes after you make the decision that “I will [fill in the blank with your goal]” you begin to hear “I can’t do it because…”

These self-limiting tapes perpetuate the lie that either (a) you are not worthy to have what you want, or (b) negative self-talk will begin to convince you that you are not able to do what you want to do. The lie begins to win and its power is seemingly too great to overcome.

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Have you ever started off a project feeling really enthusiastic about it – perhaps even to the point that you were losing sleep? Whether it was a new business direction, or book, or piece of art, or home improvement, or diet … it had you gripped. In the early stages, you found yourself thinking about it in the shower, jotting down ideas in the evening, wondering “what if…”

But somewhere along the way, you simply lost motivation. Perhaps you let your diet slide for a while and just couldn’t get up any enthusiasm to restart. Maybe you stopped writing your novel for months, and stopped caring too. Or you woke up one day and realised you dreaded grinding through any more of the steps in that business plan.

We know what it’s like to be motivated – and we know what it’s like to be unable to sustain that motivation. Here’s how to make sure you stay consistently motivated: so that you don’t burn out or lose interest.

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Image courtesy of Hemmy.net (Creative Photography)

In every economic crisis, there have been those individuals who have emerged from the aftermath even more financially secure. Luck has something to do with it, but that doesn’t tell the whole story. In order to rise up and get ahead, you need to shift paradigms. You need a new way to look at and interact with the world. Fortunately, it’s as simple as re-learning your ABCs.

In the movie Glengarry Glen Ross, Alec Baldwin taught us the ’80s ABCs: “A-always, B-be, C-closing. Always be closing!” But that’s old school. The new ABCs are Always Be Creating. People who create will be the people who succeed and excel. If you can create, you can write your own check.

I know what you’re thinking: work stinks. They’re talking about more layoffs, bonuses are out of the question, and you have to pitch in more for health insurance. Your 401(k) is in shambles, and your house is worth 40 percent less than it was a couple of years ago. The vision you had for your life has been seriously challenged. All you feel like doing when you come home is kicking back, cracking open a Heineken, and watching the tube. That’s understandable, but it’s absolutely bass ackwards.

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As a coach, I often work with people on achieving goals. Starting a business. Changing careers. Getting in shape.

I’ve learned that under every goal, there is an equation the goal-seeker has made up: If I do x, I will feel y. If I run my own business, I’ll feel a greater sense of control over my life. If I find a job I enjoy, I’ll feel happier and more energetic. If I get into shape, I’ll feel more secure about my health and more attractive.

This hypothesis then guides our actions. As a next step, we spend a lot of time and effort on x goal, believing it will be a means to feeling y. Sometimes we are right in our hypothesis, and often not. Research shows that humans are actually quite bad at predicting what will bring us happiness.

The more I work with people on their goals, the more odd it seems to me that we focus our energy on a particular goal, when what we really want is the desired change in feeling. Why don’t we focus on the feeling?

When I work with clients to focus on the new feeling they want to create, they find a wealth of options for getting there, including many that are available right now.

This is what I call “The Goals Shortcut” and its awesome power is that it allows you to feel the way you want to feel right now – not way off in the distant future after a goal has been achieved.

It has five simple steps.

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Let me be clear: I don’t believe in instant confidence as a permanent cure for confidence issues. I think what works in the long run is changing the thinking patterns and belief system which feed insecurities. And this cannot be done in an instant. It take times and persistent action.

I do however believe there are often situations when you don’t have the time to build confidence by addressing the roots and you need an instant boost for your confidence. There are strategies for this, which work a lot like a patch over a wound, with a temporary but also positive effect. This is why from my perspective, this discussion makes sense.

Do a simple search on this topic and you will actually find dozens of tips and tricks for instant confidence. Which always leads me to one simple question: which ones work the best and are truly worth applying?

Having tested a lot of them myself, as well as having seen even more of them at work in my activity as a coach, I’ve selected a couple of them, which I believe to be the most effective strategies for instant confidence. Here they are:

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