Are you losing your motivation and productivity?
It’s normal. We have been going through a lot. We had:
- A pandemic that is killing hundreds of thousands of people
- Millions are losing their jobs
- Parents are forced to work from home while taking care of their kids
- The assassination of George Floyd and many other black people.
- A crazy, racist, homophobic, religious bigot, xenophobic, sexist, misogynist president who refuses to leave the White House
- And winter is coming.
In spite of all this, if you are lucky to have a job, you are expected to be productive at work.
How can you maintain some level of normalcy and some minimum standard of productivity and motivation so that you won’t get fired?
Remind yourself that these are not normal times
2020 had been an abnormal year. It’s hard to make believe that everything is normal because it’s not. We can not just simply adapt and go on to our regular life as if nothing out of the ordinary has happened.
Give yourself some slack. You don’t have to listen to all the rah-rah being repeated on social media. You don’t have to start a new business, a new career, a new hobby, a new diet. You can just absorb all the changes going around you and try to stay sane. That’s accomplishment enough.
People are going through a lot of grief. The perception that you are not doing enough, can be demotivating in itself. At this moment, you just have to realize that not being motivated or productive is perfectly normal.
It’s the productivity paradox. We have all these new tools, apps, and software to make us more productive. New books coming out every month about how we can manage our time more efficiently. All this focus on productivity is only making us more anxious and thus less productive. Often time, just going out for a walk can be more productive than having one more app on your phone.
Continue nurturing your network
Our personalities and life experiences allow us to deal with stress and uncertainty in different ways, but one thing is certain, having a network of friends and family to share our day to day life can be a great stress reliever.
Almost every day, I spend an hour or so just chatting with my neighbor, laughing, or commiserating together. It helps a lot. I also call my family almost every day.
Get on the habit of saying hello to someone else on a regular basis. It’s good for you and it good for the other person.
At the very worst. If you don’t have a regular person in your life, go out for a walk, spend some time at a coffee shop, or at your local bookstore (bookstore owner enjoys when people open the door to say hi.)
We don’t have to be stimulated all the time
Over time we have gotten used to the constant stimulations of beeps, tags, likes, connections, comments, rings, and retweets. This has become the new normal. When we get a little bit of repose from all these stimulants we feel disoriented. At this moment, when the noise level has reduced, we can learn to enjoy a little bit of monotony and introspection. Once we are exposed to silence, we can learn to appreciate it, enjoy it and use it to relax our stressed minds.
It’s OK not to be OK
The nature of our work has changed. Many people have lost their jobs, others are working under the risk of contagion, and others have to turn their spare bedroom into a home office. Many people have adjusted, but for the many others, it’s ok not to be ok. You don’t have to pretend that everything is fine. If you just let go of that expectation, that would be a good first step towards reducing the stress you are under.
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