Procrastination solved - Chapter 3 of 3:
The last missing puzzle
That will skyrocket your motivation
After reading this chapter you will feel a little click in your mind, because it will illuminate the path to productivity and fulfilment.
Have you ever heard of dopamine? It’s a chemical in your brain which makes you feel excited and motivated when you have a lot of it but it makes you feel depressed and unmotivated when its levels are low.
This is how dopamine level looks in a normal person.
As you see, this person’s dopamine levels are pretty much constant at the neutral level. This person feels neutral, not particularly motivated but also not depressed.
After the task is completed (reward achieved) they will still feel good for a while but their dopamine level will slowly start to going back to neutral.
When a person with normal levels of dopamine starts doing a productive task (cleaning a room for example), their brain will start releasing a little more of dopamine to motivate them to finish a task. That’s why doing productive work genuinely feels good for normal people.
After the task is completed (reward achieved) they will still feel good for a while but their dopamine level will slowly start to going back to neutral.
The problem with dopamine is that the higher it goes up, the deeper it will crash after reaching the peak. If you take a drug that feels really good (playing a video game for example), it will also crash you very low - far below normal levels.
And when you are really low on dopamine, small rewards like clean room will not be enough to take you out of the misery. So you choose to take another quick and strong fix instead.
And that’s why you will never be motivated enough to do productive work. That’s why you wasted all these years in stagnation. You always feel either high on a quick fix or miserable. But never neutral.
And that’s why you will never be motivated enough to do productive work. That’s why you wasted all these years in stagnation. You always feel either high on a quick fix or miserable. But never neutral.
THE GOOD NEWS: If you now understand what is happening in your brain, you will be able to stabilize motivation and overcome procrastination in less than a week with no effort.
Here's the solution:
- Don’t cut any vices which you use as quick fixes (you wouldn’t be able to do it anyway)
- For every vice choose one that is a SLIGHTLY less enjoyable than the one you normally do. For example: my quick fix was to play PUBG mobile which is very engaging game that comes with strong boost (and crash) of dopamine. I didn’t quit playing games, I just chose a little less engaging game as my quick fix.
If your vice is bingewatching YouTube, choose a little less fun videos.
If your vice is porn, choose slightly less hardcore version.
If your vice is junk food, choose 5% less sugary option.
There is no need to do that for all the vices. Just doing it for one will be enough to start feeling significant difference in your levels of motivation.
By doing that, your dopamine crashes become less extreme while you still can use vices to improve your mood when necessary.
Soon you will notice that you don’t need so many quick fixes anymore, because there is no bad mood to fix it.
Productive tasks that drive you towards your goals and desires will geniunely become more and more enjoyable.
And most importantly: noticing faster and faster progress will motivate you more and more.
If you want to accelerate your progress towards becoming a high achieving action taker click the button below:
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