How do you make yourself do something that is necessary but you don’t feel like doing it?

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1. Start by doing the simplest part first or play music in the background and if possible your favorite show

2. Remind myself why I need to do it and why it will make me feel better once I’ve done it. Also I tell myself that the thought of having to do it is probably worse that it actually will be

3. [removed]

4. Pair it with an activity I like, such as watching a youtube video while I do the dishes or playing some music when I’m doing work that doesn’t requires too much focus.

5. I’ll think about how good It will feel to get it done or I’ll think about what could happen if I don’t do it

6. This is so dumb but it works. I say I’ll do it on the count of 3. 1,2,3 go and something about that resets my brain

7. I have various tricks starting with the most severe and working backwards —

   – taking my prescribed Adderall; it lowers the activation energy necessary to accomplish a task I’m not interested in

   – making a competition out of it; which will happen first, I pass out from this breath I am holding or I load the dishwasher?

   – I request a body double either digital or in meat space

   – I turn me doing the job into a way to instruct others (I made an Insta live showing anyone who was watching how to fold baby crib sheets; this is the only way they’d get folded)

   – I turn one task into a bunch of other tinier tasks and give myself a reward after I finish each of them; I’m not just writing to my Senators to ask them to ease the Adderall shortage, I’m drafting the letter, revising the letter once, revising the letter a second time using Grammarly, researching who my Senators even are, writing down their names, researching their fax numbers, researching each one’s office mailing address, personalizing the letter to each, faxing the letters to each, and then printing the letter, and finally mailing the letter to the one whose fax machine wasn’t working — That’s TWELVE treats!

   – Pomodoro Technique

   – focus music

   – I openly address that the task does not, in fact, have to get completed. There is no deadline. It is arbitrary. If I don’t file or pay my taxes, the IRS will just send me a bill with a slight upcharge for them doing the work for me. And see but now my brain is like, “Oh, no stakes? Then this is like playing a video game or other fun no-stakes thing we do to procrastinate. Let’s fill out and file taxes to avoid loading the dishwasher.”