(Updated January 31, 2025)
My job demands self-motivation.
Okay, all jobs and goals and dreams and important actions demand self-motivation (or any kind of motivation), so I’m not alone in that.
But as a freelancer, no one’s telling me what to do or when to do it. No one’s looking over my shoulder. No one’s even keeping tabs on when I start work (after a nice sleep-in) or how often I check Instagram (too often).
There are fewer external pressures and demands that employed professionals with a manager or team of colleagues typically have.
My work is self-directed and, for the most part, within my control.
It’s great and it’s scary. The freedom is so exciting—“Wow, I’m in total control of my work!”—and the freedom is so terrifying—“Wow, I’m in total control of my work!”
I expected to tap into my self-motivation when I decided to start freelancing. I knew I would need to rely on that intrinsic push every day to get my work done.
What I didn’t realize is that switching to this type of work would also require immense self-motivation in multiple areas of my life.
Allow me to explain with two examples:
- Movement: I work primarily from home or nearby coffee shops, so unless I intentionally go for a walk, hit the gym, or move my body, I’ll rack up a whopping 300 steps for the day. In my experience, this is different from going into an office where there is some built-in movement while you transit or take a break from work. There’s also a logical transition from home > gym > work (or vice versa) when you work outside the home. In a previous life, I would use my lunch break to go for a walk, or hit up a workout class on the way home. Now, I need to self-motivate to get some movement in—there’s no natural inclusion of it in my routine.
- Connection: Similarly, because I work independently from home, there is no natural inclusion of interpersonal connection or socialization most days. Sometimes I speak with clients or a stranger at the coffee shop, but the work is mostly independent. That’s all fine and good, but requires me to self-motivate to reach out to friends and make plans to connect. I can’t rely on work friends and colleagues to fill that need, but I have to go out and do it myself.
So, not only do I need to tap into my intrinsic motivation to work every day, I need to tap into it for other basic life functions.
Here’s the thing—I’m pretty self-motivated. I get my work done, I get my exercise in, and I get my social connection. So, none of this is bad, none of this is a problem.
Until it is.
Until that self-motivation just *poof* disappears.
Then it’s a real big problem.
Self-motivation is not limitless—here’s how I know
As it turns out, self-motivation is not a limitless resource. It runs out. Or, maybe, runs low.
I realized this not too long ago when I was really struggling to make a decision. It was around a potential trip with friends and, despite wanting to go and figuring out all the details, I just couldn’t “pull the trigger” and book the flights. I kept ruminating about options, looking at flights, evaluating hotels, wondering about what could happen, and altogether avoiding taking action.
I just couldn’t make the final decision.
And it was so frustrating! How hard is it to just decide?
I was chatting about it with a wise friend who suggested I might be experiencing decision fatigue. This is the phenomenon many experience when too many decisions drain your mental energy, making it harder to continue making decisions. Specifically, decision fatigue leads to one of these outcomes:
- Risky decision making
- Decision avoidance.
Well ding-ding-ding, we have our answer. My decision avoidance surrounding this trip was an outcome of decision fatigue. It’s not that I am incapable of making the decision or even that I don’t want to—it was an inability to just do it.
Reflecting more on why this is the case, I see a clear link between decision fatigue and self-motivation. After all, I’m using a lot of energy to self-motivate in multiple areas of my life.
The self-motivation to finish up a client project on time is a decision about how to prioritize tasks.
The self-motivation to get to the gym and exercise is a decision about how to order my day.
The self-motivation to connect with friends after work is a decision about who to contact and what to do.
Intrinsic motivation is making decision after decision for yourself and what you’re going to do. It gets exhausting and can start running low over time.
A plan to get my mojo back & give the ol’ self-motivation a boost
Luckily, realizing this is what was happening surrounding the decision to book my trip made it easier to go ahead and book. But it doesn’t totally fix everything—there are other areas where I see stagnating motivation and decision procrastination in my life.
So, I think it’s time for a plan. A plan to get my mojo back and set up a system for life and work that doesn’t rely 100% on me and my non-infinite self-motivation.
Here’s what I’m going to do.
1. Understand intrinsic motivation better
According to Daniel H. Pink, there are three elements of intrinsic motivation—autonomy, purpose, and mastery.
I’ve got the first one, but run a little short on the other two. I believe I can ramp up the purpose and mastery elements by:
- Choosing work projects that excite and challenge me. As a newish freelance writer, I’ve been known to take on any projects people will give me, often operating reactively rather than proactively in my business. I am now honing my writing services and niching down into podcast post-production copywriting. It’s something I’ve done a lot of before, but want to do it more intentionally and specifically so I can find projects I align with and am excited about.
- Spending more time upskilling and learning. I’m not sure what this looks like 100%, but may include taking an online course around copywriting, SEO, etc. To brush up on new knowledge and make sure I never stop learning.
As I approach work, I’ll use these questions to value their impact and importance: Do I like this? Am I learning something new? Do I have control over this? Am I exerting creative energy? Do I feel energized?
Caveat here: not all work can fulfill these requirements. There are the boring tasks, the must-do activities, and the bad days. I think the key is to find balance and ensure that at least a good chunk of work is checking the autonomy, purpose, and mastery boxes.
2. Stick to a schedule
The beauty of FREElancing is all the FREEdom you get. I don’t have a schedule, I don’t need a schedule, I don’t want a schedule.
Well, that attitude leaves me making a million different decisions every single day because there is no fall-back option, no automated routine. I think giving myself more structure will reduce the burden of decision-making and help, paradoxically, increase my freedom.
This interesting article explores how maintaining a strict routine may be an act of freedom. The author pulls on ideas from philosopher Immanuel Kant, highlighting the need to make commitments to yourself and that setting rules can be the ultimate expression of your own autonomy.
I believe a time-blocking strategy to be highly effective in staying on track. This time-management tool (along with its cousins task batching, day theming, and time boxing) divides your days into blocks of time. Because you’re dedicating each block to a specific task, you avoid aimlessly switching between tasks, wasting time, and not accomplishing what you need to.
My schedule doesn’t have to be anything fancy, but I think simply putting one together will help eliminate many of my daily decisions. With some planning, I can organize my time around key activities I need to achieve:
- Low-value but necessary “busywork” (answering emails, etc.)
- High-value but easy-to-avoid business development work and strategy
- Paid client work
- Prospecting and networking
- Personal writing projects
- Self-care and good-for-the-soul things like walks, cooking, lunch breaks, social plans, working out, etc.
The goal is not to remove all flexibility or autonomy inherent to the job (which is necessary for self-motivation, as mentioned earlier), but to dig deeper into what needs to be done and set up a productive system to do it.
3. Get out of the house
Staring at the same four walls everyday does not inspire me. You know what does? New places! New experiences! New people! New environments! I think novelty goes a long way to boosting self-motivation and we’ve all got to seek it out.
Some options to do this include:
- Exercise and movement. It’s annoyingly good for your mental health which can, in turn, boost your self-motivation and drive to work hard.
- New workplaces. I frequently work in coffee shops and find it great for my focus and productivity… more of this moving forward! I also plan to use the library as a workspace more often, too.
These three items are, I believe, key to longer-lasting and more consistent self-motivation. What’s worked for you? I’d love to know how you’ve struggled with self-motivation and what you’ve don’t to address it.
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