Could you tell me a time you felt motivated?

I am a lazy person. My family, friends and most people who know me will probably back me up on that. If there are things that need done, they will most likely be done at the last second or later than I had planned. This is not because I set myself too many things to do in a short amount of time, or because I’m going out and doing other things instead – I am just lazy. I’d rather sit down and do nothing than to get up and do the things I need to do.

The biggest problem with this is that I never really got motivated to do things because I was able to be lazy and get away with it. I’d be able clean my whole flat in the couple hours before a flat inspection or whip up a decent essay the night before. I was able to get good enough exam results to get into Uni on the very minimum of effort. But as time went on and assignments and exams got harder and I took on more responsibilities the little effort I put in wouldn’t take me far enough. As I got more of a handle on other things, I just started shifting the lazy. Assignments would be done well and in exchange the flat would be a mess and I would eat rubbish. I would clean the flat and eat well and I fell behind on Uni work and was less organised for work. Not because I didn’t have enough time, I am just lazy.

I used to view being motivated as a predetermined factor, a personality trait that I was born without. I’ve gone through phases of being highly motivated towards things such as going to the gym or studying but found it difficult to maintain. I realised recently when I was wallowing in laziness and not feeling motivated about anything that I was looking at it all wrong. I was looking at motivation as an on-off switch – you were either fully motivated and active or not at all. I realise now that its more like the accelerator pedal in a car, you can increase and be more motivated or ease off, take time for yourself and be a bit lazier. The reason I was struggling to stay motivated is because I felt like I had to be fully motivated all the time when that’s really not the case. I’m still trying to find the right balance between being motivated to do the things I need to do and my lazy nature but I’m getting there. Some days I’m lazier than I should be but that’s fine - motivation is a marathon, not a sprint.