How to Do Mondays (or any day during a pandemic)...

I woke up today with the thought that I’d write a blog post. I was inspired, motivated, and leapt out of bed to get started. As I made my coffee, my monkey mind also leapt into action. What will you write about? Does that even make sense? Do people really want to read about that? Won’t they feel worse about themselves? Other people—experts—have written books about that; what are you going to add? [Staring at blank document]. Ugh, this is going to take forever. By the time you finish, it’ll be Tuesday. Wouldn’t you rather go for a run right now? Ooh, actually maybe you should check your bank accounts first.

Ahh, happy Monday y’all. 😆

If you came here for a brilliant and meaningful #MondayMotivation quote, I apologize in advance. However, since I am a recovering procrastinator, what you will find is validation, support, and a few practical tips to getting moving that I’ve found useful in my own work.

Step 1: Acknowledge that things are hard.

I think many of us have been beating ourselves up for not being our best selves this year. For not being able to accomplish our goals, or even possessing the motivation to get started. We blame and shame ourselves for checking social media too much, doomscrolling, not exercising, not being as engaged in social justice as we’d like, being a less-than-engaged parent or partner, or generally not making use of the “extra” time that we might have from having fewer social commitments. If this is you, it’s no wonder you’re not “in the mood” to be productive. Newsflash: We are nearly 12-months into a pandemic. However we felt at 3 months, 6 months, or 9 months—may not be the case now. Take a moment to identify and recognize how much you personally have lost, suffered, and have had to adapt to. This is true even if you are healthy, haven’t lost anyone, are employed, or have a partner or a pod.

Step 2: Forgive yourself and practice self-kindness.

Self-compassion researcher Kristin Neff reminds us to accept that we are all human—that we make mistakes, encounter frustrations, fall short, and experience suffering. Instead of criticizing ourselves for our human inadequacies, we might consider giving ourselves the same care and kindness that we would show to a best friend. Perhaps we can ask ourselves what it is that we need in that moment to comfort ourselves? It may also help to keep in mind that we all have this experience from time to time—yes, even the friend that looks like she always has a plan and has her life together. Self-kindness may look like taking a 10-minute walk, watching an episode of your favorite TV show, calling a friend, doing a guided meditation, taking a shower, making plans for the weekend, enjoying a square of dark chocolate, or taking a mental health day.

Step 3: Just get started.

James Clear of Atomic Habits writes, “If you work, inspiration will come. If you wait, inspiration will too.” Many of us have the mistaken belief that we must be struck by inspiration before we can begin the difficult project we want to work on. And until that occurs, we procrastinate on social media. We do 10 other “urgent” but unimportant tasks first. We think of all the ways we’re not ready to tackle the task: “I don’t know what to do first.” We think that if we can’t do something perfectly, it’s not worth doing at all. Or the worst scenario, what if we fail?

This was once a belief that held me back too. But what I’ve found helpful is to reframe success as bumping up against that feeling of discomfort and anxiety and pushing through anyway. Each time I do that, I hold myself accountable and it makes the next step just a little bit easier. This is my third blog post and while it’s not great by any means, completing it puts me firmly on the path towards writing better fifth, 10th, and 20th posts. It is only by doing, perhaps failing, and getting feedback, that I can really hone my writing skills.

Step 4: Create The conditions for success by removing distractions.

This may sound obvious, but the odds you will accomplish a task increases when it’s easy to do. If you’re a morning person, block out your morning to focus on the most important task. If quiet and uninterrupted time is needed, prepare for that by putting your phone in a different room, turning off notifications, or setting a timer for how long you want to spend on a project before you take a break. Identify your weaknesses and motivations and put checks and balances in place to push you toward action. If you need additional ideas, Shane Parrish’s conversation with Nir Eyal on the Knowledge Project podcast is a great place to start. James Clear’s Atomic Habits also goes into more detail on the ways you can create routines and habits that stick.

Step 5: Set realistic goals.

If we find ourselves unable to achieve goals that we’ve set for ourselves, perhaps the reason isn’t that we lack willpower, but that our goals are unrealistic or unclear. Using the SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound) goals framework is an effective way of eliminating confusion, setting clear timelines, and tracking progress. This post goes into more detail on how to conceptualize and write SMART goals.

For me, using the SMART goals framework and generally setting smaller goals has been helpful, especially during the past year. For example, when quarantine first began, I had a difficult time motivating myself to go for runs, and at one point, I stopped altogether. After several failures at re-motivating myself, I learned what worked: I revised my running goal to 10-minutes per day. This lowered the stakes to a level that was easily achievable for me on a daily basis. And, once I got out the door, I often found myself running for longer than 10 minutes. This is a far cry from the longer runs I used to go on, but as they say, don’t let perfect become the enemy of good. Furthermore, this small, daily achievement created a feeling of progress, which in turn put me in a more optimistic mood about what I could accomplish next.

Now it’s your turn. What’s one thing you want to accomplish? And what can you do today in 5 minutes to get started?