When you have things to do, it’s easy to gain the motivation pretty quickly. When we know we have a job on our hands, the desire to get it done is often pretty big – so we just sort of crack on and work until it’s finished. But this is not always the case. I know with me, trying to build motivation when working from home is tough. There are plenty of times when I can’t quite keep my mind focused. This could be because I have another work-related issue on my mind, a personal one or a product of my damn bipolar, the job in front of me sort of gets put on the backburner psychologically.
This kind of problem can be amplified when working from home. When we have the comforts of our abode around us, our levels of procrastination can double or even triple! If you’ve ever worked from home, then you’ll probably know just how difficult it can sometimes be when you’re not motivated at all.
The key to motivation when working from home
While it’s very annoying because you’d like to be a more productive individual overall, it’s pretty common – we are flawed humans, after all, and not robots. Fortunately, there are tonnes of things that can help to get productivity and motivation back to where it should be. Keep on reading, and I’ll go through just a few ways you can keep yourself motivated while working from home:
Wake Up And Get Up At An Early Time
When you wake up a little later than you might have anticipated, it means you start pretty negatively. You begin to feel as though the morning has already been written off. This negativity then moves into the afternoon – before you know it, the day has been pretty average. But, when you wake up and get started quickly, it makes you feel good and that you’ve accomplished something already. It gives you the momentum to continue being productive. You can get so much done before the afternoon even hits, and it allows you to get even more done after your lunch break.
Don’t over schedule yourself
There’s absolutely nothing worse that looking at an overwhelming to-do list; it’s an immediate trigger for anxiety. Remember to start off small, prioritise focus to your three top tasks and break the bigger tasks down into smaller chunks if you have to. For more information on how to get started when your to-do list seems so long, visit this blog post.
Make Sure You’re Set Up Correctly
If you’re working in a terrible environment, then the chances are you won’t get anything done as quickly as you’d like. Sitting on the couch in front of the TV can be helpful for a little while, but it won’t get things done in the long-run; distractions will overtake the concentration levels. Get yourself situated in an office or a study. A place where you can sit down formally and concentrate in silence (or with relaxing music) is what’s necessary. But not just that, make the space somewhere you actually want to be. Add a bunch of fresh flowers, have your favourite artwork on the wall and fill the space with natural light.
Connect with colleagues
Let’s face it, working from home get get very lonely. When you’ve been doing it for a while (I think I’ve been doing it 8 years!) you start to get a little tired of your own company. That’s why it’s important to schedule catch ups with colleagues whether that be in person (if possible) or via a zoom chat. This may be people you work with or, if you’re self-employed, you might connect with other business women. Not only does this break the tedious cycle of your racing mind, conversations bring up new ideas, new approaches and encouragement to continue moving forward. Adult conversation is absolutely priceless.
Change Up Your Work Schedules
If your employer has set you a schedule, then there probably won’t be a way of getting around the rigid times but do discuss it with them if you can. If you’re working on an independent project or having a flexi-time regime, then you’ll be able to work at the times you prefer, of course. It would help if you used this to your advantage because working the same way, every single day can get boring and tedious. Shake things up and use different times to provide freshness. Look online at some of the routines you could adopt – it might be wise to see the benefits and challenges of a 9/90 work schedule and other similar schedules.
If you find you’re having difficulty with your schedule, getting to the end of the day wondering what on earth you achieved, make a point to track your activities and how long each takes you so you can see where you may be spending your time unproductively. A great app that I use to track my time and analyse is Toggl.
Remove Personal Social Media From Your Vicinity
Social media is excellent a lot of the time, so this isn’t a point about bashing the platforms you most likely use. When it comes to personal social media accounts, however, they can be very distracting and can zap hours from our day without us even realizing it. You may think you’re just harmlessly scrolling through something when, in fact, you’re delving into a rabbit hole that lasts half an hour! Put your phone away and focus on what you have to do. Alternatively, there are may mobile and desktop apps that can lock access to social media platforms at times you set. You won’t regret it.
Make Sure You Have Lots Of Energy
Having lots of energy in the tank will allow you to focus more heavily. When we’re hungry, thirsty, and lacking sleep, we tend to either lose concentration completely or overthink. Make sure you’re topped up with energy when working from home as you’ll make a lot more mistakes with hardly any fuel in you! While this may seem like a pretty small point, it’s something that can make or break regarding your productivity and the working day as a whole. You could get into a habit of working slowly, and your energy can play a big part in it all.
It’s so easy to fall into your comfort zone when working from home; there’s no one to keep tabs on you except yourself! The benefit of implementing these steps to maintaining motivation when working from home is that you will start to enjoy working from home when you’re kicking goals. You’ll get to banish your anxiety because the work you’ve set for yourself is achievable and, kicking goals, in general, feels really good, particularly empowering when you’re doing it alone.
Pin it
