Combine These 2 Mental Reframes as a New Writer to Stay Motivated When You Lack Traction
Boredom creeps when you’re not seeing results from your efforts
The most I’ve made in a month, writing online for 5+ years, is $11.00.
By now, it’s fair to say that digital writing is not for me. “Double down on your strengths instead of fixing your weaknesses,” they say. So it makes more sense to stick to my 9–5 job…
Everyone is good at their 9–5 job because they do it repetitively.
However, almost everyone also complains about how boring their 9–5 job is.
There’s that link between mastery and boredom. That’s the kind of boredom I’m suffering from with writing. Not because I’ve reached “mastery”, but because I’m starting to get tired of not seeing significant results repetitively.
And yet, I continue to write.
It’s less about the results and more about the mindful iteration of your approach
You hear this all the time, “It takes time…”, but that’s something you easily forget when you’ve been doing something for a couple of years and yet you’re not getting the results you want.
Why is it that others get there a lot faster than me? How much time does it really take? How long is “long enough”?
That series of questioning is really just a sign of impatience.
It’s the same feeling that attracts the Shiny Object Syndrome.
We seek new approaches in the hope of seeing much better results. This must be driven by that saying, “Doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results is insane”. However, when you are results-driven, motivation dips a lot faster than when you are outcome driven.
1. Focus on output, not outcome.
Because output is 100% in your control and outcome is never in your control.— Josh Spector
Rewiring my brain to focus on consistent output instead of results relieves me from feeling disappointed due to the lack of results.
This is a long game. To win the long game, you need to be impatient with your actions, and patient with results (as per Naval Ravikant).
Lack of results is all part of the Hero’s Long Journey
After reading Donald Miller’s Hero On A Mission, I now view long-term goals as long stories.
For a story to be interesting, you need to make the hero struggle. That makes it more relatable than someone who was born perfect. That said, whatever lack of results you’re getting now is all part of a relatable story waiting to be told in the future.
Viewing my journey this way preserves my motivation to keep going despite the lack of results.
What mixing the mental reframes look like
Mixing the focus on output and viewing the journey as a (long) story makes my 5+ years of trying as follows:
- Chapter 1: Publish 1 article in a month
- Chapter 2: Publish 2 articles in a month
- Chapter 3: Submit 1 article to a publication in a month
- Chapter 4: Submit 2 articles to a publication in a month
- Chapter 5: Submit 2 articles to a publication in a week
- Chapter 6: ????
Viewing my efforts this way makes it look like I’m going somewhere as opposed to waiting for that “big win” to validate my progress.
To make a “would’ve been boring story” even more interesting, I’d add the element of mystery to it.
Why do people watch stories? To find out what happens next!
— Michael Jamin
We see this in TV shows all the time, where each episode ends with a cliffhanger. It spurs our curiosity, “Wait! I wanna know what happens next!!”. The writers of these T.V. shows string you along for hours and hours.
Now, apply that element of mystery to your own journey to keep you curious about what happens next.
I’d ask myself, “What am I going to learn from this approach that can 10x the quality of my work in the future?”
