Why You Avoid Hard Work And How To Fix It (Not A Sexy Answer)
Change your life, get clarity, and find out what holds you back (spoiler: you do it yourself)
Have you ever wondered why even if you are passionate about something, even if you know what to do, and really wish to achieve it, you still don’t do anything?
Let’s talk about it today.
I will try to describe it from my own perspective and my experience because I’m the same human as you and have the same struggles.
Everything starts with reason and clarity.
When we want to complete some task, especially when it’s hard, we need clarity and actual steps to take to accomplish it.
I always try to figure things out and get this “aha” moment of absolute clarity. But maybe it’s not possible?
Maybe you can’t be absolutely sure and figure everything out.
But you can try new things out, and see what works for you, what do you like, and what you don’t.
You can’t choose one thing and say that this is the work of your life like we are taught to do in schools.
You find out whether it is for you or not only by trial and failure.
With time and practice, we sort out the appropriate hobby or job that we want to spend more time doing.
This month you have one purpose and goal, next month it could be another.
I tried to create this “perfect” plan when I will do step-by-step this, this, and this, and then everything will be great.
Firstly, I don’t think it will be that great. What we think we want and what we actually get, are (for some magic reason) completely different things.
Secondly, there’s no perfect plan.
Just start and with time clarity will come.
Note: Not saying it will be easy.
When we don’t really improve our lives and look at our friends comparing ourselves with them, envy could appear.
I look at others and feel envious.
But at the same time, I don’t do anything to improve my life for good.
I’m interested in lots of ideas and hobbies but when it comes to actual work, grind, struggle, and uncertainty, I try to avoid it.
Because I can run, do sports, make music, play games or do god knows what to solve boredom problem and never actually do the work.
I have a place to live, food, and all of the fundamental needs.
You NEED to chase something in life and have a REALLY good and strong reason for doing so.
The stronger your WHY the higher the chance of doing the thing.
No point in doing something if you have no clue why.
You eat because you don’t want to die. No motivation is needed.
So we already found two reasons for the procrastination problem.
No clarity on how to do the thing, no actual plan.
No strong reason for doing it. I feel comfortable. Why would I try to do something new and hard?
Let’s move further to some more interesting and mentally painful stuff.
Everything will come according to your mind and actions.
You need (at least for now) to reduce the amount of entertainment you consume.
Because it disturbs you from the actual work.
I want to write and make videos. I like that as an idea. But because it’s lots of real work (if you think about it, it’s not even work), I try to avoid it.
There are more interesting and easy things to do like scrolling social media and chatting with friends.
But you will never get fulfilment in life and will never actually improve it if you never expose yourself to hardship and sit in the comfortable shell of entertainment and enjoyment.
I think we procrastinate and don’t want to work or do some tasks because we feel we will experience mental or physical pain doing it.
That’s why we want to avoid it.
But here’s a thing.
We tend to forget the fundamentals of life and how we lived and survived as a species through centuries.
That’s impossible to always avoid pain.
You can’t just enjoy life 24/7.
Not because I said so but because that’s how the brain works.
To get dopamine and feel good you need to go through something hard.
Either a run, workout, blog post, or YouTube video.
But because we got used to “everything easy and now”, we just can’t put in enough effort and time to complete long and hard tasks, so as a consequence we get distracted and eventually give up or procrastinate.
We tried to hack this fundamental rule of getting rewarded for hard things with instant gratification, and unlimited entertainment. And where did it lead us?
Let’s just imagine that I have absolutely nothing except writing and making videos.
I will do it because I don’t want to be bored.
Let’s be honest here.
Only the first step is actually hard. Then it gets easier and you go with the flow.
The main thing is like running - just start and don’t stop.
Why don’t I do things I need to?
They are not as interesting as the constant entertainment that we all have one click away.
Our dopamine levels are fucked up so much that important stuff doesn’t bring that much joy anymore.
Solution: cut off shit.
Create the actual plan.
Not only an action plan for every goal (and of course create some goals in the first place) but also a daily schedule.
I want more freedom but ironically unlimited freedom is a jail. Rules and planning give real freedom.
I don’t perceive actual work so interesting because there’s no instant success and no real big progress right away, cause it takes time. My brain was rewired to “everything fast and easy”.
I might not be absolutely sure what to do with my life and if what I’m doing is the right thing. But that’s the point. I just do and try, and afterward, I see the result.
The idea here is that I’m moving and learning. Stagnation leads to death.
Depression, anxiety, bad thoughts, and pure mental health come from the mind that has nothing meaningful to do.
When you don’t have big goals, no clarity, fried dopamine receptors, and feel lost, it leads to mental health problems.
Gen Z is the most depressed generation ever, even though we have absolutely everything you might have needed in the past for good life.
When you don’t occupy your mind you are drowning in bad habits.
Just think about every time you have lost to a bad habit.
Were you absolutely focused on meaningful work at that time?
Or you had nothing important to do?
Were you purposeful?
Or in the flow with an average life?
I hope you see the connection here.
Let’s make a little (not so little actually) review of the whole message.
1. You can’t be absolutely sure, you need to try things out and put in time and effort to get the feedback. Clarity comes with action. After months or years, you might see the results (or not and that’s normal). Learn from this experience. You get a more clear idea of what you want (or don’t want) to do with your life.
2. No focus, no clarity, and constant entertainment will ruin your life. I’m not saying completely go on monk mode (but why not actually). You need to have the balance. Not because I’ve read it somewhere, but because of the biology. By feeding yourself with entertainment and easy-to-achieve stuff, you skyrocket your dopamine levels which makes it impossible to bring yourself into hard and meaningful work that might require months of grinding without any feedback.
3. You feel depressed because you killed the happiness mechanism of your brain. Happiness comes from doing hard things and getting rewarded for it. Not in scrolling TikTok the whole day. When you feel mental pain after trying to get rid of bad habits and dropping your dopamine levels back to normal, you can’t endure it and want to somehow lower the pain or simply relapse. I read books and articles about dopamine. The only way to end this state is to wait and endure pain. I’m dead serious. The only way is to feel like shit for some time without relapsing, go through pain, and work until your brain fixes your chemistry.
4. Find a goal or some meaning in your life. Replace entertainment with achieving it. Doesn’t have to be a big and ambitious goal. You just need direction and purpose that will upgrade your character with time, give you clarity on life, and your brain will be occupied so you don’t fall for the bad habits, self-distraction, and traps of the 21st century.
I put my soul into this post and I hope it was helpful.
Till next week my friend and thanks for reading.
And remember,
1 % better every day.
Andrew
P.S.
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