Anh Nguyen
Have you ever felt completely bored by something used to be so excited to do every time? I had that feeling so many times with my homework, exercises, and even my job. Staying motivated is extremely important to do anything without feeling tired of it. The motivation can come from different sources such as personal goals, feeling accomplished, or even someone special. So, how can we keep ourselves motivated?
Here are different ways that I used to keep my motivation alive:
1. Complete easy tasks first:
Every long journey starts with a single step forward. This works extremely fine when the feeling of bored and tired is surrounding and keeping you away from finishing all the assignments and responsibilities that were given. By completing easy tasks first, you are “warming up the machine” for more challenging tasks. This small feeling accomplished will help you to forget about all of tiredness and boredom.
2. Treat yourself a little bit after completing a task:
This solution can be a double-edge sword, so you better be careful when using it. On the good side, it will give you more motivation to finish tasks faster, but it can also distract you from completing undone tasks, or you should think about the greatest reward after completing everything that is freedom from restlessness and worry about unfinished tasks.
3. Surround yourself with motivated people:
In my experience, this works extremely well with me when I cannot be unmotivated while everyone else is full of energy and trying their best to complete their assignments. Surrounding yourself with motivated people will give you an unthinkable amount of motivation. At the end of the day, you are who you surrounded yourself with.
4. Schedule one or more activities that you really looking forward to weekly:
By scheduling one activity you really passioned about such as playing sports or going out wit friends, that is a huge motivation for you to finish all assignments in order to fully enjoy that activity. This also has a drawback when you just do those activities without finishing your duties, so you should make sure that you can only enjoy those activities after you are done with your duties.
5. Study with someone or have a small group study
Homework and assignments can be extremely stressful and boring to finish alone, but this problem can be solved by having someone to do homework together. This person can be someone that you know from classes, roommate, coworker, or someone special that you want to spend time with.
6. Think about the amount you are paying:
Let’s be honest here, going to college is expensive for most of us, and you definitely do not want to waste your own money by taking classes multiple times. Every time you do not feel like you can finish all these assignments, thinking about the amount you are paying every semester will give you a huge motivation to get up and finish them.
Obviously, there are different ways that fits for each person, and only you can find out which solution is the best for yourself on staying motivated during college. These solutions that I stated above are working relatively well in my own experience, and I hope that some of these might also work with other people. Whichever solution you choose to go with that really works on you, keep going with it until the end. Stay motivated, be responsible, and enjoy this time. One day, you will sit down and remember about this as one of the best time of your life.
Happy Valley Comm 