Why You Lost your Motivation in 2021 (4 Research Based Ways to Get it Back!)

1. 0:00 – 1:00

   “Meh days” and pandemic-driven motivation loss

   1. SZDr. Shadé Zahrai0:00

      Have you ever woken up and felt blah? I call them meh days. Everything is just meh. You struggle with motivation. Your brain is foggy. You can't focus. Everything is an effort. Now, a lot of us experienced this during the pandemic, whether it was a result of the uncertainty or the prolonged lockdowns. Maybe it was everything being virtual and the lack of human contact. Maybe because we weren't used to spending so long at home or had to cancel everything that we looked forward to. If you've experienced it, you'll absolutely know what I'm talking about. In this episode, I wanna share what this state is and then share some science-based strategies to help you work through so that you're no longer held back and can reignite your energy and your sense of purpose. Hi, I'm Shade Zurai, and I help professionals to hack their careers, overcome their limiting beliefs, and confidently create the extraordinary life they deserve. So we're talking about this lack of joy, aimlessness, where you feel stagnant, almost empty. Life feels monotonous. Days

2. 1:00 – 1:31

   What “languishing” is (and why it’s easy to miss)

   1. SZDr. Shadé Zahrai1:00

      blend into each other. This feeling actually involves a range of emotions and according to psychology and social behavior research, it's called languishing. The term was first coined by sociologist and psychologist Corey Keyes, who was interested in understanding why people who weren't depressed weren't thriving. Something was holding them back, and he describes that missing piece as the absence of feeling good about your life. Now, part of the danger with this is that when you're in this state, you

3. 1:31 – 2:31

   Strategy 1: “Name it to tame it” (label the emotion)

   1. SZDr. Shadé Zahrai1:31

      might not even notice what's happening. You don't catch yourself starting to isolate yourself, and because of that, you usually don't seek support or do much to help yourself. It's quite a confusing state to be in. So what do we do about it? Well, there are four simple research-based strategies that can help you work through your languishing so that you're no longer blah and instead feel re-energized. And the very first place to start is with what psychiatrist Dan Siegel advises. He says, "Name it to tame it." One of the most effective strategies for managing negative emotion is actually to take time to identify what you're feeling and call it out. I find this one especially useful when your languishing is leading to frustration, like, "Why can't I focus?" or, "Why don't I feel motivated to work on my goals?" In these moments of frustration, usually your amygdala is activated. That's the threat detection part of your brain. UCLA's Professor Matthew Lieberman, who's also the director of the Social Cognitive Neuroscience Lab, says, "When you put feelings into words, you're activating

4. 2:31 – 3:32

   Strategy 2: Take time off—give your brain real rest

   1. SZDr. Shadé Zahrai2:31

      this prefrontal region," which is the part of the brain that we use for rational thinking and logic, "and seeing a reduced response in the amygdala." By self-monitoring and identifying your state, you have a greater capacity to choose your response in the moment. So first and foremost, get really comfortable with actually identifying what you feel. Own it and call it out. The second strategy I wanna share is actually to take time off. Allow your brain time to rest. Your brain is like a machine. When it gets overheated or overloaded, it stalls, it freezes, and you have to turn it off and give it some time to cool down. My husband was listening to a Joe Rogan podcast the other day, and he shared how Joe's guest, Michael Easter, mentioned our tendency to completely attach ourselves to our devices, and I've experienced this myself. Because we are so inundated with information and our phones are so accessible, we don't actually allow ourselves time for solitude. When we are engaging with people, like we do at work, and even when we're looking at our phones and our

5. 3:32 – 4:03

   Practical ways to unplug and recover mental bandwidth

   1. SZDr. Shadé Zahrai3:32

      devices, our brain is engaged and using up energy in taking in data and processing it. If we don't give our mind time to just rest by looking away from the screen, we're not allowing our brain time to switch off and regenerate. We become cognitively depleted. Our mental battery runs out. Many people also struggle to be alone with their thoughts, and they defer to their phones almost like an avoidance strategy. But this only leads to feeling more anxiety. So some things that can help include mindfulness meditation.

6. 4:03 – 4:33

   Strategy 3: Enter “flow” to rebuild enjoyment and energy

   1. SZDr. Shadé Zahrai4:03

      See if you can download a free app or find a track on YouTube that guides you through a meditative process. Or you can try to calm your mind by closing your eyes, taking a long, deep breath, and slowly counting backwards from 100. Maybe try and go for a walk around your block without your cellphone and just be present. Look around. The third strategy is to engage in something called flow. Flow is a term coined by legendary psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, which refers to a genuinely satisfying state of consciousness

7. 4:33 – 5:03

   Examples of flow activities you can intentionally repeat

   1. SZDr. Shadé Zahrai4:33

      where you experience deep enjoyment, creativity, and total involvement with life. So what are some examples of flow? Well, have you ever done something where you really enjoyed it and you completely lost track of time? Maybe you were creating art, learning a new dance routine. Maybe you were at the gym with a new workout regime. Maybe you were playing an instrument or a card game. The consensus is that it usually takes around 15 minutes to enter a state of flow. But once you're in, you feel absolutely incredibly

8. 5:03 – 5:34

   How to make flow easier: remove distractions and right-size challenge

   1. SZDr. Shadé Zahrai5:03

      energized. Now, a key to getting into flow is to eliminate distractions. Put the phone away, close social media and all the tabs on your computer, and try to be in a quiet space. You also want to eliminate internal distractions, too, so see if you can write down everything on your mind, your thoughts, your concerns. Do a full brain dump before you start. You also wanna focus just on one task. Don't try to multitask. And another key with being in a flow state is that you want the task to be a little challenging in the sense that you want your

9. 5:34 – 6:04

   Strategy 4: Small, achievable goals to restart motivation

   1. SZDr. Shadé Zahrai5:34

      brain to be engaged, but not so challenging that you get frustrated. So think about what you were doing last time you entered a state of flow and find ways to do more of it. The last strategy I wanna share is an obvious one and essential for motivation. Set yourself small, achievable goals. One of the reasons why we feel empty and we lack motivation is because we feel like we're not working towards anything. There's nothing to look forward to. So what do we wanna do? We wanna give ourselves something to look forward

10. 6:04 – 7:00

    Dopamine, celebrating wins, and closing encouragement

    1. SZDr. Shadé Zahrai6:04

       to by setting very small goals that are a little challenging but totally achievable. When you achieve a small goal and apply some effort to achieve it, the feeling of actually achieving it can be amazing. You get this wonderful shot of dopamine, which activates the reward pathways, giving you a boost of motivation so that you want to keep going. Importantly, you want to celebrate these small wins, too, and the effort that you applied to actually achieve them. So there you have four strategies to help you get over blah and feel reinvigorated and ready to take on the world, or at least more motivated to get out of bed each morning, which is still a win worth celebrating. I hope you found these tips helpful. I'm Shade Zurai, and I'll see you next time. [upbeat music] Life feels monotonous. Oh my gosh, what is wrong with my mouth?

Episode duration: 7:00