doing

Why Is It So Difficult To Do Things?

I've always struggled with doing things. I still do! I'm going to talk about a few of the things that have worked for me.

Work

I didn't like my job, yet I would go to it every single day, and do the thing I didn't want to do. External pressure is better than any David Goggins youtube video or anything of the sort.

I wanted to learn programming, so I made a bunch of things to speed up work, and my team became dependent on them, they were really badly made pieces of software, but people used them, so I was forced to improve. Having a skill you want to learn be crucial to your livelihood and work will make you learn that skill.

Happiness/Dopamine

I don't read, I hardly write, I live alone & I don't do a lot outside of my immediate obligations. I struggle to get interested in new things, and to persist with said new things if they aren't critical to my wellbeing. I think a lot of this is down to Dopamine/Base levels of happiness.

I recently moved to a new country where I don't really know anyone. When I came home and saw my family and old friends, I suddenly became interested again in the world around me. The happier you are, the easier it is to do things, so make yourself happy.

I used to think, you could make yourself happy in a purely subtractive manner. Remove instagram/tiktok/alcohol/weed/porn and your dopamine will shoot up and suddenly it will become easy to do things. I've realized this isn't enough, those distractions are merely there as your life is lacking, and confronting that is far too painful, its much easier to look away.

Instead of focusing intensely on punishing yourself (installing app/site blockers, dopamine fasts..). Create a life you don't need to distract yourself from.