What to Do to Get Out Of a Rut

Don’t beat yourself up. Do these simple things instead

“When you’re in a rut, you have to question everything except your ability to get out of it.” — Twyla Tharp

There are times when we feel like shit. You know these moments. It’s when your motivation has reached 0 and you don’t do anything.

It happens to all of us. The other day I was exactly in that situation. I had a lot of things to do but was paralyzed by the amount of work. So I procrastinated by getting inside a YouTube spiral that got me watching dashcam compilation videos (I have no idea how I got there).

The thing is, we know it’s important to have some rest. Working every waking hour is not a sustainable solution. But rest should be deserved. It should be planned in a way where we limit procrastination.

There is nothing better than enjoying a chill evening after a long day. But a rut is not that. A rut is an extended period where you cannot get yourself to do anything.

The terrible thing about being in a rut is that it steals us our most precious resource: our time. Days or weeks can go by in the blink of an eye, without us producing anything.

When it happens to me, I feel sick. But after some tinkering, I found 3 actions that usually help me to get out of a rut.

Just take a nap

I would say that 50% of the time I am in a rut, it’s because I’m sleep deprived. Lacking sleep means less energy to do something, so, normally, motivation plummets.

In the book “Why We Sleep” by Matthew Walker, he explains that one of the insidious effects of sleep deprivation is that we fail to realize we are sleep deprived.

Even when you sleep 8 hours per night you might be sleep deprived. The amount of hours sleeping is important but the quality of sleep also matters a lot.

That’s why one of the best things you can do is to just take a nap. Researchers recommend it to be between 20 and 90 minutes long. You can experiment to see what works best for you. For me, it’s usually 30 minutes.

What happens after a nap is that I learn what my problem was. If I wake up with more energy and some motivation, then I would just be lacking sleep. But if I still feel like a depressed bag of flesh unable to do anything, then my problem is somewhere else.

Sleep is influenced by many things in our life like alcohol consumption, the food you eat, and the last thoughts you have before falling asleep. To improve your sleeping, try to eat healthy food and go to bed on an empty stomach. The best is to eat 4 hours before your bedtime so your body has time to digest.

It has also been proved that sleep improves your overall level of happiness. It makes your brain clearer and your decision-making process faster.

Do something

“Nobody ever got ready by waiting. You only get ready by doing” — John C. Maxwell

Anything.

Most of the time, action is the cause of motivation. Not the other way around. That’s why it’s so important to just keep moving.

You don’t need to do something insanely productive or hard. Start with something simple like cleaning the dishes, organizing your room, or clearing a few emails out of your inbox.

Let’s make that even easier. Just make your bed.

The idea behind this is to create momentum. Once you get the ball rolling, it’s easier to make it go faster. Action is the best remedy to a lack of motivation.

You won’t be doing those chores with a smile, but you’ll be doing them anyway. You’ll show your brain that you chose to do something instead of doing nothing. Just this simple truth will create some motivation for you to work with.

Tiny steps will eventually add up and become bigger and more meaningful. You just need to get started.

Remember your Why

“When you know your WHY, you can endure any HOW.” — Viktor Frankl

For me, this is the nuke option. If nothing else works then I will try this.

You need to ask yourself why you are doing all of this. What do you want to achieve? And why? We all have goals and expectations out of life.

You know you can’t reach those goals without doing anything. You need to act. So one of the most powerful triggers to motivate yourself is to remember why you are doing all of this.

Some days, I’m really tired. I work on my master’s degree at the same time as I’m creating a startup. I’m also learning German and reading one or more books per week at the same time.

When I’m in a rut I start to question if what I’m doing even makes sense. I’m not depressed but just questioning all of my life choices. I suspect we all do that from time to time.

But if I remember my why, then it becomes way easier to get started.

I’m doing all of this because I want to create a better future. I want to do my part in fighting the crisis to come, especially the climate one. I want to learn as much as I can to elevate my thoughts. I want to create a legacy I can be proud of.

Remembering why I’m doing all of this is the best way to motivate myself. Give it a try.

Takeaways

We all have highs and lows of motivation. We cannot always be at 100% of our potential. That’s life and we have to accept it.

Still, being in a rut isn’t just having low motivation. It’s being in a vicious cycle that can turn quite bad if we don’t get out of it.

Try these 3 actions to get out of a rut:

• Take a nap.
• Just do something.
• Remember your Why.

Also, don’t beat yourself up when productivity goes down or when you are in a rut. This won’t solve anything. Understand that going through these phases is part of life. And each time you do so, you learn something new about yourself.

That’s the essence of self-improvement.