Dunno how else to call it. Got me a job. It’s not a bad job. I like the work I do, I tolerate the people there, the hours are not long, it’s unionised so they can’t harrass me when I’m off the clock, it pays the bills I got.
… But god damn. Once I’m home I lack the drive to do literally anything.
I’ve stopped going to gym, I often eat junk cuz I just don’t wanna cook, even my hobbies are being left to gather dust. After working my 9-to-5 I just wanna lie down and rot until it’s work time again.
So the question is, how do the better-adjusted adults handle this?
There’s a good dozen of great suggestions in the comments here for tips to sort out various things like cooking, etc. (I have saved a few for myself later).
So instead I’ll offer some meta advice for making these things feel effortless:
Look at the additional activities you want to add on to your day before/after work and figure out what is the most effortless way to trigger starting one activity when the previous one ends.
For example, back in April I wanted to start going to the gym regularly so I did three things: put together a gym bag with enough sets of gym clothes for the week’s exercise, keep that gym bag in my car, and joined a gym as close to my place of work as possible.
By doing this I was able to build “going to the gym” into my commute home from work. I have managed to keep up the habit of three gym sessions a week since then (with the occasional miss due to illness or other life events getting in the way).
I struggled all my life with something so basic; remembering to brush my teeth both in the morning and at night. So what I did last year was use the IKEA peg board thing and found some holders for my toothbrush and toothpaste. That pegboard is right next to my bedroom door so I have to walk past my toothbrush whenever I leave the room as a visual trigger to go brush my teeth.
Think about how you can position physical reminders in your space to do the activities you want to do.
Or use your phone’s calendar/to do list app of your choice to book in reminders to nudge you into getting started.
Whenever I’m feeling tired but there’s a task that needs doing I ask myself “will this take five minutes or less?”. If the answer is yes, then I just do it there and then.
If it’s something that will take more than five minutes to complete to 100% then I say to myself “ok I’m tired but I’m just going to do five minutes of it and see how I’m feeling then”. This works out great for the gym example. Today on the way home from work I was knackered but I told myself to just do the five minutes as the bare minimum. Once I’d done a few minutes of exercise I felt like I was achieving and then pushed past the five minutes for a good 30 minutes before deciding that was enough for today.
And yes, there have been days when I literally just did the five minutes and stopped. But that didn’t matter, because I still completed what I set as the bare minimum. Those minimums still get me closer to my goals and therefore they’re still a win. So long as I’m getting just one more of these little wins over losing (i.e. not going to the gym) then the progress keeps stacking and the good habit continues to form.