A Commitment Device

Across language learning, company building, and any kind of creative project, there is a dip. The Dip is the long stretch between beginner’s luck and real accomplishment.

Extraordinary benefits accrue to the tiny minority of people who are able to push just a tiny bit longe...

Motivation is “the reason or reasons one has for acting or behaving in a particular way,” or rephrased, “the general desire or willingness of someone to do something.”

• Maintain your sense of Expectancy in the project using small wins and accomplishments.
• Reward yourself.
• Maintain a sense of value by finding a way to remind yourself of the bigger picture of the small, everyday bouts of effort.
• Build positive habits.
• Find flow...

The biggest problem we face with completing our projects isn’t productivity**or time management, but motivation management**.

When you’re sufficiently motivated to accomplish something, you’ll move heaven and earth to do it.

In any goal that has to be accomplished, there is a Start. It usually gets overlooked, as it's always there.

The Start is a much bigger problem since you can’t reach The Dip if you don’t get through The Start, and many more people fantasize about doing something than actually do it and give...

Set small, incremental goals that are sufficiently exciting to be motivating and for which you have a reasonable expectation of completing.

• Increase your reason to start a project, by increasing the value of starting it.
• Increase your expectancy of succeeding at that project.
• Decrease your reasons to delay, by increasing urgency, using a deadline.