How do you keep yourself motivated?
Motivation or willpower is not an infinite resource. It's much like a muscle that can get tired. Especially in the entrepreneurial journey, you will sometimes lose sight of the end-goal.
How do you recharge yourself in those situations?
As for me, I listen to motivational podcasts, audio, and watch shows/movies that motivate me (October sky, The Social Network, Silicon Valley, Money Ball).
An increase of the subscriber count in my newsletter https://explodingniches.com also gets me excited. I will probably make a live convertkit subscriber counter using a raspberry pi and hang it on the wall :D
My latest hack is to "just make 1 small improvement" each day. That can be something as small as fixing a spacing issue or as large as implementing a new landing page. But I find that the hard part for me is just starting. Once I start on that 1 small thing... it expands and I get into flow. That flow state is what keeps me engaged.
Works great for me as well. As long as I achieve 1 small improvement per day I'm super motivated to keep going.
Couldn't agree more. Curious how you go about the accountability and feedback sessions. Are these just close friends you keep in touch with here and there or is it more of a structured, on the calendar event every 2 weeks? This is very beneficial for me but I find it difficult to stay consistent with it.
Accountability: Explicitly reached out to a fellow indie hacker who is in a similar boat to me. We meet every 2 weeks or so to give each other feedback / updates on our products (with additional IM updates in-between if nece.)
Feedback: Ideally these should be coming from existing customers, but anyone else other than yourself is a start ;)
I prefer mindset over motivation. Because we all know what stays in long term
This is a good philosophy.
Don't rely on motivation or willpower.
My way is:
I haven't achieved it so i keep going.
Is it like an automatic thing?
Exploding Niches? Like Exploding Topics?
Seems like studying exploding niches is also an exploding niche in itself!
To answer the question, this will sound extreme to a lot of people...
But I cut out everything that can even remotely distract me.
No video games, no music, no friends, no car, no nothing!
At the end of the day, boredom will take over, and I'll be working on my startup Zlappo just to avoid the sheer emptiness of my day.
It's a good idea. I know that boredom can act as a catalyst for creative thoughts
4 month ago my first son was born, now he is my biggest motivation.
I understand :)
I do shorter feedback loops. Specifically: break work apart into smaller projects, and put these small increments out into the world sooner. Search out Tiago Forte's work & PARA framework. Very helpful frame of mind and productivity framework.
Sounds interesting! I will definitely look into it.
This comment was deleted 5 years ago
I will definitely read about OKRs.