Keeping motivated

Work ruts are the worst and motivation is low. I've found myself in a slump and now I recognise what I need to do in order to get out of it.

Brixton

Hooligan snap cap

DANIEL w. FLETCHER

Bold Stripe Pyjama shirt

DANIEL w. FLETCHER

Side Stripe Tailored Trousers

DANIEL w. FLETCHER

Striped Drawing t-shirt

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The thing I’ve realised since turning freelance is that nobody else is going to motivate you. You only have yourself to urge you to get up in the mornings, meet deadlines, keep on top of everything and keep progressing. I’ve returned back from America feeling reinvigorated to improve and better myself. I’ve been thinking a lot recently of the bigger picture and what I want to achieve in life in this relatively new career landscape where it’s not as straightforward as annual targets and office promotions. I’m in a position where working for yourself is the ceiling and it’s about how I challenge myself to accomplish more is where the reward ultimately comes in.

There have been times this year where I’ve felt quite stagnant. Producing imagery and blog posts that don’t excite me and not putting the time in to make something better than expected. Of course, this is okay at times and we can’t always achieve above and beyond, but now that I’m conscious of my lack of creativity, it’s time to try and change this in order to ‘progress’. On occasions throughout this year quite a few projects have fallen through where I’ve mentally banked it as a certain job. It sucks. When I decided to give freelancing a go I think it would have been very naive of me to believe everything would fall into place and that there wouldn’t be setbacks, yet sometimes moments like these can cause you to become content in the box you have been placed in.

Negative thoughts can begin to settle when work runs dry. This is when I need motivation more than ever. I’m at the stage I feel where work is steady, but not constant.

As someone who likes to complete things ahead of deadline and always be busy, I sometimes end up with half a day free because I’ve finished everything. There have been times this year where I’ve had weeks where work has been non-existent and I’ve had to motivate myself to think of ways to keep myself busy. I feel that these times are the hardest. If nothing is coming in, I can be quick to think the worst. To be busy at the ‘level’ I’m at would be unreasonable, but still, nobody likes twiddling thumbs amongst this I’m so busy culture.

Now I’ve realised that the time I do have left in the day I should be spending it planning, learning and making active steps, both big and small, to keep moving forward. I do have ambitions and goals I’d like to achieve, but I’ve been very quick to ignore them and just get by with blogging. I want to freelance more, I want to take photos more for others and I want to start creating on other platforms.

Just yesterday I watched a video by my friends India and Magnus about time and how it is the most important commodity. They are so right. We are unable to gain more time and should in-turn focus on how we should utilise it while we have it. Give time to understand what you want to do in life and then spend the rest of it ultimately achieving those goals. I’ve finally come around to the mindset of if you want to get something, go get it and put the work in.jbicon

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