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The original was posted on /r/getmotivated by /u/catboy519 on 2023-12-16 20:55:44+00:00.
As a result from burnout I have been procrastinating things for 2 years, even urgent important ones, so now my todo list is a giant todo list.
The psychological problem is: when my list gets bigger, I get less motivated to work on it. My goal is to have a (nearly) empty todo list once again, achieving this would be very rewarding and it is my main motivation to do the things on it in the first place. But knowing that it will take longer than a year to get it all done, and that is IF i can be productive..... makes me unmotivated.
This is called "delay discounting". Getting a reward today is psychologically more valuable than getting it next year. My subconscious thinks that achieving an empty todo list is a low value reward because it is so far into the future and I dont even know when/if I will achieve if. So this is why I feel very unmotivated to work on my tasks in the first place.
Self-rewarding wouldn't work for me. First of all I don't know what kind of reward I could give myself, second I would probably just cheat it and give myself the "reward" thing anyway because I have no self control. The only way a reward system could work for me is if its impossible for me to cheat it. But I dont know who could reward me in which way, lol.
So is there any way for me to feel more motivated to do the tasks on my todo list? Yes, obviously I know that achieving that great feeling of having done all of my list is 100% worth the effort, but my subconscious just disagrees with that because that amazing moment is so far into the future.