Motivation Wears Off. Here’s What I Do Each Morning.

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“People often say that motivation doesn’t last. Well, neither does bathing. That’s why we recommend it daily.”

Zig Ziglar

My first rule is focus on what you control and I forget it often.

Roughly 80% of my anxiety comes from losing sight of this. So I read my rules each morning and most nights.

In the 1880s a German psychologist named Hermann Ebbinghaus measured how fast what we learn wears off. He used himself as a test subject. He memorized lists of nonsense syllables and tested himself hours and days later.

A day later, most of the syllables were gone.

Each time he relearned them, they came back faster and stayed longer. In 1885 he published his results as the forgetting curve in his book Memory.

Reading my rules each morning is how I remember them.

Motivation and inspiration wear off too. So revisit your goals and your reasons for chasing them daily.

A shower keeps me clean for about a day. My rules last about as long before I need to remind myself of them again.

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What hard-won lesson should you revisit each day?