Let’s face it, people do things for their own reasons and motives, no one else’s. But the key to self motivation is learning how other people do it. Therefore, I’ve listed as many ideas, techniques, tricks, and gimmicks that I’ve heard other students use (including a few of my own) to motivate themselves to “get started,” with the hopes that at least one idea will inspire you to do the same. Good luck.

Write or type up a paragraph of why it’s so important for you to succeed in college. Make it specific, measurable, visual, meaningful, critical to your well-being, and very personal. Then make several copies and put one in every notebook you own so you can see it. Read it every day in class before the professor arrives.

Reward yourself (something desirable) every time you’re able to study for 15 minutes straight without interruption (i.e., phone call, daydreaming, etc.). If you do allow yourself to be interrupted, you must now study for 30 minutes straight (without interruption) before you can receive a reward. Keep adding 15 minutes every time you allow yourself to be interrupted.

Every time you read a page in your textbook, imagine someone paying you a $1. Now imagine yourself needing “X” number of dollars for something you really want to buy. Stop reading when you feel you’ve earned enough to make the purchase.

Whenever you feel overwhelmed by the amount of material you have to read or study, focus only on one subheading or small section, and then read it like it’s the only thing that your professor is going to test you on. After you’re done, try reading another section the exact same way.

When you go to class, look for the oldest student in your class and remind yourself that if he or she can return to college after all of these years and do well, so can you.

Just before you’re ready to blow off studying, not begin an assignment, not read a necessary chapter, or just give up, imagine your worst enemy telling you that he or she knew you weren’t going to make it because you’re a quitter. Now, ask yourself, “What are you going to do about it?”

Imagine the worst job you’ve ever had in your life. Think about that job when every day seemed like a Monday, and you worked for a boss who gave you nightmares. Now imagine working that job forever if you don’t take college seriously.

Attend your college’s next honors’ convocation (a ceremony for all the students who made the Dean’s and President’s List). Then ask yourself, “Are they just better than I am?” If not, then prove it.

Regardless of your grades, pretend you’re failing every course, and you have to show God your report card at the end of the semester. Hint: He doesn’t accept excuses.

Pretend you are a Rhode Scholar or National Merit Scholar winner; now study, read, write, and test like you’re one.

The next time you’re assigned a class paper, whatever deadline date the professor gives, write down a date that is nine days earlier (and forget the actual date). From that point on, don’t ask anyone (including the professor) about the due date. If the due date is written in the syllabus, mark over it with a black marker until it’s illegible.

Whenever possible, right after class, stay in your seat when class is dismissed and start studying or writing a paper for another class for at least 30 minutes. This goes with the saying of “strike while the iron is hot.”

Go visit your dream job or dream company and ask for some of their brochures, pamphlets, and other marketing materials. Then cut out the pictures and place them on your refrigerator, bulletin board, mirror, notebook, etc., so you’ll think twice about being lazy or procrastinating.

During the semester break and/or the weekends, try to get yourself to get up in the morning as if you had an 8 a.m. class. Although painful, this will help you stay disciplined even when you don’t have to. Success can be habit forming, but so can laziness.

Before you go home for the day, call your answering machine as if you were calling to speak to yourself, and leave the following message:

“Hey (say your name), I just called to remind you to get off your butt and start studying (write paper, read, etc.). Now, I don’t want to hear any excuses from you. Remember, winners don’t whine, and whiners don’t win.”

Regardless of how much you have to study or read, only give yourself 30 minutes to complete all of it (set a timer). Now do whatever it takes to get your studying or reading done. After you’re done, congratulate yourself and try it again.

The next time you feel unmotivated, go to the student union or wherever other unmotivated students on your campus hang out and ask yourself, “Do I want to be like them?” If not, then ask yourself, “Why am I wasting my time like they are?”

Before you think about doing something that distracts you from school work, like making a telephone call, going to the gym, hanging with friends, going to the club or to a party, or whatever, get yourself to do something school-related first for 10 minutes (i.e., study, start a paper, read a chapter).

At the end of each school day, write down five good things that happened to you that are directly related to your progress in college.

Go out and buy a class ring with your anticipated graduation year engraved on it. Start wearing it and showing it to others.

When you make your next “To Do” list, start with two things you’ve already done, so you can cross them off the list immediately. This will give you a psychological edge.

Get a copy of your college Alumni newspaper or magazine and read about the accomplishments and achievements of past graduates. Start thinking about what you would want other undergraduates to read about you after you graduate.

Start writing a “Not To Do” list of things and activities you want to eliminate from your life (as a student) and give a copy of this list to your closest friends (especially your roommate). Ask them to help you “not” do those things.

Come up with one question a day for each of your professors as it relates to the subject matter or test. That means you must read or review something BEFORE you go to class in order to ask an intelligent question.

Pray to God every morning for energy, strength, persistence, and motivation to do the things you know you must do.

I hope that at least one of these ideas might help you get and stay self-motivated. Please share these ideas with a friend. Also, if you have any clever tricks and gimmicks of your own that you use to motivate yourself, please share them with us.

Thank you for visiting RealWorld University, where success is the only major! Please drop by again. God bless and live purposefully!

What is procrastination? Most students describe it as putting something off until the last minute. My personal definition of procrastination is “a justification for lack of motivation.”

No one is immune to procrastination. Even some of our greatest leaders procrastinated about something (i.e., spending time with their family, exercising, smoking, eating properly, etc.).

The key is not eliminating procrastination, which is idealistic, but rather learning how to manage it, which is realistic.

When it comes to managing tasks, all things are “not” created equal. Before we can manage procrastination, we have to come to grips with the things that we can and can’t afford to procrastinate on. That’s right, some things can be put off until the last minute, just not every thing. It comes down to priorities, the panacea for procrastination.

Ask yourself, what things do I normally procrastinate on? Is it studying, writing papers, eating properly, reading, completing assignments, meeting with my professor, exercising, sending out resumes, breaking off a bad relationship? All are legitimate things that need to be done, but if you had to rank them in order of importance, what would your list look like? And in this particular scenario, don’t do what most college students would do, which is prioritize their time according to urgency (i.e., the nearest deadline).

When prioritizing tasks, you first must have a clear picture of your ultimate destination (i.e., goals) and what you want to accomplish; then you prioritize your tasks accordingly. The danger with prioritizing your tasks based on deadlines, is that everything will become emergency in your life.

Prioritizing your time is preventive maintenance, which prevents the frequent occurrence of emergencies. If you don’t believe me, think about the last time you were assigned a term paper or any other writing assignment. When the professor gave you the assignment six weeks ago, did you begin the assignment six weeks ago? How about six days before the assignment was due? What about six hours? I think you get my point.

Nevertheless, you eventually turned in the assignment regardless of how little time you allowed yourself to complete it. In retrospect, if you would have given that assignment top priority, and began to break down the project in little chunks, that term paper wouldn’t have seen so frightening the night before it was due. Why do we put ourselves through so much trauma? Because we are content on following the crowd and tradition. We say things like, “Everyone I know put off things until the last minute; I’ve made it this far putting things off until the last minute; for goodness sake, I usually perform better under pressure.”

Stop fooling yourself; would you want a surgeon to put off preparing for delicate operation that could possibly save your life? Would you want the college to put off making a decision that could determine whether or not you will graduate on time? Would you want a potential employer to procrastinate on making a decision to offer you your dream job? Of course not.

So, let’s get you off the loser’s limp procrastination treadmill. Try this during the next week, and let me know what happens.

First, list every role task that you have to perform this semester (i.e., as a student, organization/club member, employee, friend, etc. — not brushing your teeth and bathing) Consider some of the items I listed earlier.

Second, prioritize them (1 being the highest), not according to deadlines, but rather as essential tasks in pursuing your overall goals (i.e., graduate with a 3.0, get two job offers, etc.).

Third, do first things first in the order that you listed. That’s it.

Continue to stop by RealWorld University because we will offer even more information and insights on this topic and others. We’ll be bringing you information, ideas, and strategies from some of the world’s leading experts in the field. We believe that experience may be a good teacher, but other people’s experience is a better teacher. Our motto at RWU is, “The key to wisdom is knowing where to look for the answers.” Thanks for dropping by RealWorld University, and remember to live purposefully.

God bless!

I hope you will find comfort in the fact that almost every student goes through this phase, even the ones you think don’t have a problem at all getting and staying motivated. Remember, as a college professor, I’ve talked to thousands of students; they tell me things they would never confess to you. But I digress.

Anyway, are you tired of motivation that lasts for only one school year, only one semester, or for some of you, only one test? Are you tired of being “motivationally challenged”? Well, here’s something you can do to re-kindle that passion in your life. Now, don’t get me wrong, this won’t make you enjoy college any better (hey, I’m not a miracle worker), but it will definitely help you stay motivated through the journey of academia. I talk about it extensively in my book, “Tricks of the Grade” (hint hint), but for now, I’ll give you the short course on motivation.

Before I outline some specific steps for you to take, there’s a couple of things you need to know about this thing called “motivation.”

First, no one can motivate you. Saying that won’t help my speaking career, but it’s the truth. There’s only type of motivation, and that’s “self motivation.” Other people may get us excited about doing things, but ultimately, we do things for our own reasons, not somebody else’s. Even when you were a child, your parents may have threatened you to do things, but you still had a choice whether or not to suffer the consequences. Hopefully you didn’t have to, but if you did, thank God you’re still living to talk about it and you’re not my mama’s child.

Second, the key to motivation is finding out what motivates you internally, not externally. Often times you hear people who are driven by money. That’s okay, but money doesn’t always last, and even if you achieve it, it won’t ever be enough. Eventually, you could end up ostracizing yourself from the people you love the most if money is the only thing that motivates you. As for college, if money does it for you, by all means, use it and change it after you graduate. Sometimes it’s better to be motivated for the wrong reasons than not to be motivated at all.

So here are five easy, but serious, steps you can take to get yourself out of that college rut and onto the college fast track to graduation:

1. Establish a strong, compelling, personal “WHY” for being in college.

This is the most important step in getting and staying motivated. Remember, there’s only one type of motivation and that’s self-motivation. There is no such thing as a right or wrong “WHY” (i.e., to attain a certain salary upon graduation); there are only strong and weak ones. Consider some of the following weak “WHYs” I’ve heard from students on why they’re in college:

“My mother made me go.”

“I was expected to go.”

“My dad said that it was either this or get a job.”

“I couldn’t think of anything else better to do, so I decided to try the college thing.”

“I wanted to be with my friends so we could pledge together.”

“I’m here so I can figure out what I want to do with my life.”

“Man, I’m here to meet the babes.”

Also, understand that “to get a degree or to graduate” can be considered a weak why because almost everybody is in college to graduate. You need a why that is strong enough to help you endure boring classes, boring professors, irrelevant courses, unfair professors, being broke, confusing tests, etc. If your why doesn’t give you the extra push to endure these things, even if you get motivated, you won’t stay motivated. Trust me, I know.

2. Write or type out your “WHY STATEMENT.”

If it’s not written down, it’s not real. This might be the most important assignment you’ll ever do in college.

3. Test your why statement by asking yourself these three questions:

Am I willing to do whatever it takes to make this a reality? Am I willing to pay the price with blood, sweat, and tears to graduate?

Am I willing to take the garbage that comes along with the college experience?

If you want to, you can E-mail me your why statement, and I will give you suggestions and tips on making it stronger and more compelling.

4. Ask yourself, did I answer the previous three questions honestly and blamelessly? (If no, find another “why.”)

5. Put your why statement in a place (your notebook) that you can read it at least once a week (preferably Mondays). The key to motivation is finding, accepting, and pursuing a strong purpose for doing what you’re doing. If you’re uncertain on why you’re doing a task, your commitment to that task will also be uncertain. You get motivated by determining your reason for a degree; you stay motivated by committing to that reason.

Want more help? Continue to stop by RealWorld University because we will offer even more information and insights on this topic and others. We’ll bring you information, ideas, and strategies from some of the world’s leading experts in the field. We believe that experience may be a good teacher, but other people’s experience is a better teacher. Our motto at RWU is, “The key to wisdom is knowing where to look for the answers.” Thanks for dropping by RealWorld University. Come back soon, and tell a friend. Remember to live purposefully.