Are You Waiting for Motivation? (yawn)

A common problem a client brings to your therapist is lack of motivation. “If only I felt like cleaning my house…”, “I just can’t get myself to the gym”, “I know I should be working on that project but I find every reason not to do it.” Lack of motivation can be a symptom of depression, yes. Others turn inward and call themselves lazy. Yet others wonder if their level of fatigue is to blame. Could it be their thyroid, perimenopause, testosterone deficiency, anemia?  

It could be any of these ailments. Your therapist might want you to even get yourself checked out. But your therapist secretly knows it’s most likely that you are over-stretched. Our society normalizes and even celebrates exhaustion and busyness. We have all seen the memes about mommies needing their coffee to wake up and their wine to wind down. We have created the verb to adult when joking how much of a struggle life can feel like during your day-to-day. How being a functional adult is pushing us past our limits. We live in a country that is capitalist-driven. The American dream can be yours if you work harder than your competitor. Being busy is an expectation and yet we are surprised by our exhaustion. 

Both men and women have more on their plates in terms of expectations. In the 50’s the traditional household had a division of labor. The husband put his energy and time into work and maybe weekend yardwork and the wife reared the children and took care of the home. We have evolved in a positive direction with the rise of women’s equality but our expectations never changed. The wife is permitted (and usually expected) to work. The husband is expected to be more involved in parenting. Chores are split at home. But what happened to the division of labor in the home? The answer is that both partners are expected to do everything. And well. Women should work full-time and progress in their careers while being 100% involved in their parenting. Similarly, husbands should be working and on the School Board as well as driving kids to sporting events on the weekends. 

So we are left with a generation of high achieving, exhausted adults who feel they are running slower than the rest of the herd and want to know what’s wrong with them. Your therapist will check in on your busyness and expectations. She will inquire about self-care. Most of the time our clients tell us, in one way or another, that they can’t stop to fill up the gas tank because they are driving 100 miles an hour and feel they can’t slow down. Your therapist will try to get you to see the irony there. 

She also sees all the things you do every day for which you likely don’t have motivation. You weren’t motivated to go grocery shopping. You weren’t really feeling like taking your car to the shop for an oil change. It wasn’t motivation that got you to brush your teeth and go to work. Your therapist knows that you only have so much energy in a day. You first use your energy for what you perceive to be your “musts”. Work, dropping kids off, grocery shopping, going through the drive-through for supper. Our clients are complaining of lacking motivation to do even more after they have used up their energy.  

As a prescriber, I often have patients seeking help with their energy resources. If I have ADHD, that might account for my lack of motivation and amphetamine might give me a kick to do more through the day. Maybe I’m depressed and that’s why I can’t find time to clean my house after work and being a single parent. Could it be Chronic Fatigue Syndrome that is bringing me down to only functioning as a regular human and not a super-human.

Your therapist knows that you might just be overdoing it.  

Feel better, y’all!