no power to the valley
"This will never go anywhere. I’ll never be able to do this."
Starting a project, building a habit, learning something new — at first, it’s easy. Motivation is high and progress comes fast.
But then the excitement fades. Progress slows. You get inconsistent. Eventually, you stop — even though it felt like the best idea ever just last week.
The real problem isn’t ability.
It’s sticking to it long enough to get through that Valley of Despair, where all the effort seems pointless. It’s trusting the process and staying consistent.
I don’t have a magical solution for solving that - and there probably isn’t one.
What I do have is a simple solution to keep you honest, track your motivation, visualise your valley and help you stay consistent, even when things get tough.
How it works
Simple: You start with your big project, why it matters and what you will gain from sticking to it every single day - even if you end up giving up on it one day.
Then you break it down into your regular activities, set yourself some checkpoints along the way to track progress, all the standard stuff.
Now we build habits: what are the tiniest steps you could take to ensure you at least get into position to work on your project every day (e.g. do a single pushup, sit down in front of the piano, open Squarespace). If you at least manage that much, your streak is still going and you still care.
Finally, visualising your Valley of Despair: every day, think about how motivated you were to work on your project. What did it feel like to wake up in the morning and thinking about it? And if you did work on it, did you get more or less motivated while doing so?
Rate your motivation from 0-10 and track it. There will be dips and tips, but you’ll notice a trend - and when you do, you’ll know when to shut down that voice inside your head!
