Experiencing problems with motivating yourself to study? Have a big test next week but still not picking up your books yet? Does thinking about studying make you feel turned off?
If you feel this way, then welcome to the club. Most of us have experienced difficulty in motivating ourselves to study. It doesn’t matter if you’re currently a student or an adult who is picking up new knowledge, everyone experiences this.
Fortunately, if you are able to combine determination and willpower with the study motivation tips below, you can easily get yourself motivated about studying.
1. Set a schedule and study at the right time. Set a study schedule everyday. It’s good to plan your day in advance. Set a specific time for studying, and a time for playing or relaxing. This way, you won’t worry about ‘missing’ your fun. You may be studying hard now, but you know that later on you’ll be enjoying yourself. So this keeps you focused on studying in the present.
2. Use the 5 minute principle. The motive of the 5 minute principle is to get things started. To get the ball rolling. In anything that you do, the first step is always the hardest. Once you have some momentum, it becomes easy to maintain the drive.
To help yourself get started, this is what you can do, whenever you’re not motivated to start studying, just plan to study for 5 minutes. That’s it, just 5 minutes. Tell yourself that you’ll be studying seriously for 5 minutes then you’ll stop.
What will happen is that after those 5 minutes of intense and serious studying, you would have already gained serious momentum and probably can’t stop yourself from studying. You will feel more compelled to continue studying rather than stop studying.
3. End and re-start at fun and interesting parts. Whenever you have to stop your study session, such as to take a bath, to eat some food, to run an errand etc, deliberately stop at the part of the subject that is more interesting. This makes getting back to studying much easier and also keeps your motivation levels up throughout the time when you are away from the books.
4. Remove distractions. As much as possible, try to remove the possible distractions as far away from you as possible. Let’s face it, if the TV remote is right in front of you, you’re more likely to turn on the TV. If you study on the bed, it’s like giving yourself a free invitation to take a nap. Make it as difficult as possible for these distractions to get to you. If your bedroom is at the other end of the house, you will be less likely to walk the ‘long’ journey across the house just for a nap.
5. Set study goals. People will naturally be more motivated whenever there is a target to aim at. If you set study goals, you will be determined rise up to the challenge and push yourself to reach those goals. The satisfaction that you get from meeting those study goals will drive you to want to study even more and set even higher goals.
