Turn vague shoulds into musts using pain and pleasure wisely

Motivation often fails because the benefits are vague and far away, while the comfort of right now is warm and near. Prospect theory shows we feel losses more than gains, and temporal discounting makes future rewards seem small. The workaround is to make the pain of inaction vivid and the first step tiny.

A client had “I should write” on every list for two years. We rewrote it to “I must write because sharing stories helps people like me.” Then she ran a five‑minute regret drill: no writing for one year, five years, ten years. She pictured boxes of drafts yellowing in a closet and a career that looked the same. Her chest felt heavy. That feeling, not a pep talk, moved her.

We added a commitment device: she’d send $10 to a cause she disliked for every day she skipped opening her draft. Her phone buzzed each morning with a two‑minute cue to write a single paragraph. Most days she kept going because starting is the hard part. I might be wrong, but the combination of emotional leverage and tiny starts is the closest thing to reliable willpower I’ve seen.

Psychologically, you’re flipping the valence on change. You link action to immediate identity rewards and link inaction to near-term loss. You also lower the activation energy so the first step doesn’t trip your threat system. Over time, repeated starts become a habit, and habits do the heavy lifting that motivation can’t.

List five avoided shoulds, then rewrite each as a must with a personal reason that matters to you. Close your eyes for five minutes and picture the real cost of staying the same across one, five, and ten years so the loss feels present, then attach a simple commitment device like a small donation or a message to a buddy if you miss. Shrink the first action to something you can do in under two minutes and set a daily cue on your phone to trigger it. Let the first small win carry you forward and adjust only after a week of reps. Start with one must tonight.