I'm not an expert or anything at this but I have appreciated the Atomic Habits book where switching your brain's focus to trying something for 5 minutes eventually overcomes the barrier to not doing it.
I was considering supporting anti-charities (e.g. NRA, DNC etc..), but I thought that was unnecessarily distracting.
iE1 (body recomp): calorie counting app, tracking everything that goes in, including hydration + sleep, go into an optimized sports programme and give it all I got, keep an eye on optimal macro/micro, applying social pressure on myself... and so on, everything that might have an impact + preplanned schedules and optimized convenience factors to do the right thing, right from the start. After a few weeks, I just stop it. Doing unhealthy stuff again, ignoring all tracking/notes/plans/appointments and even handwaive the social pressure. Also initial investment (sometimes quite significant) = money factor is just something I shrug off in that mood.
iE2 (building software): I have a good enough idea, sometimes even things I really desperately want for myself. I have a vast toolset of mastered tech stacks at my hands I can use right away, can setup good implementation plans, start with shipping "hello world" to production first (me being a devops many years) and iterate quickly. Also include customer journeys and marketing key points right off the gate. Code written to my personal high standards including full testsuites/coverage, clean component libraries, whatever fits, and also keeping an eye on security and performance. I don't even have to worry much about any expensive hosting/operations costs at all at this point. Still after 2 weeks max, I abandon the project... quite often with a working state that actually is good and usable (most MVPs are in a worse state, as they should).
Its like no matter what I do, there are zero issues for me to research a thing and jumpstart doing it the right (as in: best effort research that looks like actually working) way, and then just stopping it after some time for no particular reason. Somehow my brain just can't be forced for an extended amount of time.
Being aware of that, I also tried several things that are recommended to build up discipline, from atomic habits of different flavors to gratefulnes diaries, so far nothing worked. To give you an idea: I am not able to brush my teeth every single morning/evening as a man in my 30s, its more like 5 out of 7 days roughly. Also I have no attention shortages and can comfortably read a full book cover-to-cover nonstop, meditate or keep the focus of a full-day meeting on track with multiple persons in the room trying to derail.
If someone truly had a solution that works in my case, I'd pay a high premium for that with a smiling face. So far, only failures, and a hopeless me.
> Also I have no attention shortages and can comfortably read a full book cover-to-cover nonstop, meditate or keep the focus of a full-day meeting on track with multiple persons in the room trying to derail.
In mentioning this, it sounds like you're addressing that it's probably not adhd, but I'd gently mention that these don't disqualify adhd quite as much as you might think.
I'm not 100% sure what you mean by no attention shortages, but the desire for novelty within systems and not just any given moment (eg. I can start a system but always lose it) is common for many of us Now kids. :)
Reading a book cover to cover is an example of hyperfocus, and adhd trait.
Crushing a full day of meetings with many people trying to derail is actually an adhd superpower imho. It's that when we're BORED we're super distractable, but when we're putting out fires, and it's go go go we can do very well.
I don't know you well, and I'm also working on making tools for this space (super early tho) but I'd recommend perhaps getting tested, because the right medication changes peoples LIVES. Search reddit for stories. Days when I'm on adderall vs not are hugely different. Good luck to you and thanks for sharing.
Here's my advice, it's simple. Keep a streak in Duolingo, it'll remind you. I like the Android widget too. I do maybe one minute of work daily to keep my streak and at least for me it's the cornerstone habit I've then added other stuff over time. Once I had a small streak built up I went to the gym every day to either walk or run and when I ran I just did exactly what the couch to 5k app told me to do. When I was walking, I did duolingo. Self reinforcing.
Being able to run 3 5k's a week by the last week I no longer have problems basically exactly like you described. Or if I do, it's not nearly as egregious as it once was. The only trick for me at least was to just do exactly what I was told. It ramps up and I just never stopped before I was told to.
Key takeaway is that your body and brain are malleable and will adapt. Hope this or something like it helps!
1. Were you just so hungry that you didn't want to stick with it anymore? What was your daily calorie deficit?
2. Did you enjoy your sports program or was it a chore to do?
2) the usual dopamine loop seemed to work for me here, like the workout itself was intense (nearly fainting after lifting sometimes), feeling a small high afterwards, and even enjoyed the DOMS 2 days after proudly, also helped noticeably in stress reduction to move (accumulated over sets) a few tons of iron. had a kind of personal coach (even though shared with others when I didn't need him) and felt well in my gym environment - everything on point. After a while, I stopped going for no particular reason.