How To Get Motivated for Change

New Year’s resolutions actually tap into a very strong human impulse to create start-over points in our lives and to use them to motivate improvements that we wish to incorporate into our regular lives.  Internet searches for items like “diet” and “gym” that may be prompted by a desire to do something healthy show increased activity around the first day …

Exercise and Depression

Exercise is more than just cardio Moderate exercise is associated with lower rates of depression, longer life and reduced cognitive impairment in a number of recent studies.  Evidence is accumulating that exercise is for more than just cardio-vascular health, and confers significant benefits at all stages of life. A 2019 observational study looked at exercise rates correlated with depression rates …

How to Increase Motivation

How can I make myself do better?  How can I get motivated to fulfill my resolutions and good intentions?  Motivation is something we all hope to get more of, but motivation to get out there and do the work is often elusive.  It’s easy to find people to give good advice, even MoodSurfing is full of good advice, but when …

How to Make a New Year’s Resolution Work

Are you contemplating a significant lifestyle change this year?  Quitting smoking for good, or really getting fit, not just losing a few pounds and gaining them back later? Research shows that making real changes in life is not just a matter of motivation, commitment, or not being “lazy”.  Change requires skills and knowledge that can be learned and applied for …

Motivating Healthy Behavior Changes

What is the most effective way of motivating healthy behavior changes? And how does medical practice best  take advantage of information about what motivates people to make positive changes? It should be obvious that just telling someone that a certain behavior is healthy is often not enough to motivate change. An article in the Journal of the American Medical Association Internal …

My Motivation Is Gone

Several of the people that I saw this week have been struggling with a loss of motivation. A lack of motivation can be one of the most prominent symptoms of a major depression, but there were other aspects of their loss of motivation that I found fascinating. I asked one of these patients, a man in his 40s who is …

The No Motivation Blues

Today, I met with a couple of women whose central concern was the fact that they felt a complete loss of motivation. One of these women is finishing graduate school. Only a few weeks away from graduating, she has found that she is not completing the assignments that she needs to in order to graduate. She knows that she can do …