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I'm Losing Motivation to Shower

Sondae

Fapstronaut
Just a year ago, I was becoming the best man that I could be.

Aside from the obvious porn addiction being my only major problem, I was doing wonderfully. I had recently come off of a 60-pound weight loss, began growing out my hair, remarkably improved my hygiene, and focused intensely on my hobbies. One year later, I have lost most of the motivation required to do these things. Although I am annoyed by my refusal to engage with my hobbies (making music, baking, reading, etc.), I am much more concerned about my recent neglect of my hygiene.

I find it oddly difficult to strike up the motivation to shower. I used to have a good routine; I would shower immediately after getting home from work every evening. However, that routine has all but disappeared. I no longer have a schedule. I shower whenever I can muster up the motivation, or only when I am scared of smelling bad around my peers. I rarely shower at night anymore in exchange for rushed morning showers before I leave for my shift or class. During the Summer, I couldn't get by with this quite as easily since I was sweating all day. However, the cold seasons has me unafraid to skip showers for as much as three days. I would say I only shower and average of three times a week now.

Now, I know all of the specific showering tips such as "don't shampoo your hair every day" and all that. Even if you don't think it is necessary to shower every day, it is still something that undeniably makes you feel good, winds you down, and keeps you happy. I personally think showering at least every other day is ideal, but I usually only skip showers out of laziness and a lack of motivation rather than for specific health reasons.

So, what are some solutions? How can I muster the motivation and get back into a solid showering schedule? Has anyone else experienced a similar situation? If you have any advice or personal experiences you would like to share, please do so! I would love to hear what you guys have to say :)
 
I think the first thing to do here is identify if you were truly motivated. I'm not saying you weren't, in fact I believe you were, but motivation is a tricky thing. I can't remember who said it (I think it was David Goggins) but I heard that motivation is fleeting, merely a short term or temporary but strong urge or desire to do something. Motivation can also be very surface level, I want to do this to do it, and it doesn't necessarily have any underlying reasoning.

This is why I asked if you were truly motivated. If you were feeling the motivation to do it you just wanted to do it, but that alone isn't good enough for long term success.

What you need to focus on is being driven. Find a long term goal that you wish to achieve. Don't just think "I want to shower today to feel better and be clean" think "If I don't shower (Or do any number of things today to better myself and prepare for long term success) when I get home, how will this negatively impact my future?"

Motivation is enough to get you through the short term, but once you motivate yourself and achieve your immediate goal, then what? You need to set yourself up for long term success.


For me, I want to learn several foreign languages so that I can travel and communicate and better myself. If I get motivated one morning and study, once that session is over I feel accomplished in completing my goal, but I lose the long term goal. That rush from achieving a goal is great, but it's hard to build up the motivation again when I have already experienced the reward and I lose sight of my end goal. This leads to lackluster results because I don't keep up with my studies.


Set up goalposts that you can reach, but that take effort. That's why many people on here set up 90 day goals. It takes time and effort to reach, so they must have long term drive to get there, but it is still attainable so you can enjoy the excitement of overcoming your challenges without fatiguing.


With all this out of the way, from2003 is also spot on, sometimes you just have to do it anyways.


Hope this helps.
 
I think the first thing to do here is identify if you were truly motivated. I'm not saying you weren't, in fact I believe you were, but motivation is a tricky thing. I can't remember who said it (I think it was David Goggins) but I heard that motivation is fleeting, merely a short term or temporary but strong urge or desire to do something. Motivation can also be very surface level, I want to do this to do it, and it doesn't necessarily have any underlying reasoning.

This is why I asked if you were truly motivated. If you were feeling the motivation to do it you just wanted to do it, but that alone isn't good enough for long term success.

What you need to focus on is being driven. Find a long term goal that you wish to achieve. Don't just think "I want to shower today to feel better and be clean" think "If I don't shower (Or do any number of things today to better myself and prepare for long term success) when I get home, how will this negatively impact my future?"

Motivation is enough to get you through the short term, but once you motivate yourself and achieve your immediate goal, then what? You need to set yourself up for long term success.


For me, I want to learn several foreign languages so that I can travel and communicate and better myself. If I get motivated one morning and study, once that session is over I feel accomplished in completing my goal, but I lose the long term goal. That rush from achieving a goal is great, but it's hard to build up the motivation again when I have already experienced the reward and I lose sight of my end goal. This leads to lackluster results because I don't keep up with my studies.


Set up goalposts that you can reach, but that take effort. That's why many people on here set up 90 day goals. It takes time and effort to reach, so they must have long term drive to get there, but it is still attainable so you can enjoy the excitement of overcoming your challenges without fatiguing.


With all this out of the way, from2003 is also spot on, sometimes you just have to do it anyways.


Hope this helps.

This is actually really good advice, especially the points about motivation disappearing once you have that sense of accomplishment on the first day. This is definitely my biggest problem. Every time I accomplish something, it is born of a short burst of motivation that doesn't stay around long enough to be useful later on. I feel as if overcoming that smaller problem is the key to helping me unlock this drive that you speak of. Thanks man
 
This is actually really good advice, especially the points about motivation disappearing once you have that sense of accomplishment on the first day. This is definitely my biggest problem. Every time I accomplish something, it is born of a short burst of motivation that doesn't stay around long enough to be useful later on. I feel as if overcoming that smaller problem is the key to helping me unlock this drive that you speak of. Thanks man
Glad I could help, keep fighting the good fight king !
 
Too real?

I don't know about him, but to me personally I agree with most of what you said. Being a man you often have to do things just to do them, even though they suck and you might not have the desire to complete the task at hand. However, I think the conversation got derailed at

"I'm actually really sick of people complaining about motivation.

Grow up. You need to be told to shower? That's pathetic."

It went from positive and useful to you complaining. I'm not here to argue if you're right or wrong with what you said, but the fact of the matter is it wasn't entirely pertinent to the conversation and didn't add anything.

That's just my guess as to what he might mean.
 
If this is your go-to response, then you do not belong on these forums.

I thought about what I said, and It may have come off harsh.
But listen to the latest Joe Rogan interview with Goggins.
He always says it "I stare at those running shoes and i just don't want to go run" but he does it.
You.may never want to shower, just do it anyways man. Good luck
 
I thought about what I said, and It may have come off harsh.
But listen to the latest Joe Rogan interview with Goggins.
He always says it "I stare at those running shoes and i just don't want to go run" but he does it.
You.may never want to shower, just do it anyways man. Good luck


You're absolutely right, and for my part I believe that I interpreted it harsher than it was meant.


Good luck to you too!
 
At first i thought this topic was kind of odd but the more i think about it i realise that for some reason, at least in my experience, young boys are not the biggest fans of taking showers. Is it solely unmotivation that hampers you. I have to tell my son every day to take a shower. He fights me on it almost everyday. My daughter on the other hand would take 3 showers a day if we let her.

The real reason why i responded though was to share my grandmas good ol country wisdom. Anytime im feeling tired and perhaps sluggish about taking a shower, i think about my grandmas old saying - "Anytime you can smell yourself, others have already been smelling you for 3 days". I promise you that even skipping one day of a good shower, especially as a man, that others will smell you. My wife could smell a fart 3 houses down. I have come to realize that i don't have the best sense of smell but my wifes smell is extremely keen. Even if you don't think so others around you may have very sensitive smelling.

We also have a saying in our house about showers. "You'll feel better once you do" showers are like free medicine. Especially on a website like this where the benefits of showers are widely known.
 
Asking you @Sondae, what would help you shower every day?

From my experience, you definitely do need to have a “just do it” mentality and eventually things do become habitual and easier mentally.

However, the loss of motivation for things in general sounds like something bigger is going on. It seems like you’ve made some tremendous progress in your life so far with things. How long ago do you feel this lack of motivation began?

Don’t be down on yourself though. Sometimes the next step in our journey is to face our shadows. It might seem like you backslid but in reality it is you facing a pattern/program that you are ready to resolve and move past from. Growth happens in mysterious ways
 
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