Motivation Is a Liar.
Here’s how to win without it.
Everyone loves to talk about motivation. It’s become the go-to answer for anyone chasing a goal.
Want to get in shape? Stay motivated.
Want to build a business? Get motivated.
Want to change your life? Just find your “why” and light the fire inside you.
The internet is flooded with content that treats motivation like it's the engine behind every meaningful result.
But here’s the honest truth: motivation is a mood. And moods are unstable.
Sounds realistic, right? Yes, it is.
You're motivated when the sun’s out, you’ve had a full night’s sleep, and your inbox is empty, but it can quickly fade away when,
when you’re under pressure
when you're tired
when life gets messy
when things go sideways.
And when the motivation disappears, most people stop.
This doesn’t mean they aren’t capable, but they built their strategy around how they feel instead of what actually works.
The Problem With Relying on Motivation
Motivation feels powerful in the moment, but it’s fragile. It depends on your mood, energy, and circumstances, all of which change constantly.
When things get hard, motivation is usually the first thing to disappear, and if your entire plan relies on feeling motivated, your progress will stall the second when life gets messy.
That’s why I stopped chasing motivation a long time ago.
I stopped waiting for the “perfect mindset” or the ideal conditions to create. I stopped needing to feel inspired in order to make progress. Instead, I built a system.
But why a system?
Because a system doesn’t care how I feel, and it doesn’t need me to be in a great mood. It doesn’t rely on perfect conditions or emotional spikes.
It just runs. Quietly. Repeatedly. Reliably.
That’s the difference between motivation and a system.
I’ve worked with 100s of clients, run millions of paid ads, and written thousands of pieces of content over the past 8 years in my digital marketing life while rarely feeling motivated.
I don’t really remember when I was last motivated to write my journal, but somehow, I did because I had a system in place to keep me going.
To be frank, I had a lot of distracted, tired and overwhelmed days, but my system doesn’t care. It just works and still works.
For example, if you’re a writer,
Write three ideas.
Turn one into a post.
Schedule it.
Move on.
No drama. No overthinking. No wasted hours waiting for inspiration to strike. Just show up and run the play.
That’s it.
That’s the secret most people overlook.
The people you admire?
Can you name anyone who said they are always motivated? Hell No
They’re not motivated all the time. They’ve just figured out how to make progress without needing to feel ready.
They built systems that reduce decision fatigue. That eliminates friction and takes emotions out of the equation.
Because they don’t rely on motivation, they show up more often.
And when they show more often, they get better results. More often means more consistency. More consistency creates skill. Skill creates Confidence, and confidence creates momentum.
And the momentum makes things compound.
How to Build a System That Wins Every Time
Most people don’t want systems. They want feelings, the rush of a new idea, the buzz of a plan, the dopamine hit from a motivational video.
Let me tell you something.
A new idea sparked your mind. To build an app that solves a real problem. You quickly go ahead and research it on the internet to find if there are already any apps like this. You search forums, Google, ChatGPT and so on, and you finally found that there are no apps that could solve the problem that you are about to solve.
You started building the app. Days passed. After a few days, you won’t really have that energy to build the app that you had before, at the start.
Because you lost motivation.
Motivation can quickly fade away from your goals.
The truth is, most people don’t want systems. They want feelings. They want the rush of new ideas, the buzz of a fresh plan, the hit of dopamine from a motivational video. But that thing fades fast.
And when it does, they’re right back where they started: stuck, unsure, and unproductive.
However, the system, on the other hand, is boring. It’s repetitive. It’s not something you brag about. But it works. It’s what gets things done when you’re sick, stressed, distracted, or simply not in the mood.
So if you’re stuck right now and waiting to “feel motivated” to get back on track, please stop. Don’t wait for a mood to change. Don’t wait for the perfect moment. Don’t scroll for another hit of inspiration.
Instead, ask yourself this:
“What’s one simple system I can build that works even when I don’t feel like working?”
Then build it.
Then run it.
Then watch what happens.
You need a system that runs when life gets messy and when motivation disappears.
That’s how you create results.
That’s how you build confidence.
That’s how you win. Day after day, year after year.
What’s an example of a working system?