If You Can't Motivate Yourself to Do Anything, It Might Be 'Avolition'—Here's How to Beat It

It’s a scenario that many of us can relate to: Feeling like you have plenty of drive to get things done, but then at some point it peters out. You’re left feeling like you’ve lost all interest, motivation, and enthusiasm for checking things off your to-do list. Emails, tasks, chores, and projects pile up, and deadlines come and go.

A lack of motivation can strike anyone’s psyche, whether they’re a Type A, get-it-done person or someone with waxing and waning levels of ambition. But as it turns out, there’s a clinical term for this more pervasive, severe lack of motivation and interest in achieving tasks, and it’s called avolition.

What Is Avolition?

“Avolition is the inability to engage in and pursue goal-oriented behaviors,” explains Wendy O'Connor, PsyD, positive psychologist and success coach. While decreased or non-existent motivation can affect anyone at any time, in the mental health world, the long-term, life-affecting lack of motivation of avolition is commonly connected with disorders such as depression, bipolar disorder, and schizophrenia.

There are key differences between avolition and a temporary lack of motivation that can come from the typical flow of life. According to mental health professionals, avolition is typically closely linked to mental health disorders. Your lack of motivation may not be anything to worry much about—but if you feel it’s interfering with your life, relationships, and well-being, it’s best to be properly diagnosed by a mental health professional who can determine if it’s just decreased motivation that will pass or avolition that could really use some attention and further help.

Why Do People Struggle With Motivation?

Whether you’re dealing with avolition or a general lack of motivation, O’Connor says it’s simply unrealistic to expect to wake up each day raring to go with overflowing levels of motivation.

“It’s more realistic to expect motivation to change much like the weather does and to have a more effective strategy to create happiness, fulfillment, and success,” she says.

Diminished motivation is something that’s increasingly permeating today’s society, whether you’re struggling with a mental health condition or not. Likening motivation to waves in the ocean, since they come and they go, O’Connor says you can think of motivation as something that can be helpful, but that’s often unpredictable.

“A common reason for having little motivation in our society is that too many people feel overwhelmed, confused, stressed out, and even burned out,” she explains. “This can lead to shutting down and motivation levels dropping because there is a lack of clarity around what to pursue or enough energy to pursue a life of meaning and purpose. There is widespread pressure in our society to pursue a successful life, but not necessarily a happy life.”

What Does Avolition Look and Feel Like?

“Avolition can look different for people,” O’Connor says. “For some, it may include not responding to messages or emails. For others, it looks like sitting around and not doing anything for hours or days. And to others, it can look like a lack of hygiene and self-care. It feels like a significant lack of interest in taking action, and can even feel paralyzing.”

When Should You Be Concerned About Avolition?

When it feels impossible to dig deep and find any motivation—internal or external, large or small—and when it begins negatively affecting your life, it may be time to determine if what you’re facing is a more serious headspace of avolition. “When you notice that your lack of motivation, interest, and ability to pursue your life doesn’t seem temporary, it could be a good time to seek support,”O’Connor says.

How to Work Through a Lack of Motivation

Try behavioral activation.

If you’ve been diagnosed with avolition that’s tied to a mental health condition, O’Connor recommends something called behavioral activation as a treatment strategy. Used frequently in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), behavioral activation is a CBT skill in which people deliberately practice specific behaviors to reach an improved state. For instance, when you’re struggling to get motivated, you can try a “fake it till you make it” approach by starting to do the thing you’re dreading. People often assume motivation is first necessary to bring about the action—but it often works the other way around. Within moments of taking action—even the smallest step forward—motivation may spark, and the task may seem easier than you thought.

Even if you aren’t dealing with a specific mental health disorder, this is good advice to anyone who grapples with lack of motivation, procrastination, and other avoidant tendencies.

Take (small) breaks.

O’Connor encourages you to give yourself permission to take breaks from goal-oriented behaviors. In fact, it may help you ward off burnout, which is something that can squelch motivation in a hurry. Taking breaks may help you reset and find trickles of motivation once again.

But don’t let these breaks go on for too long, or they’ll start to affect your ability to pursue a functional life (taking too many breaks may translate to not doing the task at all!), she says.

Find a therapist.

Speaking of therapy, if diminished motivation is greatly impacting your life, sitting down with a therapist or psychologist could be wise, whether you just want to talk through it or if you want to seek out a diagnosis for a condition. Another option is to see your primary care doctor or psychiatrist and talk about medication options if motivation is completely elusive.

Seek support from loved ones.

While a therapist can absolutely be part of your support network, in general, O’Connor says that support of all kinds can help you get back to healthy routines and practices. See if your best friend wants to be an accountability partner to you. Tell your significant other about your goals and ask them to help you toward it. O’Connor recommends surrounding yourself with supportive people (even if you aren’t feeling terribly motivated to socialize).