I think we’ve all been there. Lying in bed at the end of the day thinking:

“I really didn’t get anything done today. Where did all that time go?”

We’ve got so little time, and so much we need to do. Work, socializing, sleep, family, and countless other obligations… all constantly demanding pieces of your day.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how I spend my time. I’m not the most productive person, but by making myself aware of what I could achieve I feel more motivated to get up and do something every day.

Let’s get into some ideas that can motivate and inspire you to make the most out of your time. …

Depression affects more than 264 million people. It’s a serious mental illness that can have horrible consequences.

It’s likely that you or someone you know will suffer from depression at some point. That might even be the reason why you clicked on this article.

The good news is that there are things you can do to make it less likely that you’ll get depressed. At the very least, you can make depression hit a little less hard.

By implementing these habits into your life, you can help manage or prevent depression. There is no guarantee, as depression is a result of several complex factors. …

For those who don’t know him, Brandon Sanderson is a fantasy author who has published many books since 2005, totaling over 5,5 million words. He also finished The Wheel of Time series, after Robert Jordan passed away before being able to.

During his career, Sanderson has learned a lot about the craft of writing and the process of becoming a writer. He shares these lessons in his lectures at BYU, where he teaches creative writing.

Through watching these, I’ve picked out some nuggets of writing wisdom, which I hope will help you on your writing journey.

1. Don’t spend energy on what you can’t control

Writing is a long process that requires a lot of mental energy. That’s why it’s so important to focus your energy where it needs to be. …

Music, writing, art, and other creative professions can be very challenging to find success in. There’s a lot of competition, and you constantly have to prove your worth.

People can work in these professions for their entire lives without making it big enough to quit their day job. It's hard to persevere through such resistance. However, it can also be worth it.

The people who are quoted here have all achieved something most people don’t: success in a very competitive business. That success didn’t come without its fair share of life lessons.

Whether you’re a musician, writer, artist, or any sort of creative person, there is wisdom to gain here. I write in terms of music but you can replace ‘musician’ with ‘writer’, ‘painter’, ‘designer’, etc. …

These are simple things you can do every day. Eventually, you’ll barely notice that you’re doing them. Can you imagine how your mouth would feel if you never brushed your teeth? That’s something you probably do every day that has a huge benefit for how little time it takes. Imagine implementing habits like this in other areas of life. Good habits can provide huge benefits for little effort.

1: Meditate

Not everyone is open to meditation. Some may find it too good to be true, or too spiritual in nature. However, meditation can improve mental and emotional health, help your attention span, and improve your ability to solve problems and make decisions. …

What would you rather your motivation be dependent on; your own joy in the process, or external rewards? In this article, I’ll teach you about different types of motivation and what you can do to ensure your motivation doesn’t rely on anything but yourself.

Different types of motivation

Motivation is often divided into two categories: intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. The difference between the two is where the motivation originates.

Intrinsic motivation comes from within yourself. It is the motivation you get from simply enjoying something. Think of your favorite hobby. What drives you to do that? …

How much time do teachers spend trying to teach proper writing skills, such as grammar, spelling, genre, form, and structure? Probably a lot of time. After all, they are important skills for writing successfully. However, how much focus is left for teaching the most important thing of all? Learning to love writing.

If you want to learn how to write better, there is one thing you can’t get away from: the need to practice. And not just a little bit, either. Writing any text is a difficult process. …

We’ve probably all been there. We want to write, but we don’t want to sit down and actually type out all the words. There can be many reasons why we get demotivated in our writing journey. After all, writing is a difficult process. Yet, when we finish a piece of writing, it can be so rewarding!

A lot of it comes down to our motivation to write. Motivation is a tricky subject, but an interesting one. That’s why I wrote my master’s thesis on it. During that process, where I didn’t always feel motivated, I learned some important lessons about motivation. …