Different tricks work for different people. Here's one I find works for me: given a pile of tasks sufficiently daunting that it's hard to get started, take the

Different tricks work for different people. Here's one I find works for me: given a pile of tasks sufficiently daunting that it's hard to get started, take the easiest. Not the most important, the easiest, the one that can be completed fastest. Burn some (scarce, precious) willpower doing that. Then use the morale boost from successful completion of that first task, as activation energy to do the second easiest, and so on. If the easiest task is so unimportant that it doesn't feel like a good idea to spend time on it, should it be on your to-do list at all? It's sometimes a good idea to physically or mentally designate tasks to not be done at all. No, cleaning up files on your computer is not worth doing. Yes, you've been meaning to get around to writing to your old high school friend for the last five years and haven't yet done it - so admit that, stop wasting morale beating yourself up about it, and just cross it off your to-do list.