Physician and former professional triathlete Dr Els Visser on why motivation dips, and the foundations that keep you going when it does.
Key Takeaways
Motivation is not a fixed trait or pure willpower. It rises and falls with your sleep, stress, nutrition and mood.
Low motivation is usually a signal, not a character flaw. It often means one of the foundations supporting your health needs attention.
Action tends to come before motivation, not after. Taking one small step makes the next one feel easier.
Consistency is built on routines, not inspiration. Small habits repeated daily carry you through the days drive disappears.
If low motivation persists despite good sleep, nutrition, movement and stress management, speak to a healthcare professional, as it can have a medical cause.
Els is a medical doctor with a PhD and a professional long-distance triathlete, European Champion, and Dutch record holder. Her work centres on longevity—helping individuals optimise their health, performance, and recovery over the long term through the four key pillars of nutrition, movement, sleep and recovery, and mental health. A survivor of a life-changing boat disaster in 2014, she brings a deeply personal perspective on resilience and purpose to everything she does.
People often assume that successful athletes are motivated every single day. The truth is, they're not.
During my years as a professional triathlete, people regularly asked me how I stayed motivated through thousands of training hours, early mornings and long racing seasons. They imagined I woke up every day excited to train. I didn't. Some mornings I felt energized, others I was tired from travel, mentally drained or simply didn't feel like training.
If I had waited until I felt motivated, I would never have become a professional athlete. What kept me consistent wasn't motivation: it was the habits I'd built. Training, eating well and prioritising recovery weren't decisions I made every morning, they had become part of my routine. Those habits carried me through the days motivation disappeared.
Today, as a physician, I hear the same thing from my clients. "I just don't have any motivation." "I know what I should do, but I can't seem to start." Most people immediately blame themselves. They think they're lazy or simply lack discipline.
But that's rarely what I see. More often, low motivation is a signal not a character flaw. It's your body telling you that one or more of the foundations supporting your health need attention. So rather than asking, "How do I become more motivated?" try asking: "What is my body trying to tell me?"
We often think motivation is something we either have or don't have. In reality, it's influenced by both our brain and our body. Every day, your brain is constantly weighing whether a task is worth the energy it requires. That decision is influenced by many factors, including sleep, stress, nutrition, physical health and emotional wellbeing. When those foundations are strong, taking action usually feels easier. When they're compromised, your brain naturally becomes more protective of its energy. Even simple tasks can suddenly feel overwhelming, not because you've become lazy, but because your brain is trying to conserve resources.
One of the brain chemicals involved in motivation is dopamine. It's often called the "motivation molecule", but that's a simplification. Dopamine plays an important role in helping us anticipate rewards and learn from our experiences. When something feels rewarding, whether that's finishing a workout, completing an important task or enjoying a nutritious meal, dopamine helps reinforce that behaviour, making it more likely that we'll repeat it in the future.
At the same time, our brains are designed to use energy efficiently. From an evolutionary perspective, conserving energy increased our ancestors' chances of survival when food was scarce. Although our lives look very different today, that biology hasn't changed. When we're sleep-deprived, stressed or low on energy, even simple tasks can feel more demanding because our brains naturally prioritise conserving energy. That's why low motivation isn't always a sign that you need more willpower. Often, it's your brain responding to your current physical and mental state.
Struggling to get started rarely has a single cause. Instead, it's often the result of several small factors gradually building up over time. When a client tells me they feel unmotivated, I don't immediately ask about productivity or mindset. I start with the foundations.
Sleep is one of the strongest drivers of motivation. Even one night of restricted sleep has been shown to impair executive function, the part of the brain involved in planning, self-control and decision-making. In other words, when you're tired, making healthy choices genuinely becomes harder, requiring more effort than usual. As an athlete, I learned that recovery wasn't something that happened after training, it was part of the training itself. Sleep was one of my most important performance tools. The same applies outside elite sport. If your sleep is inconsistent, you're more likely to struggle with getting started the next day.
Short periods of stress can improve focus and performance. Chronic stress does the opposite. When your brain is constantly dealing with work pressure, family responsibilities or endless decisions, it has less capacity for everything else, including healthy habits. Many people describe this as a lack of motivation. In reality, it's often mental overload.
If taking action feels difficult, waiting until you feel like taking action rarely works. More often, it's the other way around: action creates motivation. Behavioural science suggests that once we take the first step, our brains quickly reassess how difficult a task actually is. What felt overwhelming before often becomes much more manageable once we've started. That's why getting started is often the hardest part. Instead of aiming for an hour at the gym, begin with a ten-minute walk. Rather than overhauling your entire diet, prepare one healthy meal for tomorrow. If improving your sleep feels overwhelming, simply start by going to bed fifteen minutes earlier. These actions may seem small, but over time they create momentum. And when repeated consistently, that momentum gradually develops into lasting habits. Through neuroplasticity, the brain's remarkable ability to adapt through repetition, the neural pathways involved become stronger and more efficient. As a result, healthy behaviours require less conscious effort and begin to feel increasingly automatic.
One lesson I learned as a professional athlete is that consistency was never built on feeling inspired every day. It was built through ordinary behaviours repeated day after day. I didn't wake up every morning wondering whether I should train. My training sessions, meals and recovery were already planned. Those routines reduced the number of decisions I had to make and made consistency much easier.
Healthy habits don't need to be complicated. In fact, the most effective ones are usually the simplest. I encourage people to focus on four foundations that influence both physical and mental wellbeing: sleep, movement, nutrition and stress management.
Sleep is one of the strongest predictors of how you'll feel the next day. Rather than aiming for perfect sleep, build a routine you can repeat. Go to bed at a similar time each evening, reduce screen time before bed, create a wind-down routine that signals to your brain it's time to rest. Small habits, repeated consistently, often have a greater impact than chasing the occasional perfect night's sleep.
Exercise doesn't have to be intense to improve your health. Interestingly, regular physical activity doesn't just improve physical health. Research consistently shows it also reduces symptoms of depression and anxiety, improves cognitive function and supports long-term brain health. A brisk walk, cycling to work, taking the stairs or stretching for ten minutes all count. The goal isn't to complete the perfect workout, the goal is to make movement part of your daily routine.
Elite sport taught not to rely on motivation at all. Some days training felt easy, other days it felt incredibly difficult. The athletes who stayed consistent weren't necessarily the most motivated. They were the ones with the strongest routines. That lesson stays with me now during my medical career. Whether you're training for an Ironman or simply trying to improve your health, lasting change rarely comes from one burst of motivation. It comes from repeating small behaviours until they become part of who you are.
This idea is captured beautifully by James Clear in Atomic Habits, "You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems." I believe that's just as true for our health as it is for sport.
Although healthy habits can make a remarkable difference, it's important to recognise that persistent low motivation isn't always explained by lifestyle alone. If your motivation remains low despite sleeping well, eating well, moving regularly and managing stress, it's worth speaking to a healthcare professional. Sometimes the cause is medical, such as iron deficiency, vitamin B12 deficiency, thyroid disease, sleep apnoea or medication side effects. In other cases, persistent low motivation may be linked to depression, anxiety or burnout. There's no shame in asking for help. Seeking support isn't a sign of weakness. It's an important step towards understanding what's really going on.
One of the biggest misconceptions about motivation is that we need more of it. In reality, we often need stronger foundations. Low motivation isn't usually a sign that you've become lazy. It's often your body's way of asking for something different: better sleep, better nutrition, more movement, more recovery or less stress. So instead of asking yourself, "How can I become more motivated?" try asking, "What small habit can I build today that supports my health?" Because enthusiasm comes and goes. Healthy habits are what carry you through on the days it doesn't show up. And in my experience, as both a physician and a former professional athlete, that's where lasting health is built.
Low motivation is rarely caused by a lack of willpower. More often, it's the result of several factors working together, such as poor sleep, chronic stress, inadequate nutrition, emotional overload or physical illness. Instead of blaming yourself, it's worth asking which of your health foundations may need attention. Low motivation is often a signal from your body rather than a personal failure.
Yes. While occasional dips in motivation are completely normal, persistent low motivation can sometimes indicate an underlying medical or psychological condition, such as iron deficiency, thyroid disease, sleep apnoea, depression or anxiety. If symptoms last longer than two weeks, interfere with daily life or are accompanied by persistent low mood or hopelessness, it's important to seek professional advice.
Rather than waiting to feel motivated, focus on taking one small action. Motivation often follows behaviour, not the other way around. Lower the barrier: go for a ten-minute walk, prepare one healthy meal or go to bed fifteen minutes earlier. Small actions create momentum, and repeated consistently, they become habits that no longer rely on motivation.
The good news is that our brains are also remarkably adaptable. Research suggests that a substantial proportion of our daily behaviour is habitual. That means lasting change doesn't depend on feeling motivated every day. By repeating small healthy behaviours consistently, they gradually become part of our routine, making healthy choices feel easier over time.
Your brain accounts for only about 2% of your body weight, yet it uses around 20% of your body's resting energy. It needs a constant supply of energy and nutrients to function well. During my years in endurance sport, I saw athletes unintentionally under-fuel themselves in the hope of improving performance. Instead, recovery slowed, mood declined and it became much harder to train consistently. The same thing happens outside elite sport. Busy schedules, skipping meals or restrictive diets can all leave people running on empty. Sometimes what feels like a lack of motivation is simply a lack of energy.
Everyone experiences periods when it feels harder to get going. Illness, disappointment, grief and prolonged stress can all temporarily reduce our drive. However, if low motivation persists for several weeks or is accompanied by persistent low mood, hopelessness or loss of interest in activities you once enjoyed, it's important to seek professional support. Temporary dips in drive are common. But if those feelings persist, they deserve attention.
Although these factors are very different, they all influence the same thing: your brain's capacity to take action. That's why simply telling yourself to "try harder" rarely works. If you're sleep-deprived, chronically stressed or running low on energy, willpower alone won't solve the problem. The first step isn't to push yourself harder, it's to strengthen the foundations that support both your physical and mental wellbeing.
That's exactly what I now encourage my clients to do. Don't wait until you feel ready. Start with one small step. Momentum builds habits, and over time those habits make healthy choices feel less like a decision and more like part of who you are.
Focus on habits that make nutritious choices easier. Keep healthy foods available, prepare meals in advance when you know life will be busy, and aim to include protein, fibre and healthy fats in most meals. Whole foods should always be the foundation of a healthy diet. But none of us eat perfectly every day. Life gets busy, we travel, work long hours or simply don't always manage to eat as we'd planned. That's why I believe in building simple routines that make good nutrition easier to maintain. For some people, that may include a comprehensive daily nutritional supplement as part of an overall healthy lifestyle, not as a replacement for healthy food, but as one way to support consistency.
Many people schedule work, meetings and exercise, but very few schedule recovery. Yet recovery is essential for both physical and mental performance. That doesn't always mean taking a day off. Sometimes it's a ten-minute walk outside, sometimes it's reading instead of scrolling before bed, sometimes it's simply sitting quietly with a cup of tea. Small moments of recovery help reduce stress before it becomes overwhelming.
None of these habits need to be perfect. What matters most is repeating them consistently over time. One of the core principles of preventive medicine is that our future health is largely shaped by the small choices we repeat consistently, not by occasional moments of perfection.
Absolutely. Your brain depends on a constant supply of energy and nutrients to function well. Under-fueling, restrictive diets or nutrient deficiencies can all contribute to fatigue and low motivation. A balanced diet rich in protein, healthy fats, fruits, vegetables and whole grains provides the foundation for normal energy metabolism and healthy brain function. If deficiencies are suspected, speak with your healthcare professional.
The goal isn't to become more motivated, it's to make exercise easier to start. Choose activities you enjoy, lower the barrier and build movement into your daily routine. A ten-minute walk is far better than waiting for the motivation to complete an hour-long workout. The more consistently you move, the more likely exercise becomes a habit rather than a decision.
