How to stay motivated when working from home…

Working from home sounds like a luxury on paper. No horrible commute, you can wear whatever you want, you can work from your extremely comfortable couch… It sounds like heaven. 

It also comes with a fair few challenges. Your couch is so comfortable and the TV is so close. Maybe one episode of that new show in the background for soe white noise. Before you know it, you're six episodes deep into season 3 of Grey's Anatomy, wondering if you should have been a surgeon instead.

I (Nic) have never actually had a job where I've got to work from home. And now that I’m running my own business, I have no other option besides working from home. It's definitely been an adjustment, so I thought I would give my top tips for staying motivated. 

Keep your work life and your home life separate. 

It can be easy to slip into bad habits, but I've quickly learned that in order for me t ostay on track, I need to keep my home life separate. This means no TV on in the background. It means avoiding working from the couch - and if I do work from the couch - then absolutely no lying down. I am the easiest sleeper in the world - if I lay down for more than 5 minutes, I'm out like a lamp. 

While working from home, it's crucial to keep yourself in the “working” mindset during your work hours. This way, you can feel the shift when you sign off for the day. One of the worst parts of working from home, for me at least, is the feeling of going stir-crazy after being cooped up in my flat all day and night. This leads me on to my next point…

Make sure to split up your day and get outside.

Take your breaks and take them outside, if you can. Or, at the very least, in a different room. You never want to get sick of your own home, but it can easily be done when you never leave. Instead, I like to make sure I torture myself by going for runs during my breaks. 

You don't need to subject yourself to that kind of pain, but it does help to get some fresh air and break up your day a bit. There are countless benefits to getting fresh air throughout the day,  and there are much smarter people than me who can explain them. This article does a really great job at explaining why you should get outside during the day. 

Structure is your best friend. 

This is a point that may apply slightly more to people who run their own businesses, but it still works for people who work from home for other companies. 

Be strict with yourself about when you start and finish. It can be easy to stay in bed and lounge around and do bits here and there - but all you are doing is delaying the work that needs to be done. For some people, a huge benefit of working from home is the flexibility you get to choose your own hours. 

For example, my partner has his own business and he exclusively starts working after 10am. It's not because he is lazy, it's because he likes to split his work up in a unique way. His structure is there - but it's the structure that works for him. Where I like to start at 9am and aim to finish by 6pm, he likes to do the bulk of his physical work from 10am to 4pm, then come home and unwind. Then, as a self diagnosed night owl, he will complete all his other work after 9pm because that is when he has the most energy. 

I know someone else, who is a hairdresser, who wakes up at 6am every morning to get the bulk of her admin work done. Then, she sees clients until 3pm and her work day is finished by the mid afternoon.

All of these work days are very different, but they have one thing in common. Structure. 

Find the work hours that work for you and stick to it. Not only will it feed into the other two points (by keeping your work life separate and allowing you breaks to get some air), it will also increase your efficiency. 

And if working from home isn't for you - there are so many great co-working options out there. I'm curious to try some soon - I’ll let you know my thoughts when I do!