How to build enduring drive (Rethinking Motivation)

January 01, 2026

Dear readers,

First off, Happy New Year!

Before we get to today’s post, here are two ways to help you start 2026 strong.

First, my friend and bestselling author Chris Bailey, whom TED once called “the most productive man you’d ever hope to meet,” has just published his new book Intentional. I read an early copy and really loved it. The book is packed with timeless principles and practical advice you can apply right away. It’s a science-based, transformative guide to accomplishing your goals—and a genuine must-read. In today’s LinkedIn post, I shared three powerful methods from the book that I use all the time. You can order Intentional here.

Second, I will be hosting a free 60-minute live masterclass on how to double your productivity without burning out on January 15. After coaching 100+ top executives, I have learned one core truth: most people don’t need more time. They need more focus, better energy, and a way to make stress work for them instead of against them. In the Becoming Ultraproductive Masterclass, you will get actionable, science-based systems you can apply immediately, followed by a live Q&A to address your specific challenges. Spots are limited, so sign up here today to secure yours. Looking forward to meeting you live.

On to today’s post!

“Desire is persistent, but happiness is fleeting.” — Daniel Z. Lieberman

Why it works

Daniel Z. Lieberman (pictured) is a professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at George Washington University. He is one of the world’s leading experts on the science of motivation and reward and the author of the international bestseller The Molecule of More. His work has been featured in The New York Times, The Washington Post, and countless leading scientific journals. Lieberman’s eponymous “molecule of more” is dopamine. While it’s widely viewed as a pleasure chemical, it’s much more than that. Dopamine lowers the threshold for taking goal-oriented action, sharpening our focus on outward goals and motivating us to pursue them. In short, dopamine is not about having, but about wanting (“more”); it’s our molecule of motivation.

In his book, Lieberman contrasts the dopaminergic system with a second system that he calls the “here and now” system. One of the key neurochemicals involved in this system is serotonin. While dopamine is the molecule of more, one helpful way to think about serotonin is as the molecule of enough. High levels of serotonin help balance the motivation and pursuit created by dopamine with feelings of appreciation and satisfaction. While dopamine pushes us toward the next goal, serotonin helps us appreciate what we already have. This shift allows us to move from striving to unwinding, from accomplishment mode to contentment mode. In short, serotonin is not about wanting, but about having (“enough”); it’s our molecule of content.

Dopamine provides the push toward goals and progress, while serotonin ensures that effort is paired with satisfaction and calm. Seen this way, we can rethink motivation not as a single force, but as a dynamic dance between the fleeting gratification of dopamine (which lets us strive for more) and the deep contentment of serotonin (which lets us appreciate what we have). In practice, this means emphasizing dopamine-driven focus and pursuit during the day and shifting toward serotonin-supported unwinding and contentment in the evening. Functionally, that’s why you want dopamine levels to be high relative to serotonin early in the day and serotonin levels to be high relative to dopamine late in the day. Here’s how to get started in three simple steps.

How to do it

Step 1: Set up the baselines
As both dopamine and serotonin are neurotransmitters, establishing stable baseline levels is crucial. Here’s how to do that while avoiding the most common dysregulators of both.

Dopamine baseline
To set up your dopamine baseline, nutrition is key. Start by ingesting caffeine, protein, and healthy fats. First, caffeine increases dopamine levels and enhances the availability of dopamine receptors. However, both quantity and timing matter: up to 400 mg is safe for healthy adults (about two regular cups of coffee). Since caffeine late in the day will disrupt your deep sleep, avoid it in the last eight hours before bed. Second, eat enough protein. Protein-rich foods include tyrosine, a substance that our body needs to produce dopamine. To boost dopamine, go for 1g of protein per kilogram of body weight a day. Third, get plenty of healthy fats, notably eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA). It supports our dopamine baseline, and we get it from fatty fish (like salmon) and other foods rich in omega-3 fatty acids. If that’s hard, consider supplementing 1g of tyrosine and/or 1g of EPA per day. As always, talk to your physician first.

Apart from nutrition, exposure to light also strongly influences your dopamine levels. Morning sunlight is not only vital for setting our circadian rhythm and optimizing sleep. It’s also crucial for maintaining healthy dopamine levels throughout the day. So, expose yourself to sunlight in the first 30-60 minutes after waking and before 10 am. Any later and you’ll enter what scientists call the “circadian dead zone,” when your circadian master clock does not respond to sunlight. If you live in a season or place with little morning sunlight, you can support your circadian rhythm by using a portable daylight lamp. Here’s the one I use during the darker months of the year. Also, avoid bright, blue light after 10 pm. Viewing light late at night reduces your capacity to release dopamine during the day.

On top of nutrition and light, temperature is a third powerful lever for setting up your dopamine baseline. Adding some cold exposure to your morning routine boosts its levels significantly and sustainably. The increase amounts to around 250%, which is the same rise one gets from cocaine. Wild, isn’t it? Also, the rise in dopamine lasts for several hours afterward. The bad news: this is never going to feel great, but that’s the point. The good news: you don’t need an ice bath or expensive cold plunge to get the benefits. Just take a cold shower. To avoid cold shock, put safety first: Start your shower nice and warm; then turn it to cold for 30-60 seconds at the end. Learn more about morning cold showers here.

Serotonin baseline
To set up your serotonin baseline, you can use the same three levers around nutrition, light, and temperature. In terms of nutrition, while our body needs tyrosine to produce dopamine, the biological precursor for serotonin is tryptophan. Foods high in tryptophan include white meat (e.g. turkey), fish, and starchy carbohydrates, which is why having some bread, potatoes, pasta or rice with dinner can be a good thing. As a bonus, these foods lower levels of the “stress hormone” cortisol. As with caffeine, both quantity and timing matter. Don’t overdo it and keep portions reasonable. Also, protect your deep sleep by not eating anything in the last three hours before bed.

While getting plenty of light early in the day is vital to setting up your dopamine levels, avoiding bright blue light at night not only protects your dopaminergic system but also your serotonergic “here and now” system. Serotonin is the precursor to melatonin, a major sleepiness hormone, and viewing bright light late in the day inhibits our body clock’s signal to convert serotonin into melatonin, making it harder for us to wind down and eventually fall deeply asleep. So again, after getting 10 minutes of sunlight into your eyes before 10 am, you want to avoid bright, blue light after 10 pm. Learn more about using light to optimize energy and sleep here. 

As with dopamine, temperature is the third powerful lever for setting up your serotonin baseline. While cold exposure in the morning significantly and sustainably increases dopamine levels, a hot shower, bath or sauna can have a powerful effect on serotonin levels late in the day. As with cold exposure, you don’t need expensive equipment (like a sauna) to benefit from some heat. A hot shower or bath is a great place to start. And as it turns out, the calming effects of heat exposure are quite significant. According to sleep expert Matthew Walker, a hot bath can increase deep sleep by up to 40 minutes.

Most common baseline dysregulators
Last but not least, avoid behaviors and substances that chronically dysregulate your dopamine and serotonin baselines. The most common examples include doomscrolling, comfort foods, and excessive alcohol.

Doomscrolling engages dopamine-driven reward learning through novelty, unpredictability, and information seeking, even when the content itself is negative. Repeated exposure can reinforce habitual checking behaviors, increasing attentional fragmentation, heightened stress, and even anxiety. At the same time, chronic exposure to negatively valenced information is associated with reduced serotonergic functioning, likely mediated by increased stress, threat vigilance, and rumination.

Comfort foods (also known as ultra-processed foods) trigger dopamine release due to their high sugar and fat content. Consumed frequently, this dopaminergic response can become blunted, requiring larger or more frequent “hits” to achieve the same effect and increasing cravings in the process. Comfort foods also negatively affect the gut microbiome, thereby indirectly influencing serotonin synthesis and regulation via the gut-brain axis.

Excessive alcohol produces a short-term increase in dopamine and serotonin, leading to transient pleasure and social ease. This acute effect is followed by a longer-lasting reduction in dopaminergic and serotonergic activity, leaving mood and motivation lower than baseline—and increasing the urge to drink again. With repeated use, neuroadaptation and tolerance develop, prolonging this post-drinking dip and reinforcing cycles of craving and dependence.

Phew, that was a lot. Let me be clear: there’s nothing wrong with scrolling through your feeds, enjoying some good food, or having a drink (or two) once in a while, especially over the holidays. But if any of these behaviors have turned into habits that you feel are clearly holding you back, this article will show you how to break them.

Step 2: Boost dopamine during the day
In addition to setting up your baselines for dopamine and serotonin, you want your dopamine levels to be high relative to your serotonin levels during the day. The three tools that I use every single day for that are the Rule of Three, Time Blocking, and Non-Sleep Deep Rest.

The Rule of Three
As you get to work, a powerful way to boost dopamine levels is to remind yourself that you are moving toward your goals. While big milestones can feel intimidating, breaking them down to manageable, bite-sized chunks is immensely powerful. My favorite tool for pulling this off is the Rule of Three, which I first learned about in Bailey’s first book The Productivity Project. The rule is simple: at the beginning of each year, fast-forward to its end and ask yourself, “By the time this year is over, what three main things will I want to have accomplished?” Personally, I use that rule to plan my year by setting three professional and three personal goals in January. And each Monday, I break these down into three goals that I want to accomplish by the end of the week. As Jim Collins has famously said, “If you have more than three priorities, you don’t have any.”

Time Blocking
Time blocking is how peak performers like Bill Gates, Jack Dorsey, and Marc Andreessen structure their days. A Harvard Business Review survey of 1,000 productivity strategies ranked time blocking as the most effective. At its core, time blocking uses what scientists call “implementation intentions”—a fancy way of saying that instead of just deciding what you’ll do, you also decide when you’ll do it. For example, instead of planning to “do focused work on a project,” you schedule it from 8 am to 9 am. According to psychologist Peter Gollwitzer, this approach works especially well for tackling complex and ambiguous tasks. It’s also highly effective for chronic procrastinators. When they scheduled a specific time to complete a task, they were eight times as likely to follow through with that task. If you want to learn more about how I use time blocking (also known as timeboxing), read this article.

Non-Sleep Deep Rest
Most people lose up to two hours each day to the afternoon slump. It’s a period of low alertness and motivation that occurs between 1-3 pm. They then try to push through this slump, often fueled by late caffeine, which disrupts their sleep architecture at night. When you’re tired or unmotivated during the day, a much better way is to get 10 to 30 minutes of non-sleep deep rest (NSDR). Also known as Yoga Nidra, NSDR has been shown to increase dopamine levels by up to 65%. NSDR combines exhale-emphasized breathing and a body scan, and even Google CEO Sundar Pichai does it most days. Learn more about NSDR and other “Deep Rest” methods here.

Step 3: Increase serotonin in the evening
After you’ve set up your dopamine and serotonin baselines and maintained healthy levels of dopamine through the day, you want your serotonin to be relatively high in the evening. The three tools I swear by to achieve this are Three Good Things, the Accomplishment List, and Intermittent Digital Fasting.

Three Good Things
This tool was presented by world-leading positive psychologist Martin Seligman in his book Authentic Happiness. It’s as simple as it sounds: when calling it a day in the evening, write down three things that went well that day. These might include a great presentation, getting in some hard exercise, or having a meaningful conversation with a colleague or friend. On top of that, also add a brief explanation of why each of these things went well. For example: “My presentation landed well because I prepared thoroughly,” “the workout went well because I pushed beyond my comfort zone,” or “the conversation was positive because I was fully present.” This practice not only directs your attention to what you have, but also reinforces your sense of agency by highlighting the role you played in creating these positive outcomes.

Accomplishment List
This is one of the many amazing tools that Bailey describes in his book Intentional. Instead of focusing on what still remains undone, it shifts your attention to what you have already achieved. The idea is simple: keep a running list of accomplishments, large and small, across a chosen time frame. You might update it weekly by noting completed tasks, difficult conversations you handled well, or habits you maintained. Or you might keep a yearly list that captures the broader results your efforts have produced at work and at home. By regularly reviewing this list, you counteract negative self-talk and the feeling of never doing enough.

Intermittent Digital Fasting
The third tool is what entrepreneur and author Arianna Huffington calls Intermittent Digital Fasting. One hour before bedtime, put your smartphone out of sight. Give it its own bedroom, in a room other than your own. Plug it into a charger and get an old-school alarm clock to wake you up in the morning. Why do all this? Because it’s a powerful way to avoid what Harvard professor Ashley Whillans calls “time confetti.” While we have more leisure time than 50 years ago, she argues, it has become far less restorative because our free time is constantly fragmented by screens. Instead of real downtime, we fill small gaps with quick digital distractions, leaving us feeling stressed and hungry for time, even during our leisure. Intermittent Digital Fasting counters this by creating clear boundaries around phone use. If you want to dive deeper into intermittent fasting (including activities that truly restore you during that last hour of the day), read this article.

Enduring drive comes from harnessing both the dopaminergic system for ambition, action, and goal pursuit and the serotonergic, “here and now” system for contentment, rest, and presence.

Here’s my question for you:
What are your three major professional and personal goals for 2026?

And here’s my challenge for you:
Pick your #1 baseline dysregulator (doomscrolling, comfort foods, or excessive alcohol) and work on avoiding it. In my experience, 99% of people regularly fall for at least one. So, why not experiment with some intermittent digital fasting, clean eating, or a Dry January this month (I’ll do one, too).

Also, use the Rule of Three to break your three major professional and personal goals for 2026 down into smaller, achievable weekly goals. Recall them in the morning to boost your dopamine each day.

Last but not least, try Seligman’s Three Good Things to boost your serotonin in the evening.

This might turn 2026 into one of your best years yet.

Christian

PS:
Are you struggling to focus on the important work being busy with urgent stuff? Are you feeling tired throughout the day despite sleeping for 7 or 8 hours at night? Are you having trouble dealing with high stress at work and "switching off" at home?

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