There are two ways to get yourself to do something.
The first and the popular choice is by motivating yourself.
Second one is to cultivate discipline.
In my experience motivation is always wrong. It gives you a short time boost, but it also operates in a backwards manner – the whole idea of choosing motivations relies that in order to execute a specific task you have to be in a particular mental or emotional state.
While by cultivating a proper discipline you are separating the task from your emotions and moods.
I recognize my old past in the picture below so hard, that it actually hurts. Even now there are still parts of me, things that I know are still stuck in this diabolical root. And this relies on the absolutely stupid fantasy that we all have “We should be doing things only we feel like doing”? which leads the question becoming “How do I get myself to like doing things that I know and rationally decided that I need to do”. I believe this is the wrong mindset. The correct one would be more “How do I stop being a little bitch and just suck it up and do the things that I know I should be doing”.
However the biggest problem with motivation is it has very low shelf life and in order to be actually effective it needs to be constantly refreshed. It is decent option to push yourself for couple days, maybe week. It is like cranking a watch and watch it work for a day before it stops. There are times where that might be the correct attitude, but it’s terrible horrible basis for normal life.
Just to compare that to discipline – once it’s kickstarted it will continue to work for years and bring consistent, long-term results. How do you improve discipline in yourself? Build habits. Small ones, if need be. Gather momentum. Use motivation if need be. Progress with bigger habits and bigger changes to your routine and get yourself into actual positive loop.
Tldr; Motivation = trying to make yourself to like doing things, Discpline – doing things even if you don’t like them.