When I paused for a moment and took a look at what inspired me in the past, I realized that I had moved away from all my inspirations completely. I had condemned myself to go through a cycle of lack of inspiration by not following patterns I had subconsciously laid for myself during a time of inspiration.

During my most recent bout of inspiration I had been pulling from people, books, Twitter, blogs, and a huge amount of sources that challenged my everyday thinking. When I started to let these things go and fall back into a substandard routine of laziness, I lost almost all my motivation. I had been on such an inspiration high for such a long time, I considered it to almost be a norm and noticed my change for the worse.

I recommend you takes some advice that Jim Cramer give’s in one of his books: When you do something, you have a reason for it. Write down that reason, or document it somewhere, so that in the future when you are wondering why you did that, you can go back and see your reasoning.

So with this in mind, when you have inspiration, document what you believe are the key factors of your inspiration during that time. Obviously these can change and adapt over time, but you will have a springboard to help you jump out of your inspirational droughts.

Make a schedule.

Perhaps the simplest way to build energy is to have a schedule and stick with it.  Your body will align itself with this schedule and you will always know when it is time to take a break, eat, go to bed, or wake up.  A schedule is necessary to eliminate wasteful actions.

Find words of inspiration and energy and recite them.

Finding inspirational words is extremely necessary to both building a retaining energy.  Words are powerful.  They can alter your thoughts and emotions.  When you find a statement you like, write it down and read it at the beginning of everyday.  When you feel yourself starting to fade, read the inspirational quote again.  One should have many different sets of inspirational words for different situations as needed.  If you are religious, try Romans 8:31 and Isaiah 40:31. 

Identify a cause or idea and bind yourself to it.

Find something that you can totally emerse your self in, drawing your energy from it.  Your work, an idea, something that is bigger than yourself and other people.  It always seemed a bad idea for you to identify yourself with a person or persons when trying to maintain energy.  This is because people wear down or change.  Then your source of reflected energy is gone or does not align with you anymore leaving you stranded like a child after a sugar high.  Once again if you are religious, God is a great source of energy waiting to be tapped through prayer.  If not, emmerse yourself in meeting objectives to get a promotion or finding a new job.  Anything that gets you excited that has longevity.

Reduce wasteful emotions.

You can’t control everything.  Learn to let things go.  Ignor petty annoyances and clear your mind.  A great way to clear your mind is to write out everything that is bothering you and then throw it away.  If something is still on your mind that you can’t control, then write some more, or talk about it with a neutral party who can sympathize.  Letting emotions control you is a huge drain on your energy that needs to be stopped.

Eliminate wasteful actions.

I mentioned above that having a schedule eliminates wasteful actions.  So does a little bit of planning.  Take a few minutes to plan your day around what needs to be accomplished.  You will identify actions or events that can be paired as to minimize needed time and energy.  Don’t run to the store twice when with a little bit of planning you can get everything you need.  This will help retain your energy.

Stretch your mind.

Finally you need to supply yourself with new ideas.  These will inspire energy and create new paths through which it can flow.  Look at things in a new way, play games, take a different route to work, read, talk about new things with knowledgable people, et cetera.  Anything to build new sources of energy.