ChatGPT for Productivity: 5 AI-Powered Strategies to Supercharge Motivation

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Struggling with motivation? Here’s how to use ChatGPT for productivity and motivation to beat procrastination and stay on track. Get practical prompts, tips, and real-life examples to boost your focus—even when you’d rather be scrolling!

Big plans, no drive?

This is me, to a tee. Lots of stuff I want to do, but I struggle to get started.

Have you also had those days when you want to be productive, but you just…can’t?

Or maybe you have plenty of drive, but the sheer number of tasks feels so overwhelming that you don’t know where to start.

This also describes me.

And scrolling Insta is so much easier than getting started, right?

Motivation can be fickle–some days, the simplest tasks feel so damn hard. 

And if you’re juggling multiple projects or responsibilities, that just multiplies the overwhelm—leading to a total motivation shutdown.

There are countless strategies out there to push past mental blocks and get things done. I’ve found combining those tried-and-true strategies with AI helps me bypass resistance and trick my brain into momentum.

In this article, I’m sharing how.

Whether, like me, you need a gentle nudge or a firm push, AI can be your accountability partner, body double, productivity coach, and cheerleader—even when you’d rather be scrolling.

Note: I use ChatGPT, but you can use Claude, Copilot, or other AI models to do the same thing. All the screenshots from this article are from ChatGPT.

How I Set Up AI as a Personal Productivity Assistant

Ai can act as an interactive guide and personal productivity assistant if you give it progress updates.

Since first writing this article, AI can now also check in on you to see how you’re doing like a true accountability partner (paid feature – see later in the article for how to set that up).

To make the most of AI, set up a simple system:

1. Decide what you need help with.
   • Are you struggling to start?
   • Need help context-switching?
   • Struggling to push through resistance?
2. Create a custom workflow.
   • Tell AI what you need help with and how it can help. Ask it what it needs from you so it can help you.
   • You don’t need a custom GPT, but if you want a more tailored experience, you can create one with specific instructions about your goals and work style.
   • Otherwise, just talk to AI like you would a human—it even understands slang and sweary words. It understands natural language, so you don’t need to overthink your prompts (although I will share some prompt ideas below to get the creative juices flowing).
3. Build a habit of manually checking in.
   • AI won’t follow up automatically unless you have a paid plan, but if you initiate the conversation, it can guide you through focus sessions, motivation blocks, and accountability check-ins.

Example prompt: “Hey, it’s 9 am, I need to start working, but I can’t be arsed today. Help me get going.”

Sidenote: Creating a Custom GPT Personal Assistant

This is totally optional, but if you’re on the paid plan with ChatGPT, you can create a custom GPT tailored to your needs and goals. 

I’ve created a ‘personal planner’ assistant GPT to help me with all the things. I gave it some basic information about myself and my goals, primed it with its role and told it how I want it to interact with me (pro tip: ask ChatGPT what information it needs from you to fulfil the job you have for it).

It’s a work in progress—the more I use it, the more I go back and update the instructions to customise it to my needs and changing circumstances.

If you’re on the free plan, you can still do this in a regular chat—just save your AI’s best responses in Notion or a doc to copy over when needed.

AI as an Accountability Partner

Maybe it’s the people-pleaser in me, or maybe it’s the dopamine boost I get when AI praises me for progress, but I’ve found that AI accountability keeps me engaged and productive.

Whatever it is, studies show that having an accountability partner significantly increases the likelihood of achieving goals. According to research by the American Society of Training and Development (ASTD), the probability of completing a goal is 95% if you have a scheduled accountability check-in with someone (source).

It’s not always easy to find a real-world person who is happy to keep you accountable with regular check-ins. So while AI can’t enforce real-world consequences, it can simulate the experience of someone keeping tabs on you.

Regularly checking in with your ChatGpt buddy can hold you accountable and help you work towards your goals—at least, I’ve found it helps keep me accountable! I don’t want to “disappoint” it by telling it I didn’t finish (although it’s very sympathetic if I do).

Accountability Partner Prompt Ideas:

• “Act as my accountability partner. Ask me three questions to commit to a task and follow up after I answer.”
• “I need to finish [task]. Ask me what’s stopping me and help me move past it.”
• “Ask me what my focus is for the next 30 minutes, and help me break it into smaller steps.”

How to Make This Work:

AI as a Body-Doubling Companion

Body doubling is a well-documented productivity technique, especially for people with ADHD or those who struggle with focus. The idea is simple: working alongside someone else—whether in person or virtually—helps increase motivation and reduce task avoidance.

A study published in the Journal of Attention Disorders suggests that, while there’s no recent research, anecdotal evidence suggests body doubling can improve focus and task completion rates by providing external structure and reducing the perception of effort (source).

When I learned about body doubling, it really made more sense when DD asked me to sit in her room with her—just sit, no talking—while she cleaned it because it helped her get the job done. We also have sessions where I work, and she does her homework. It helps both of us focus.

While you can join a Zoom co-worker hour or ask a friend to body double if you need to get something done, I’ve found AI can mimic this effect by providing a virtual presence, prompting check-ins, and offering encouragement, helping you stay engaged and productive.

Body Doubling Prompts to Use:

• “Pretend you are my virtual co-worker. I will tell you what I’m working on, and I will check in with you every 30 minutes so you can ask me about my progress.”
• “I’m going to work for 25 minutes. Keep me accountable by asking for an update when I finish.”
• “Act as a supportive work buddy. Encourage me and check in on my focus.”

How to Make This Work:

AI as a Cheerleader and Motivation Booster

When motivation is nonexistent, sometimes I just need a pep talk.

AI can reframe negative thoughts, remind you why your work matters, and help you push through resistance.

Motivation Prompts to Use:

• “I have no motivation today. Give me a pep talk like a motivational coach.”
• “I feel stuck and unproductive. Remind me why my work is important.”
• “Hype me up! Make me feel excited about [task].”

How to Make This Work:

AI as a Productivity Strategist

Overwhelm can lead to procrastination. One minute, you’re spiralling from all the plates you’re spinning; the next minute, you realise you’ve just wasted two hours watching bad reaction videos on YouTube.

Or is that just me?

AI can help you find your way out of the overwhelm by helping you break down tasks, prioritise, and simplify your workload.

Productivity Prompts to Use:

• “I feel overwhelmed with too many tasks. Help me prioritise the top three things to focus on.”
• “Break my project into manageable steps and help me set deadlines.”
• “I need to work on [task], but I don’t know where to start. Guide me through the first three steps.”

How to Make This Work:

Look, AI is not perfect at this.

It doesn’t know that it’s 5 am, and you can’t just call the plumber right now to knock that job off your list.

But it’s a great way to get everything out of your head and also get help sorting all the mess that is be bouncing around in there, and that might be stopping you from taking any action at all.

Ways to Integrate AI into Your Workflow for Daily Productivity Support

Imagine starting the day with a coffee—maybe you’ve even taken it back to bed to drink—and you open your mobile AI app and just…talk to it.

You tell it everything you need to do today, what is a priority, what needs to be done, and when. A relaxed conversation about the day.

Then, AI creates a prioritised to-do list that you can either refer to during the day or copy into your task manager. 

And then, throughout the day, you just check in: “I’ve hung the washing, taken the kids to school, attended the work meeting, and now I’m focusing on project A.”

(Literally “project A” for privacy.)

Of course, if you’re feeling motivated, you don’t need actually to check in—keep working!

But if you do need a bit of cheerleading, AI can help.

And let’s be honest, I quite enjoy the little dopamine hit every time AI tells me, “I’m on fire” I’m “crushing it today.”

AI Limitations: What It Can and Can’t Do

AI is not a magic bullet—it won’t:

But it can provide structure, encouragement, and momentum—and sometimes, that’s all you need to get started.

ChatGPT Tasks (Paid Feature) – AI as an Automated Accountability Partner

Since first writing this article, ChatGPT has added scheduled tasks to its models.

I’m just exploring how to use this feature, but one strategy I’ve discovered is using it to check in with me on a regular basis as an automated accountability partner.

Here’s how I’ve set it up:

First, to get notifications on your phone, you will need the ChatGPT app installed.

Secondly, if you don’t want to get a ton of email notifications, then go into your settings and select push notifications but not emails.

I’ve created a task by using natural language to get ChatGPT to check in on me regularly during work hours, as shown in the screenshot below.

So far, so good. It’s been checking in on me regularly.

I can choose to reply and give it an update, which is good if I’m spiralling or need motivation. Or, if I’m working productivity, I just ignore the notification.

But then I decided to add a bit of extra spice to my prompt. To edit, click the three vertical dots on the task and edit.

Now, each time it checks in on me, it gives me a motivational quote as well:

Is it as good as an actual human buddy?

No.

But when you don’t have a human accountability buddy, AI is a great alternative.

💡A chat can only go on for so long before it stops working, and you need to start a new chat. If you’ve been using the chat a lot, there might be some important info that you want to carry over to the new chat. Ask ChatGPT to summarise all the key points in the chat and copy and paste that summary into a note or document. Edit as needed and copy it into the new chat so it can ‘catch up’ on where you’re at.

If you ever decide to create a custom GPT (see box at the beginning of the article), you can use the information summarised in the chat to help you write the instructions.

Final Thoughts: AI Won’t Give You Motivation—But It Will Keep You Moving

The not-so-secret secret of getting things done is to not wait for motivation but to build systems and find techniques to just start—to act even when you don’t want to. 

AI won’t force you to do the work, but it can help you start, stay accountable, and push through resistance. No pressure, no judgment—just support.

Try it now:

Open ChatGPT and type:

“Help me focus on my next task.”

See what happens—you might be surprised at how much easier it feels when you have a virtual teammate on your side.

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