While I can do fine without doing this specific project, my problem is doing anything productive in general. I need to work to support myself. I need to work to support those who cannot support themselves.
I don't actually like doing this. The issue isn't that I think I ought to. It's that I think I can. I've enjoyed programming in the past. I've spent a week doing almost nothing but eating sleeping and programming, entirely for my own enjoyment. As I am now, I dislike doing anything productive. If I can't change, I'm doomed to have a job I hate. If I can enjoy it though, I can have a good life.
Well then do something you enjoy that's not productive right now, but can become so if you try enough to raise your skill at it. Every ability I can boast of so far has been picked up along the way as I was avoiding tasks I ought to have worked on in favor of leisure activities that still required some sort of skill to be performed well. Even procrastination can be useful if your chosen method of procrastinating earns you abilities for which someone, somewhere is willing to pay you.
That is, as long as you don't refuse to enjoy something on the grounds that it might turn out to be lucrative one day, and therefore it's not proper enjoyment.
I have a master's project I'm having trouble working on. It's something I've wanted to do, and I even started working on, long before I started my master's degree. If I can't even enjoy that, then I'm doomed to spend eight hours a day doing something I hate for the rest of my life. Even if I manage to improve my willpower, I doubt I'll be very productive doing something I don't want to do.
Does anyone have any idea how I can enjoy working more?