That was actually the section I looked at most closely and suffers from the problem I'm describing. I've read getting things done, Zen to done, tried the pomodoro technique, read books on habit formation, tried apps like beeminder, habitRPG, etc.
All of these have their merits but implementing them consistently is the whole problem, merely being aware of their existence is not sufficient.
I actually went ahead and bought the Motivation Hacker before seeing your reply here from the link in the article as it sounded interesting.
Motivation is a complex beast though, the evidence seems to be mixed on the degree to which it is a limited resource / can be increased through training but it certainly seems to be finite. I don't think the difficult of applying so many of these techniques consistently in practice comes down purely to motivation but it is no doubt a factor.
When it comes down to it, a lot of this stuff is just straight up hard. Certainly there are little 'hacks' that I've picked up over the years that help in various areas but overall it is just hard, slow work, results are very difficult to measure in any way scientifically and there are always limits in time and other resources.
Not to pick on GTD but just to use it as an example, it is not in fact very cheap or easy to try it out and see how you get on. It is difficult and time consuming to start the way it is recommended in the book, it is difficult and time consuming to stick with consistently and it is difficult to objectively measure its actual effectiveness. I'm not aware of any strong scientific evidence that people who are able to apply it consistently are actually more productive even.
