My daily commute to work was 20 miles round trip. Now I work out of my home. Any suggestions as to how I can motivate myself to ride, when it is snowing, raining, or Judge Judy is on?

Well, can you do any off that home-work somewhere else? The library or a coffee shop? If so, that could be a few days a week "commute" for you.

Are you motivated by goals such as tracking mileage, or number of days successful in bicycle commuting?

I am one of the few people who still keeps a paper calendar, in my Day Planner. Every successful commute day that I ride in to the office and back home, I highlight the date number with a blue highlighter. At the end of the month, I tally my "wins" and write that by the month name. It may sound silly, but it motivates me. I also track mileage, but the "wins" and "losses" motivates me more. For me, a successful bicycle commute is a "win", a telework day, overnight business travel day where I don't travel to the office, or vacation/sick day doesn't count, and borrowing my wife's car to drive in is a "loss." It might not work for anybody else, but it works for me. July was my best month so far, 14-4. October was going great until I came down with a cold that has me knocked down, but I am 9-0 so far.

If I switched to home-based working, I suppose I would pick a route to ride daily (that was safe, interesting, or maybe the same as before?) and still track "wins" or mileage. YMMV!

Money is a motivator for me. The bus company is not going to get a buck offa me Even on the days I'm not working, there are errands. My supermarket run is about 6 miles round trip. There is one just a couple of blocks away, but I like the distant one better.

A lot of miscellaneous things come up, and I just take care of as many as I can on a bike.

Maybe take a ride before u start working at home or after work. Maybe also a trainer while u work (i seen 1 guy have a snack tray on his handle bar and would peddel and type on the computer (his work) at the same time. Good way 2 kill two things at once).

I track my miles too. Old fashioned way... on a calender. I love figuring out how much I saved in gas, etc and I love seeing the weight come off!

Ok, my suggestions.... take the time to plan out some routes. I do this with ridewithgps.com. Make like 3-5 routes you can pick from and perhaps have a coffee place in there somewhere to ride to. I think working from home and being able to ride is exciting! Just dont get lazy about it.

Wow, I am thinking if everyday I could just ride where I wanted to I would definitely get up every morning and do a twenty to thirty mile ride just to start my day. I find exercise of any kind first thing in the am helps mental alertness. I think you have it made. Biking in and of itself and enjoying the outdoors seems like motivation enough to get out and ride every morning.

Try joining a gym that is the distance that you find agreeable, then ride, workout, and ride back. The ride is a great way to warm-up and you don't have to worry about arriving sweaty because it's a gym, everyone is sweaty.

Make a morning ride a required part of your workday, like any other. Schedule it. Remember, it energizes your body and mind. Think of all the brain derived neurotrophic factor you'd otherwise miss out on! Tell yourself you need a sharp pencil, and keep it sharp as part of the task.

If you drive to the supermarket and other errands, ride instead.

Getting an ex-kids trailer helps a great deal with this, made it much more practical for me to haul food home.

Yup, I should have mentioned that. The kiddie trailer is the primary way I carry stuff.