Commonly, people say that they do not act because of a lack of motivation. Seemingly, it is this quality, motivation, which stops so many people from doing the things they claim are things that they want to do. To some, it might be simple. If you want to do something, you do it, but for others, it isn’t quite that simple. If you’re someone who find themselves wishing that you had motivation to do the things you wish to do, it’s best to think about and consider the things that have caused you to be motivated in the past. Not only this, but also consider the things that you find hold you back, or strip you away from your motivation, so that you have the awareness of what impairs you, which then can bring you closer to having the motivation that you so desperately desire. If it is still not clear, then what does one do? An emotional desire cannot always be enough of a force, or a catalyst, to cause you to act, so what do you do then? Or perhaps, none of these things are applicable to you, but you find yourself wishing to stay motivated despite many things attempting to strip you of that quality, how would even handle that? I want to talk about my own experiences with motivation, and hopefully through them, you’ll understand at least how one person can search within themselves to find things that can either make them motivated or strip them of their motivation. Most commonly, I find that motivation can come from an urge to change things, to want more things, to want things that weren’t given to you as a child, from “higher” reasons, to become the most or best at something, or a deep emotional need for something. There are also the realities where you might emotionally need to do something, but you aren’t motivated, or you have negative variables pulling you down. Perhaps you might not even know what you want to do, but you want to do something, and you need motivation to start something, to even find out if you want to spend your time and effort on whatever the thing is.
When things are good, I find myself to be a person who can simply “do what they want.” Fortunately, for you, not for me, this is only the case when I feel mentally well, and it is clearly the minority of the time. Thus, like most people, I need motivation; I need something to give me a push or a force that tells me that I need to act. The first thing I want to focus on in the context of why I get motivated, and where that comes from, and how I continually use that, has to do with emotions. I mean this in the sense that I feel like I must do things because I emotionally feel discontent with what already is, and that alone is the sole motivator.
If I had all that I wanted already, speaking in the context of security and comfort anyway, I don’t think I would push as hard as I do with many of the things I care about. Suppose writing. I enjoy writing, and even if I weren’t in need of money, I still would be writing, but what changes is how often I would write, what I would write about, and who I would write for. I no longer would feel the need to write as much as possible, to put together just about anything on a weekly basis for a video, and I would spend a lot more time on each piece of writing because I would feel as if that option would be open to me. Obviously, as it is now, I feel pressure from myself to perform so that I might have a chance in reaching closer to what I want, this being income from things I enjoy doing… in this case, writing. Yes, there are more things, but this tends to be the most prominent thing, and the thing I have the most skill in, that could also be utilized as something that could then lead to monetary gain. On top of this, if I had already achieved that, from there, I would just continue what I’ve already been doing; however, I would likely decrease my rate of production.
As a result of being in the environment that I’m in, with the things that I do, I am emotionally always in need of something more. This more comes in the form of what I’m doing with my time, and because I’m emotionally upset at what I already spend the majority of my time doing, I want to change that. Wanting to change, and then actively working towards that change, are the qualities that define that motivation I feel when it comes to writing within the limitations of video creation. It is because I am discontent with the present world that I feel like I must alter it so that it is less agonizing. The emotional need for things to change also plays into the need to have more.
I want more. It’s pretty human to want more, however, the more that I’m wanting stays within certain parameters. Wanting to spend more time writing is a want that I have had for a long time, and when it is fulfilled, I feel much more content than when that isn’t the case. Having more time in general is a want of mine, and when my time is freed up, like when I’m not working, I once again, feel significantly better. I alter from someone who is distancing themselves away from reality to one who is actively experiencing every moment and staying aware of that fact. The need for more plays very closely into my emotional need for things to be different than what they already are. I’m emotionally in a state of discontent, and so I want things to be different, so that I may feel content. These two qualities play together to force me into a state of motivation. I want; therefore, I act, and the execution of my actions then leads to results, which only further promotes the actions being committed. The wants, aside from writing and finances, can be related to knowledge and understanding. I’ve always had a feeling that I need to know.
I have always felt a need to know and understand. Whatever it was, I wanted to know and understand it, and then continually fall down that endless abyss of comprehension and retention. Now, that has changed a bit, but the feelings that I must do it, even if it were simply for the sake of it, acted as a motivator. In the present, when I’m understanding or learning something, it usually has a pragmatic use that then would lead to action. Not only action after learning the information, but because what I’m learning will then lead to action further down the road, the action of learning is motivated by what will come later. There are times where I learn for fun because I simply feel good as a result of my learning, but when my time is more limited, I become more focused in how I’m spending my free-time. Examples of me acting in this way usually go back to the times where I was learning Premiere, some other Adobe software, and things within the realm of making content online. I spent time learning how to make a website so that I could make one, it wasn’t just for the sake of knowing how, it was in order to create something. Aside from wanting things that would make my life more satisfactory, there are wants within me that stem from not receiving certain things as a child.
There is a tendency for most people to have less-than-ideal parents. This is a struggle for just about everyone, and within that struggle, many of us don’t receive certain things when we are children. Due to this, we then, as adults, search out for these things, perhaps not even clearly knowing why. Basically, there are thoughts and feelings that arise as a result of not receiving certain things from your parents that should have been given to you. For example, if someone did not receive enough attention, this could lead them to acting and being motivated to do things that would then lead to them receiving attention. Of course, then you have people doing things in order to simply receive attention, whether that might be good or bad is irrelevant to the individual, because they simply want to be noticed. Any attention is what they want, and it is because they didn’t receive that attention as a child that they act the way they do as an adult. There is probably a plethora of things that I didn’t receive as a child, but there is one thing in particular that stands above the rest.
The most prominent thing I did not receive as a child that acts as the strongest motivator, at least to my awareness, is love. It may or may not sound insane to hear someone say they weren’t loved as a child, but things are much more nuanced than what that statement means standing on its own. I believe I was loved at certain ages, but it was due to my growth, from child to teenager, that I felt like I didn’t receive love. Why was this the case? How I perceived love was basically the same, but what changed was me. I no longer was a child that didn’t have any qualities to make them an individual. Before teenage years, I was a dumb, fat kid, and that’s fine, but because that’s all I was as a kid, I was easily lovable, and so I could feel that love, and I could love back. However, it was through my growth, that I no longer felt like I received the same love.
I grew, and became an individual, and the person I became was not someone who could be loved in the same way as in the past. I started having things I had to hide, and things I had to suppress, because if I didn’t, I wouldn’t receive what I would consider love, or really, I just would have preferred to not be hated. I didn’t feel lovable, because if I were lovable, why would I have to hide away all these aspects of myself? Why would I hate myself for being the person that I was? It caused many issues that still last today, but because I didn’t receive that love, that acceptance, I then sought it out in other ways. How I did that in the past is different from how I do it in the present.
In the past, I would seek out this “love” online, which in many cases, is not something that should be described here. However, in the present, I seek out love by sharing love, or at the very least, there is an attempt to do this. I try my hardest to share what I can, what I know, in order to help others, because I find that to be love. I accept others, no matter what they are, because that was something I did not receive. A quality I received from my parents, judgement, has led me to being a judgmental person. I am undeniably a person who judges, but in my judgement, there is acceptance. No matter what the person is, I accept them for that, because if I don’t, I only hurt the both of us. By sharing love, or trying to, I think it then leads to love being shared back to me, which is something that I desperately crave. I do the opposite of hiding away, I share everything, because I was once so afraid of sharing any aspect of myself, but once I no longer had to be afraid, it was all let out, and is continually let out, and I don’t know when it’ll stop. What I do know is that by expressing myself, especially in writing, I have felt much better, even in my darkest hours, than what I would normally experience even only a year or two ago. What I’ve described, at least for the most part, has been desires and motivators rooted in the material world, but I would like to think motivation extends beyond this.
What I’m speaking about is self-actualization of your internal world. Self-actualizing, the most that you can be, to look inwards to find the building blocks of self, yourself, and then using those to make more of you, is also a motivator. Without stepping into too abstract of territory, there are sometimes unexplainable qualities, like selflessness, which also act as motivators in many people. They play together with wanting change, whether in their internal world or the external one, or wanting to understand either or both of these. Whatever the case, something of note is that no matter what is causing the motivation, at least for myself, I am never interested in becoming the most or best of anything that I want to become or possess. The most, best, or ultimate of anything is always going to be out of grasp, and thus, at least for me, it acts as a poor motivator.
At first, it might seem like a good thing, to become the best at something, but after some time, you’ll realize how blinded you are to the world around you. It isn’t so simple. You have to be able to push yourself, forever, constantly, and always be in a state of pushing, because that is what it takes to become the best or number one of anything. Even when reaching the top, in a theoretical circumstance, although you never will, you will then have to continually maintain that position, because at that level, you still will have to push. Otherwise, someone will catch up with you and take the label you once had. I’ve known a few people who wanted this, or something like this, and perhaps they can get there, or something like it, but why do they want it in the first place?
This comes back to the lack of receiving something. This something is what they didn’t receive as a child, and now they act in such a way, as an adult, so that they might somehow receive it through their actions. They might have never received confirmation that what they’ve done is enough; if they were never told they were enough, or that they were doing enough, or that they didn’t have to be perfect, why would they try to be anything but perfect? The behavior learned is that anything below perfection is not enough. To be perfect is to be the best, because the best is as good as it gets, and if you’ve learned as a child that anything less is not enough, then when you’re older, you’ll indefinitely strive to be the most. While I don’t actively try to be the best or most of anything, I find myself striving for perfection, and I tend to associate with people who act in similar ways.
My striving for perfection used to be much worse. It was rooted in seeking approval from my parents. Everyone wants approval from their parents. They want to feel like they are enough, and they feel appreciated, not that no matter what they do, no matter how hard they try, it will never be enough to get the slightest amount of recognition. In my childish mind, I thought that perhaps I just needed to do more to get that approval. If my grades weren’t enough, then I’d have higher ones. When that didn’t matter to me, seemingly, my parents had a focus on grades, which hurt me, because I wanted approval in the ways that then did matter to me. I wanted to feel like there was approval of who I was, what I wanted to be, and my own feelings. Of course, I never did receive approval of those things, but rather, I received disapproval, and I accept that now, but it has only caused me issues both in the past and the present.
I can jokingly notice where my old systems of perfection are still present. Joking about having to practice something before anyone seeing me do it, or having anyone see me struggle, or anything like that, I’m aware of it, but that hasn’t stopped it from happening. Awareness is one part of the battle, but actually handling the thing, being able to do something about it, is a completely different beast. It used to be more extreme. If things had stayed as they originally were, I would be in a state of impairment when attempting to do anything, but especially creation. The things I write I’m completely aware have many issues, many errors, and are less than perfect, and will always be that way, but I used to think I shouldn’t write, or at least I should keep the writing to myself, because it was so embarrassing to be less than perfect. Eventually, I came to terms that I would never have a perfect piece of writing, or a perfect ability to do anything. I was always going to be imperfect, and I can accept that now, but the next layer of acceptance has to do with letting others see my struggles.
Everyone has to struggle in order to get what they want. I’m in a constant state of struggling for the things I desperately wish for, and the last thing I would want is for others to see that. I don’t want anyone to know about any of those processes. By anyone seeing any process, I am then, in a sense, naked. They are then aware of my lack of perfection; they’ll see all my errors and less than ideal choices. Being able to let others see this, and then being okay with it, is the next step in dealing with this whole system of perfection. I know it’s all irrational, but that doesn’t make it go away. This loops back to motivation, as the force to make me be more, or make something of a high quality, is rooted in belief that I need to be perfect.
I want perfection, or if you want to look at it in a different way, I’ve been conditioned to strive for perfection. Due to this, the need to be perfect acts as my catalyst to then making something of a high quality, or at least, what I would consider a high quality. That alone is the motivator to me striving for perfection. In whatever I do, I want it to be good. This then leads me to being very picky and specific with what media I will watch, read, or listen to. If I find that it isn’t up to my standards of quality, then I will drop it, because as I know now, you become whatever you internalize, and if you want to be closer to perfection than imperfection, you want to internalize what you perceive as the highest possible quality. Just the same, what I make, I want it to be what I perceive as perfect, and as we all know, that isn’t possible, but despite this, I try to make something as good as I am capable of. This means it could be quite terrible, but if that is the best I can do, then that’s what is done. What I believe to be of even greater importance than perfection is the need to make anything at all, and that’s how I’m able to do anything. I have to make things, or so I’ve made myself believe, and because of that, I am then able to create without feeling like the end result of whatever I’m making has to be without any type of error. The things that I do, especially writing, appeal to my emotional needs, and without them, I don’t know what I would do with a lot of my feelings.
The need to do a lot of the things that I already do has to do with my emotions. I’ve spoken extensively on things like internalization and externalization, and that’s because I find those things to be incredibly important to me. I’m always thinking about them, and how I act in accordance to those ideas will affect how I feel and what I do. This goes onto say that there are things that I use for self-expression, or externalization, or whatever you want to label it as. There are things within me that need to get out, because if they aren’t let out, I then let my internal world become more chaotic, more insufferable, and I want to distance myself from it, and by doing so, things only continually get worse. This is all going on to say that I need something like writing in order to appeal to myself emotionally, and because I need that so strongly, it too, acts a motivator in making me write.
Creating a supposed world where I don’t feel like I have to get out the internal on paper or some other medium, there would be no qualities of self that have left me that have a level of concreteness. To clarify, I’m saying that I wouldn’t have something like a sheet of paper or document that someone else could read and then look into who I am, what I am, and how I came to be. Nor could they, whether directly or indirectly, learn of my values and ideas. These things could be obtained in very direct interactions, like conversation, but they forever would be fleeting and minimal, however, I believe that for many people, that’s simply enough. I enjoy a good conversation; I want to engage with individuals to grab qualities from them that I like, and I love to give them some back, but I find that it’s never enough. Unfortunately, with something like conversation, it feels like I never get myself out properly, I’m never the me that can write and sift through all my thoughts and feelings, work through them, and then come to some end piece, which is never truly the end, because I could continually work on anything I’ve written forever, but I can decide to stop, and that gives me some amount of control.
Aside from writing, there are other things that emotionally tick for me that are motivating. I find that drawing can help me at times, but because of my inactivity, I lack a certain level of quality, and as I’ve described already, if I want it to be perfect, whatever it is I’m drawing, then I’m going to be disappointed. Yet, in many cases, I was able to look past that, and just try to get myself out on paper, which then helped me feel better. I became inactive because I started focusing more strongly on writing, and when you don’t have the time to play around in many different mediums, you’ll probably divert back on the track that you feel you have walked down the most and that you have the most comfort in. Music is similar to this, because I would say in many ways, I am incredibly undeveloped musically. However, just by playing around on bass or guitar, I am able to give myself something, even if that something is small. I know that the way for me to get more out of it is to continually practice, and I accept that, but I don’t always act in such a way. I’m not always practicing, sometimes I really just want to sit on what I have for a bit, and I think that’s okay too. My focus has gone from mostly guitar to mostly bass, because I find that more strongly aligns with my thinking, and because of that, I am able to express myself more comfortably. It’s still very much a work in progress, but it is nice to have something rather than nothing, because in the situation where writing isn’t working, I still will feel a need to get something out, and if I don’t have any other means to externalizing, I might start combusting. The motivator for doing any of these things is simply my emotional need to get things out. If it hurts to stay in a certain state, and you know how to obtain a release, then wouldn’t you go ahead and strive towards that release?
For me, it’s easy to say that one should release their inside worlds upon the outside world if it were to make them feel better. It’s only recently, relative to my whole lifetime, that I’ve been doing many of the things that I do now. It was only in the past few years that I began writing more often, and then being able to share that writing was another layer of difficulty. The quality many years ago was terrible, and I can only imagine what the future version of myself a few years in the future will think about the words on a page like this. The point is, I’ve been at it for a while, and while I can feel upset at the fact that there are those who have started much earlier than myself, there are similarly many of those who have not started at all, and are my age, or might even be older. They have some emotional need to get these things out but don’t know how, or perhaps don’t know why they feel like there are bottles that need to be opened, and the safe way to open those is to slowly let the liquid from within dribble out in actions that showcase the contents of the bottles. There is likely a tendency for this type of person, or even the person who does want to make things, or has in the past, but feels they are lacking in motivation; the drive to do the thing they once loved doing so dearly. Emotionally, they might want to do it, but if the mental ticks that actually tell them to do it aren’t present, what might one do?
The disappointing answer is that sometimes you simply have to wait. If you don’t feel motivated now, but you did in the past, there could be many different reasons for your idleness. It depends on your own situation, which means it could range from self-hatred to burnout. It would be too time consuming to assess each particular theoretical situation, but what can be done is assessing what could be done during this waiting period. It doesn’t mean you have to give up the thing you want to do but it does mean being able to accept a period of doing things that don’t align with your main interest or focus. If your brain isn’t quite online yet, you have to consider the things you should do when it’s offline, and then work within those boundaries. At the very least, I’ll make mention of some of the things I do, and why I do them, and how they work for me, but also the limitations of them.
One obvious and big thing that I do during a dry period is read. I might be reading all the time, but it’s a matter of how much I’m reading and what is being read. During a period where I want to write, but can’t find the words, nor the ideas, I run back to literature with my tail between my legs to find out what the construction of words is supposed to look like, because in many cases, it feels like I forget. In these circumstances, not only does it feel like I forgot how to put all the words together, I forgot what those words would be all about. Ideas are stemmed from other things, and those things tend to be books, at least for me, and so if I minimize the amount of time I read in comparison to the time I write, there will inevitably come a time where I must read in order to freshen up my mind a bit. I have to take a lot more in than what I put out, and I accept this, but simply accepting it is not enough; I have to act in accordance to it. Otherwise, I won’t have a flowing movement where I consistently write and read, but instead, moments where I write a lot and then moments where I read a lot. This same idea can then be moved into other pieces of media, of which I have interest in, but I find are likely main “things” for other people.
If you’re a musician and you find yourself in a dry period, but you desperately want to make music, what are you ought to do? Well, there are a few options. It depends on your choice of music creation, too, but to limit things down, let’s say you play a particular instrument. You could play that particular instrument a lot, but during this period of time, you could either practice a lot or play around a lot. The benefit of practice would be that you might not feel creatively there, but by practicing, you can increase your capabilities beyond what was previously possible, which then would open up doors that were closed not so long ago, which then could inspire you to do new things you haven’t thought about before. If you play around, you might stay at the same skill level, but it could enable you to try things you hadn’t thought about trying before, or finding things that you would’ve never expected. The final method, which goes along with what I do, is simply listening to music. Listen to music you like, and look for qualities you enjoy within that music. Give it as much attention as you can, and listen to each particular instrument, and ask yourself questions while listening. Try to understand why you like it, and if it’s something you want to replicate, ask yourself how you’re going to get there. This is going to be a bit repetitive, but something like drawing is going to be similar.
If you’re an artist that deals with physical mediums, many of the things already mentioned, like dealing with a dry period as a musician, are similar and can be transposed to fit the different medium. You can play around with new drawing materials, or draw things you normally would never draw, or you could search for art that you normally wouldn’t look at. You could also look at the art you normally enjoy, and focus deeply upon it, to really understand it, and to search for the nuances within it, and once again, decide if that’s something you would want to replicate in your own work. Feel open to being influenced, but in doing so, be intelligent in what you choose to be influenced by. This is all towards motivation, because you want to draw, but don’t have the catalyst to do so, but if you continually expose yourself with what you love, it will almost act as a reminder of why you should be doing it, instead of simply looking at it or thinking about making it. However, in this circumstance, the reason you aren’t motivated isn’t because of something pulling you down, but because you simply don’t feel the urgency to do the thing. What might someone do if they feel like there are forces pushing them down which inhibit them from doing what they want?
If you want to run every day, but you dread the exhaustion from running, and it sounds utterly terrible to you, how can you get yourself into a mindset that moves you forward and stops the negative thoughts from holding you back? In this example, we’re dealing with the mental world, so that means you can, with some time, stop thinking. The thoughts want to hold you back, but you don’t have to be held back by them. Instead, you can “just start.” Instead of thinking about how agonizing the thing is, or how incompetent you are, or whatever excuse that you might want to come up with, if you just start, then you’re already in. Starting is the hardest part, but if you start, then the hardest part is over. At least for myself, I think there’s a tendency to continue whatever it is I’m doing once I have begun. Yes, I get tired, and I get distracted, my mind will inevitably drift off, but the main task is still my general focus, and even if loosely, I hold onto that. If I don’t start, then I’m going to be only in a state of variability, drifting from one place to the next, never concretely holding onto anything. This might work if you’re dealing with mental variables holding you back, but what about things outside of you?
In many cases, sacrifice is a necessity. While I was at my relatively cozy contract position, I had to make sacrifices in order to read and write. I wasn’t able to genuinely rest while on my breaks, there was always something I had to do, and if I felt utterly depleted, then those things didn’t happen, but if I had enough power within me, it always did happen. I might have work holding me back, and I might be so utterly tired when getting home that I can’t get anything done; so much so that I just fall asleep when touching my bed, but I then had to learn how to work around these things. I sacrificed having a genuine break, but in that, I was able to do the things I wanted to do, even if only for short periods of time. If something is pushing you down, then you simply might have to cut it out. I could say it a thousand times, but my parents only pushed me down, being in that environment pushed me down to the point of almost never doing anything, and me rising to try and do anything while there was one of my greatest struggles. The reality was, and what I did, was remove myself from that environment, and that was a sacrifice, because those people are also out of my life, but that also means they no longer can hold me down. Cut out the things that harm you or pull you down, because otherwise, they’ll continue to do so, and if you really want to do the things you think you do, then it shouldn’t even be questionable. All of these circumstances speak in the context of you already having something you want to do, and you know what you want to do, but are lacking the motivation or having your motivation suppressed. There are many out there, or even simply situations, where you want to do something, but don’t know what, and lack the motivation to find out, what then?
The reality is, it’s very similar to the running example, which means that you’ll just have to start doing the thing. However, the difference is, you don’t know what to start, nor do you have the force to push you there. If you don’t know, then spend time thinking about it, and if you’ve already done that and came up empty handed, ask your loved ones what they think you should do. This doesn’t mean you should follow their word, but it can give you ideas as to what, at the very least, you should try. You could even be reactionary, just trying random things until something sticks, but if you want to go down that route, be willing to give each thing enough time to truly find out if it works for you or not. Simply trying to find out will get you somewhere, but it might take a while, and you’ll have to accept that. This is only part of the equation though. Where does the motivation or urgency come from which enables you to start searching in the first place?
If you have the want to do something, then that means motivation is present. It’s a matter of acknowledging and fostering it. Allow yourself to want, and then use that want to act. Motivation is not some magical thing, and if you simply focus on your wants, use that as a catalyst to move yourself forward. If you want to do something, but don’t know what, and don’t have the motivation to search, then starting thinking that you do. The idea is that you lie to yourself, but really, you aren’t lying to yourself; lies become truth, after all. Lie to yourself, or truth to yourself, if you want to word it differently, that you do have motivation, and that you do want to try things, and keep telling yourself that, and even if slowly, start doing things. It doesn’t matter what it is you do, just do something, and then continually do things, and increase the abstractness of the thing you do, until you can find yourself comfortable at a particular place. It isn’t going to be easy, but no one said it would be, and you also have to be okay with that. It wasn’t easy to get where I am now, and it won’t be easy to get where I’m going, but I’ve accepted this path as the only one I could go down.
Motivation is not so simple, it seems. It is something that inevitably is going to take a lot of time and effort to work through and understand, but in your new apprehension, you can start to tackle what was once so confusing and hard to find. Search for motivation, do things to make yourself motivated, and get yourself inspired. Hopefully by sharing some of my experiences with motivation, you’ll understand how I’ve made it to the point of actively working on things, feeling the urgency to do things, and what I do when motivation isn’t present. Maybe you’ve noticed where I want change, to want more out of the things I do, and ways that I am motivated as a result of not being given certain things as a child. Other reasons for motivation, like becoming the best at something, hopefully are now seen as not desirable, or less desirable than before, as it is something that unfortunately is not achievable, and will likely lead to despair. I continually will develop, and that means I will learn new ways to keep myself motivated, and that entails large amounts of questioning towards myself, and I suggest you do the same. Do the things you want to do, and if you don’t know what you want to do, start searching now, not later.