Motivation.
Once you get a taste, a glimpse, or even an experience of something that isn’t familiar to you, it can either drive you down a rabbit hole, allow you to rethink your place within the world, or completely divert your path in a new direction. For me this is motivation, it is a taste of the unknown with the idea that you’ll eventually get to a place of known.
I’m motivated by this: creating money doing what I love to do. Making work, life, balance an everyday occurrence, not just something that I get to taste every once in a while. Money right now is the answer to that solution, entrepreneurship is also an answer to that solution. I know what I am motivated by and it’s great because I can look forward to progressing towards my goal of owning more time.
But, what if you aren’t motivated by any of these things, what if you’re not really motivated to do anything at all.
That’s more common now than I’d like to believe and I think there are solutions. First we have to look at why people aren’t motivated to understand how to solve that problem.
As entertaining as the media is, it absolutely is the biggest motivation killer there is. We live in a world of instant communication, which in its own right is more useful than not. But, it also is a segway to instant gratification, which I think is fundamentally a flawed trait for humans to have.
It’s really funny to think that we look down on gambling in a lot of ways, yet partake in it everyday. If you own a smart device, or any piece of electronics, you are absolutely triggering the same neural responses as if you were gambling. The constant release of dopamine is killing motivation amongst people globally. We gamble by watching, reacting, and listening to advertising all the time. It’s propaganda fueled by people who know how to absorb and are rewarded for retaining our attention. As we scroll and see kids in flashy cars, people with giant yachts, or successful businesses, we are triggering a release of dopamine in our minds that either motivates, or absolutely crush our ambitions. The best part is, if you aren’t motivated by any of the things I just listed, you likely have an algorithm tailored to your interests and are getting blitzkrieged by dopamine the same way I do when I watch these videos.
The fundamental flaw for humans to have instant gratification is that you don’t learn character traits that withstand hardship. As fun as it is to dream about being in the shoes of some of these people, you didn’t get to see the work they put in to get them into these positions. You don’t get the bigger picture, you get the most attention grabbing substance they can feed you. When something works, like fear mongering or flaunting, your subconscious can’t tell the difference if these aren’t your thoughts. We are absolutely the byproduct of our environment and if we are constantly fueling our perception that we are in a state of lack or the world’s ending, then we are going to feel unmotivated to do anything.
There are a couple solutions out of this starting with the easiest. Limit the amount of time you absorb other people’s opinions, whether that be media (books, social media, podcasts, etc.) or advice from anyone that isn’t you. It’s really important to know yourself, and it’s incredibly difficult to do if you constantly absorb the information of the environment you surround yourself in. Having your own thoughts, opinions, interests is essential in knowing what you want. Having a clear visual agenda of where you want to be in your life then directs your attention to the people that will help get you there. Instead of watching or consuming brain rot, you can listen to stories of people who have bettered their situation and learn ways in which you might be able to do the same. Sorry to break it to anyone that needs it but, you most likely won’t be an overnight success, and it may take way longer than you think it will. Great news is, it has always been like that. Motivation is the starter, discipline and habits are learned through time, trial, and iteration.
Another solution for finding motivation is by changing your environment. Whether that be: traveling, working another job, moving into a house you can’t quite afford, or checking off some bucket list items. This is a great way to find what you’re good at. By changing your environment you force yourself to figure out how to adapt. In a state of complacency we are quick to build patterns in our heads, often leaving us stuck and unmotivated. By changing your environment you step outside of the comfort zone you built up through your patterns. Often building up new skills and foundations in search of making our lives easier. By setting the boundary of what we once thought was achievable just far enough within reach, but not totally within our bearings, we often find solutions that may not have presented themselves previously. Motivation sometimes isn’t about not wanting to do anything, it’s more about not having the right perspective.
The last one I’ll touch on is finding what you’re interested in by picking up hobbies. Having hobbies gives you multiple facets to be purposeful in. Purpose is the most essential thing in everyone's life, and honestly I think it’s the main reason people feel the way they do when they are unmotivated or happy. When you have a purpose or feel purposeful, you set aside some of the noise in your life and get to focus on something that makes you feel. Like I was saying earlier, the reason we motivate ourselves to do something is because of the unknown, and having a purposeful life opens the doors to more of the known. If you know what you like, you’re naturally going to continue to put yourself into more of those positions, and as that evolves you may be completely askew from where you started. That is the beauty of not knowing, you’re forced to follow the path of least resistance, guiding yourself based upon the depth of your knowns.
I hope this helps some people, I know I haven’t been feeling motivated in the last couple weeks. The more I keep chipping away at my goals, the more I feel appreciative of lessons I’ve gotten to experience. They wouldn’t have been there if I didn’t step into the unknown.
Thanks for reading.
With love,
Kai
Weekly Poem:
That book you’ve been waiting to read
That podcast that you’ve been waiting to listen to
That canvas you’ve been waiting to paint
Has all the signs you need if you know how to listen
