Understanding Motivation

 It has been said that the hardest part in doing something is starting it, however sustained efforts of multiple activities becoming increasingly difficult to maintain as so many things are vying for our attention. Whether family, friends, work, or personal likes/interest attempt to grasp our attention, it seems there surely is something else we could afford to give more time to.

So then how do you remain energized and attentive throughout all facets of life?

“Motivation, defined as the energizing of behavior in pursuit of a goal, is a fundamental element of our interaction with the world and with each other,”1 Simpson writes.

When playing sports, this writer’s coach use to always say, “only you know if you are giving full effort,” in the context of running in earnest doing wind sprints. He would continue,” only you know what’s going on in those 6” between your shoulders.” The same can be said for anything in life. Only the person performing the activity truly knows if that is all they can expend at that moment on the given task.

Sure, others can measure and compare past efforts to the current and say the performer isn’t measuring up, however aliments, mental fatigue, physical exhaustion among other things could be affecting the one acting and prohibiting them from replicating or even exceeding past endeavors. Or they could simply have their mind elsewhere not focused on the task at hand.

How then, do you move forward despite the pain, or even assurance that this effort won’t be as good as the last time or produce the same results or better?

E.O. Wilson writes, “Beliefs are, or at least involve, dispositions or readinesses to act as if something were the case or were a fact.”2 One must be convinced that their efforts are not in vain. No matter how insignificant it may seem, or how insurmountable the task appears, as long as reason, logic, and realistic expectations have been used in goal setting, one can move forward in their endeavors knowing that one step closer is, indeed just that, ONE STEP CLOSER.

It’s easy to get swept up in the fast-moving zeitgeist and lose grounding in reality, however we live in the now and are moving towards the hereafter, so find solace in knowing that our current efforts are what produces our future measures. No one expects an ear of corn to sprout out of the ground without first planting a kernel. So, continue to plant kernels expecting a field full of corn, and should the harvest not prove as bountiful as one could hope, fret not but be content for the gains that were reaped and used that as fuel for the next season of sowing.

Dr. Michelle Segar gives a great acronym for this kind of thinking namely SMART (Self-Care, Mindful, Autonomous, Respectful, Tolerant). In short, she has found through her experiences of helping and working with people that even with results, those results aren’t what keep a person moving or exercising. She then found that we have to reevaluate our mindset, which affects our behaviors, and we must be sensitive to ourselves and realistic in our expectations that we set.3

1 Simpson, Eleanor H, and Peter D Balsam. “The Behavioral Neuroscience of Motivation: An Overview of Concepts, Measures, and Translational Applications.” Current topics in behavioral neurosciences vol. 27 (2016): 1-12. doi:10.1007/7854_2015_402

2 (E. O. Wilson, Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge, Knopf, 1998