What inspires you?
A friend and ex-colleague was recently on a work retreat "prize" for being one of the top sellers in the company, along with other top performers and of course, various management who had done very little. 60 employees and their plus-ones spent a week in the Virgin Islands at an exclusive resort for what he described as a one in a lifetime experience. He said that if he and his partner got away with a lunch under 200 dollars, he felt lucky. The rooms to the public were around 3000 dollars a night, meals and everything else were crazy expensive, and all this while the company is getting rid of people.
Typical.
At the end of the trip, the president of sales gave a very American speech about how the people back home aren't happy for them, are jealous, and next year they will be gunning to take their spot at the table etc. My friend (who is an American in Finland) was pretty uninspired by this call to competition, and the Finns were even less impressed.
It is an interesting situation though, because what it highlighted is the difference between personal motivations, and how some people believe that the only inspiring factor is money. Sure, most people like to have money and more is better than less, but the majority of people are not inspired by making more money, especially when it is obvious that like this guy (who is part of the venture capital buyer group) benefits directly from it. His motivations are clear, but he hasn't put much thought into what inspires others.
A common problem for sure.
For instance, I often write about various health improvement areas, because it is an area that both interests me and I am keen to develop myself in. Yet, while I wish more people would take their health seriously, I understand that many people aren't inspired by the journey to good health, even if they want healthy outcomes. Perhaps, for me it is important because I have spent so much of my life in ill-health, that I value the scarcity of good health. Perhaps it isn't important for others because they haven't yet experienced a huge amount of poor health. Or maybe it isn't because they are unable to connect the outcome they want strongly enough to motivate them to take the journey toward it.
It is similar with most things I assume, where people who have never known what it is like to not have money, needn't focus their attention too much on making it. And perhaps as a result, they make it more easily because they are doing what they do to make money, engaging in the journey, not the destination.
I have the opposite experience with health and money, where I have developed a scarcity mindset, so the outcome is important, and while I try to focus on the journey, it can get very difficult, because it is not where my true interest lays. But the journey requires investment, consistency, and adjustment. It needs to be taken seriously in the sense that it is these things we do, that lead to all the results we have. Because even though there is a lot of random interventions that can take place, the general trend is going to align to our general activity.
motivation
/ˌməʊtɪˈveɪʃn/
Motivation is the internal or external driving force that initiates, guides, and maintains goal-oriented behaviors. It is the process that fuels, directs, and sustains effort toward achieving a specific outcome, acting as the "reason" for actions. It includes activation (deciding to act), intensity (vigor of effort), and persistence (continuing despite obstacles).
As some one who has had the majority of theirs taken away in an unexpected medical event, I believe so. Yet it is also interesting, because while a lot of people want to "live in the moment" of life, motivation can't be derived from the moment. Even though the actions are all performed in the moment, motivation requires a pressure from the past that pushes, or a gravity from the future that pulls. For it to be an internal force, it really has to be part of the process prior to the action.
Are you motivated?
For many, I think motivation is a bit more like a passing infatuation, it doesn't last. It is the passion of attraction, but not enough to build the consistency that turns it into love. As they say, do something you love and you will never work a day in your life. But that is of course bullshit, because when you love something, you will work like a slave for it. When you are motivated to do the work consistently for something one loves, there is more than just the reward of accomplishment, but there is also the feeling of purpose.
Is purpose important?
Again, I think so. I reckon a lot of the problems we have in the world today at the societal level are caused by a lack of meaningful purpose. People are chasing all kinds of things, but very little of it is truly relevant enough to make us feel part of something larger than ourselves in a way where we are advancing humanity. Most of it is instead adversarial, where people's meaning comes from being in a movement against something, rather than a series of actions that grow something.
And I think this takes us back to the start, where the sales leader was trying to motivate people, but fell flat because he assumed their motivations. He expected that it is enough for them to feel purpose in making him richer, and themselves, for the potential of a fancy holiday for a few days. Nothing he said spoke to the growth of the individual needs, just money. Maybe that isn't his job to motivate people, but these days, when everyone just about is working to fulfil the dreams of an owner they will never meet, personal purpose is being lost.
And a holiday doesn't make up for a life of meaningless activity.
Taraz
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