Effectivity

Find Your Motivation Switch

If you were to look at my life as I worked on two different activities, you might be tempted to believe that you are looking at two different people.  If you saw me dragging myself dejectedly through paperwork, scratching my head as I try to submit my annual tax return, you would have trouble believing that this was the same person that you observed early that morning getting up before the sun to write and to train.  You see, I am just like any other person, in that some things flick my motivation switch, while others don’t come even close.  Does this sound familiar?

Everyone has things like this in their life:  some that are inherently motivating while others are 100% demotivating. 

The amazing part of all this is that often it is not the activity itself that switches us on or off, but just a few aspects of the activity.  For example with my tax situation, it surprises me that I don’t find it more motivating.  I enjoy mathematical processes, I have a good understanding about the way cash flows around a business, I am a big fan of systematisation, but somehow that isn’t enough.  Tax, for me is a never-ending loop.  I never really get the feeling of completion because as I am filling out forms for one period the next has already begun.  I never get the sense that I am getting anywhere.  So I find it very demotivating.  This is one of only a few things that aren’t motivating for me when it comes to tax time. 

On the other hand, I don’t particularly like getting up early, I don’t like the feeling of missing sleep, I miss waking up at the same time as my family and I would much rather keep the same time schedule as a “normal” person.  But despite all of these things I am still highly motivated to get up early.  The main benefit for me is that I am able to use the time early in the day exactly as I choose.  It is my time, there hasn’t been any opportunity for anything else to intervene at that early time and so I do as I have planned and I do it in peace.  For me that is extremely motivating.

What is your switch?  More than likely you will have a few answers to this and they may play a part in a number of different situations.  While one motivation switch may play a part in social interactions, another totally different one may work in a business context.  The most important thing to realise, is that what switches on your motivation is 100% personally yours.  It can’t be adopted from someone else or pushed onto you.  It must come from within.  Since you are a unique person, you have a unique motivation switch.

In order to find your own motivation switch(s) you simply have to look at what is working for you at the moment.  What situations are you currently in that make you feel motivated?  If you had free time to do more of one thing that you are currently doing, what would you choose? Then carefully look at these things and decide what you could take away from them and still find them motivating.  For example, if you find surfing highly motivating, would you still feel the same if you had to do it by yourself, if you had to do it in a polluted and unattractive ocean, if you did not consider it to be a healthy way to spend time.  Sooner or later, you will discover one aspect that stands out to you as the switch that controls your motivation.  Without this one thing, the activity loses its motivation for you.

Once you have discovered this motivation switch you now have a valuable insight into your inner workings.  Rather than believing that you find surfing motivating, you now believe that anything that includes (for example) an individual challenge that you can share with others, can potentially be highly motivating.  This will now help you to decide in advance, if you will be able to sustain involvement in a new activity, based on whether or not it contains your motivation switch.  

If an activity does not include your motivation switch naturally, in some cases it may be possible to add the switch artificially, to help your motivation.  For example, meditation is commonly an individual challenge that is pursued in isolation and privacy.  If your motivation switch is individual challenges that can be shared with others, then you may be out of luck.  That is, until you create a community of like minded meditators who meet up to discuss your experiences and practices.  This could be enough to switch on your motivation to enable you to continue with the activity, staying motivated indefinitely.  In cases like these, the ability to add our own motivation switch really just depends on our creativity. 

We have to remember, that it is also quite easy to overuse a motivation switch to the point that it becomes powerless.  If we discover that an effective switch for our motivation is vigorous mental gymnastics, then we can be tempted to include an aspect of this intellectual stimulus in all of our activities.  Very quickly, we would find that this switch would lose its power and may even turn into a de-motivation switch as we rapidly approached mental exhaustion or staleness.  This is another example of too much of a good thing.

If we find one switch that we believe is particularly powerful for our motivation, then it may be worth leaving it for extremely important activities.  In much the same way that you might leave a prized shirt or necklace for only the most important events, we can benefit from having this “super-switch” in our store ready to be used when we really need it.  This will mean that it retains it’s motivating power and this may even become stronger as it is denied on more mundane occasions.  One example may be that you find the process of being totally, selfishly and obsessively focused on one activity (even for a short time) to be highly motivating.  You would love to add this switch to your stamp collecting hobby or your daily reading habit, but instead you decide to put it away for special occasions.  You keep it in store for the time that comes around each year when you are given a short time to produce and submit a short film to a competition that is very important to you.  You save this obsessive, focus switch for that one time each year and it holds, and even increases, its power to motivate you.

So why not set about the process of finding out what are the switches that control your motivation?  Take a list of activities that you are motivated to carry out.  Prune and trim away at them until only the essential motivation switch remains and write this on a card to carry in your wallet.  Use it to assess the likeliness of your motivation lasting for any length of time in a new activity or pursuit.  You can also use the same process in reverse to discover de-motivation switches.  Once you have isolated these, you will be able to keep a look out for them and then you will be able to predict which activities will de-motivate you given the chance.  Finally, you will be ready to start deliberately using your motivation switches to help you achieve your life goals.  Used sparingly, these switches have the potential to keep you going towards your destination over time, obstacles and changing circumstances.

You might be asking why I have not used this technique yet with my tax paperwork?  Good question, and I guess the only answer is that I am human.  I am only able to work on a few areas of my life at once.  If my tax paperwork was higher up on my priorities then I would have dealt with it long ago.  As it is the Government will have to wait, I hope they understand.

Please leave a comment below about what you have found to be your motivation switch.

Thanks

Tom