What is motivation? Why it's useless and what you actually need.
Ever heard of the infamous 2 am motivation? Why does it happen at ghastly hours and why does it only come about once in a blue moon? If everyone had 2 am motivation every single day, the world would be a vastly different place, with far more advanced people, and the human race would've already transformed into a multiplanetary species with advanced technology. And yet, it hasn't happened. It dies down quicker than the promises made by politicians during their campaigns.
The reason is quite simple. Motivation is a feeling. Feelings change. Especially for complicated creatures like us. Motivation depends on a multitude of factors such as mood, energy, sleep, confidence, the weather and perhaps a random comment someone made about you in a school reunion party three years ago. There are simply too many weak links. If you only work when you are motivated, your progress will look something like:
Big burst, long gap, guilt, another burst, repeat.
Sound familiar? This alone is proof enough that motivation is not the key that opens the door to a future that you envision. But then, what is? Before that, we need to dive into why the motivation farce is still ever so prevalent despite the continued denial of effectiveness.
The Motivation Industry
Let's talk about motivational content for a moment. There's an endless torrent of this nowadays.
Loud music yelling you're the only one you've got and nothing but your goal matters.
Someone screaming their lungs out.
Black and white clips of people lifting heavy things, running through valleys and climbing mountains.
Quotes that sound deep and make sense at the moment and perhaps even "motivate" you but do nothing.
These things don't exist to change you or the situation you are in. They exist to generate some quick cash to those who actually figured out the game. Think about it. How many videos with titles like, "Give me 7 minutes and I will change your life" have you watched?
This industry runs on the guilt of people who simply want a better life, but don't know the boring, millennium old trick that actually works and instead give in to these temporary highs.
The Boring Old Trick
"You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems."
~James Clear
International best selling author, James Clear, himself has made it extremely clear in his book "Atomic Habits" that it is the small things you do everyday that add up to something greater.
The boring old trick that every legend knew since the dawn of civilization is this.
Find what you are good at. Do it. Do it again. Now do it better. Not yet, you can do it even better. Years pass. There, you are one of the greats now.
See how simple that was? Simple, yet not easy. Obvious, yet so shrouded in mystery and nonsensical waves made by the industry.
"I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times."
~Bruce Lee
Let's say you practice any kick of your choice, but only that one, just ten times a day. In 3 years, you will have practiced it over 10,000 times. And anyone can practice just one kick 10 times a day. And all they have to do is continue that for 3 years and you are now someone that the legendary Bruce Lee fears. But instead, most of us practice 10 types of kicks 100 times each every day for a week, resolving to be greater than Bruce Lee and when you burn out, you are now the very type of man that he said he does not fear.
The secret is obvious. Pick something simple. Do it over and over and over again till you are one of the best at it. It doesn't take some incredible pain tolerance and constant waking up at unrealistic hours or hardening of the body and mind to achieve great things. But it does take patience. And a lot of it.
Identity
People act the way they believe themselves to be. If you believe that you are lazy, then your subconscious has all the ammunition it needs to turn you into one. The same goes for the opposite. If you actually believe that you are a productive person, then you automatically act like one. However, switching beliefs like that isn't easy. But it is extremely important. Fortunately, it blends perfectly when you have a boring system in place.
Your self identity is who you believe yourself to be. How does it come to being? The same way you judge what someone else's identity is. You observe their speech and actions and decide that they are this sort of person. Whether or not it is true is irrelevant since it is their behavior that led to whatever conclusion you made about them. Similarly, you have access to all your speech, actions, thoughts, desires, past memories and such. Your self identity is what you have judged yourself to be, based on all those factors that you have observed about yourself. Hence, it is not easy to change any preconceived conclusions that you have made about yourself.
It is, however, possible and it doesn't take any extra work. You just have to set a workable system or set of doable habits in place and the more you carry out these habits and mingle in this system, the more you'll believe that you are the person that this system is meant to produce.
"That which is asserted without evidence can be rejected without evidence."
~Christopher Hitchens
Hitchens has perfectly summed up what this means. Temporary 2 am motivation makes you temporarily believe that you are now a person who'll go beyond the greatest of obstacles and be great. But there is no evidence of that in your identity and hence it'll be cast out within a matter of hours. However, when you do have an evidential assertion, it cannot be rejected.
When you perpetually carry out your systems, you garner evidence that you are a person who follows his system. This leads to further reinforcement which leads to further evidence. Carry this out long enough and your identity will have fully warped into what you wanted it to be when you started out with your system. It is as simple as that.
Closing Thoughts
Motivation can help time and time again, as long as you have a workable system in place. Remember not to overdo it, since that almost certainly will lead to eventual burnout. It's boring, but it has thousands of years' worth of success stories and all that evidence is undeniable.
"Most people overestimate what they can do in one year and underestimate what they can do in ten years."
~Bill Gates
Build simple habits and systematically carry them out on a daily basis on the designated times. Make sure they don't take much effort and friction, and make sure it is designed in such a way that it can be done even on days that bring about unexpected surprises. The best of systems are the flexible ones, since they stick around the longest.
The daily effort may feel small and insignificant, but a decade long effort rewrites your reality.