Motivation – the most overrated feeling

After luck and talent, today we will look at motivation. You may be wondering what the title means, since motivation is often discussed in management and leadership. We talk about how to motivate employees, we talk about internal and external motivation... Yet motivation is probably the most overrated feeling.

What is motivation?

Of course, there is no single universal definition of motivation, and I am not claiming to have one, but for the purposes of this article, I will define motivation as

An emotional stimulus that influences an individual's will to act in order to achieve a certain goal.

In other words, "I feel motivated (= emotional stimulus) to exercise (= action) in order to lose weight (= some goal)."

We often talk about external and internal motivation, although we should rather talk about external and internal goals.

External motivation

We have external motivation when the goal comes from outside:

• money/reward

• being liked by someone

• recognition

• trying to avoid punishment

Internal motivation

We have internal motivation when the goal comes from within:

• joy from the activity itself

• curiosity

The problem with motivation

Motivation as a feeling

The fundamental problem with motivation is that it is a feeling. One day you have it, the next you don't... Feelings change from day to day. The desire to achieve something struggles with the boredom of the activities necessary to achieve that goal. The effort to improve struggles with feelings of inadequacy.

You cannot rely on motivation in the long term.

Ask yourself how many times you have started something new. Maybe you started learning something? Maybe you started exercising? Maybe you decided to start your own private project... How long did it take you to give up? A few days? A few weeks?

The feeling of enthusiasm and motivation was replaced by a feeling of boredom, frustration, and "why am I actually doing this?"

External motivation

The situation is even worse in the case of external motivation. External motivation lasts even less time than internal motivation.

Less experienced managers often use external motivation, both positive (salary) and negative (dismissal), as a tool to control their subordinates. And although salary and possible dismissal are tools that even an experienced manager must know how to use, they are not used as motivation. Salary is a reward for work performed, representing contribution and position. Dismissal is a possible consequence of inadequacy or redundancy. However, neither can be used as motivation. Enthusiasm for a higher salary quickly fades, and it is difficult to build on negative motivation.

Leaders seek alignment between what they need and what drives employees internally.

Gratification

Gratification is the satisfaction of achieving a goal. And it works like a drug. We want something, we get it, and a flood of chemicals is released in the brain (dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, endorphins). This is a natural reaction that evolved and was necessary for the survival of the species and the individual at the time.

But today? In an age of such easy gratification? There are many ways to achieve gratification very quickly. Why work on a project whose results are distant and uncertain when I can open a bag of chips and go to bed instead? Delayed gratification vs. immediate gratification.

Why devote myself to long-term, painstaking work when I can do something spectacular and everyone will praise me?

The need for gratification is the killer of motivation. Even leaders should be aware of the extent to which their subordinates are "addicted" to praise.

Change in motivation

If motivation is a feeling that drives me to achieve something, what if it changes? One day I am motivated to have a good relationship with my colleagues, and the next I am not. How stable are your motivators? We all have the right to change our minds and priorities, but if we change them constantly, how can we achieve long-term goals?

How much do your current emotions influence your long-term goals?

Motivation – the most overrated feeling

Motivation is extremely important for guiding each of us, but motivation alone cannot achieve goals. Motivation is what we want, but motivation does not do the work for us; we achieve goals through work, not motivation.

Motivation is overrated; too much time is spent on what we want to achieve instead of how we will get there step by step. Without a strategy and a plan, we drive ourselves with motivation only to give up on the work we have started when the motivation runs out. We confuse motivation with current desire/feeling and change it every quarter, or we confuse motivation with discipline and fail to understand that motivation is a feeling we have and discipline needs to be built up gradually.

How to work with motivation?

However, motivation can be worked with. Motivation is like a compass. It shows the way. Look inside yourself for the reason why you get up in the morning. What do you want on the most ordinary day? What do you really want when you have no other strong emotional influences?

Focus on the process, not the goal. Don't let yourself be motivated only by a distant reward that can be disrupted at any time; let yourself be motivated by daily progress toward a given goal. Let yourself be motivated to persevere. That is a feeling of fulfillment that you can nourish on a daily basis. Every day you can move one step closer, and if instead of focusing on how difficult and boring it is, you focus on how much closer you are, if you can motivate yourself by not giving up, if you learn to move forward regardless of how you feel, then you won't stop.

Motivation tells us what we want to achieve, but discipline gives us the tools to make our dreams come true.

Articles in this series

• Luck - anchor around your neck

• Talent - a common excuse

• Motivation – the most overrated feeling