What Motivate You?

Are you a master of procrastination? Failed to begin a new beneficial habit? Or can never stick to your new year resolution? Maybe you just haven't found the (right) motivation.

Lack of motivation - a common disease among this generation.

I am a born explorer. An ambitious young man who afraid of nothing. I eat challenges for breakfast then chew on some mental illnesses just for fun. I finished an impossible 8 hours deadline given to me at 10 pm. I came up with a revolutionary marketing idea (jk).

But I'm miserably, hopelessly incapable of finding a hobby?...

Here how it usually goes: I see someone doing something cool, very very cool. I want to learn it and make it a hobby of mine, one that would better myself as an individual. Sports, music, social activities, you name it, I tried it. I will take the first step seriously. Then I stumble upon some challenges. I struggle to keep up in a period of time then give up shortly after.

The embarrassing part is that the challenge isn't even that challenging, most of the time it is just a minor inconvenience but still it managed to put a stop to my entire hobby pursuit.

There is an actual gap between starting doing something and adopting it permanently into your life, a huge ass gap it is. Without immense focus fueled by motivation, you will never get to the other side.

Fails after fails, I keep pushing myself in the quest to find my new permanent beneficial hobby, one that I can stick to at least for a year or so. I learnt guitar, bought a camera, planned out a business idea, started a YouTube channel... And none of them stick. The motivation that I desperately need to get me through the gap disappeared half way through leaving me with my newly discovered problem: how to keep the fiery motivation burning.

I started to unironically googling and applying things that they told me to do to maintain my highly motivated state.

Check-listing is also an action that required motivation - Who could have guessed?

Here's some of the familiar one that I think we all heard:

- Plan things out carefully

- Take small steps first.

- Be consistent.

- Reward yourself for each successful section.

- Find a teacher.

- Be patience...

- Feel like giving up? Remember why you started.

- ...

If you are also a procrastinator, you know this won't work. Your lazy mind only allow you to do the bare minimum. And these, aren't bare minimum, so does adopting new hobby that will excite your life.

So I have stuck on this stage for ages until I realized. I like working out. Work out is not a must. People don't drop death because of the lack of working out. Nobody enjoys working out either, we just like its results. The thoughts of dragging your ass to a sweaty gym to perform repetitive body movement until you can't move is retarded and not enjoyable (at first). So how did I started AND keep on going. What was my motivation?

It wasn't exactly a what that motivated me. It was a who...

I vividly remember a girl I crushed long ago once said AND prove that men need to be strong... Fuzzy memory. But as a growing adult, I was focused. I exploded with motivation. Every time I got distracted, her face would pushed me right back in track.The fire kept burning for so long it burnt it way right into my core value. My brain rewrite my perception of likeness and working out turned from a "should do" to a "I like to do".

More often than not, you will lose track on your journey to pursuit something. "My plate is already full, it probably okay to give up this one hobby", you thought. You won't feel bad for giving up because you won't be disappointing anyone but your drunk future self. But if your motivation is a person, it suddenly matters now.

Find the one who by being alive alone are able to fuel you up with motivation, who make you do what you should do without even making you uncomfortable. It may sounds vague, but you'll know it when you see it. It may sounds cliches, but you won't find anyone more important to your life than this person.

MTFYE: Sport teams use cheerleaders as a personification of that school/city so that players have a real person to anchor their motivation to.

Quanny Nguyen

#motivation #my2cents